I spotted heart shaped plaques at my local craft store and thought they’d be perfect combined with wooden spools or candlesticks holders to make a set of mini cake stands for Valentine’s Day.

A lovely way to present a few special Valentine’s Day treats like decorative cakes, cookies, petit fours, chocolates, heart shaped meatloafs. Go crazy, people.

Making two or three or twenty in varying sizes, heights, and tones is really nice for presentation. I picked one large heart plaque and one small one, but my craft store had a few options in between too. I’d love to go back and make a couple more to add to the collection, experimenting with colors and decoration (ribbon! lace! painted polka dots! stripes!)

I couldn’t wait to finish the photo shoot to sample each of these petit fours I picked up from a local bakery. Valentine’s Day came early for me this year. Om nom nom.

Full tutorial for making these pretty Valentine’s Day cake plates after the jump!

I found these wooden heart plaques, spools, and candle stick at my local craft store. The plaques and candlestick were about $2.50 each, the spools $.99. So each cake plate came out to about $3.50 + paint.

I hot glued two spools together. You could build up more on top of these as well.

Then I hot glued the candlestick and the attached spools to each of the cake plates. Making sure they were centered so treats wouldn’t topple when standing.

Wait until the glue dries completely, which only takes a few minutes.

Find a well ventilated area to spray paint and go to town, making sure to do an even coat all the way around.

The light pink stand needed about 3 coats to cover it effectively. A non toxic paint would be a good idea too, although I think there are protective sprays to do a finish coat with (anyone know?) Found! By reader Melissa! Acrylic spray is the thing to get. Add ribbon or decorate as you wish.

Bake your heart shaped meatloaf and present with pride. PS Here’s a trick for heart shaped baking!