As much as I love to go out on the town, there’s just something amazing about spending a night in. As I get older, I’m really embracing doing fun things at home with my girlfriends, instead of going out. Today, I’m sharing my very favorite girl’s night in idea…and it involves wine AND cake. What’s not to love about that?
My girlfriends and I started doing what we call “cake and wine night” a little over three years ago. It’s my favorite tradition that we started and something I look forward to each and every month!
The whole idea came about when one of my friends decided to take it upon herself to come over to my house and bake me a birthday cake while we chatted. I had been going through a really rough time and she knew I wasn’t feeling up to leaving the house. So she did the next best thing…she came to me! It was seriously soooooo nice. I didn’t have to change out of my sweats, didn’t have to put makeup on, and didn’t have to worry about crowds, parking, or grabbing a bartender’s attention for a drink. We chatted, laughed, baked a cake, and drank wine. It was amazing.
After that night, both of us brought up how much fun it was to catch up while doing something we both loved…baking!
We started planning a new cake night once a month from that point on and haven’t looked back. We’ve added more friends to the mix and lots of wine too. 😉
About a week before our girl’s night in, we pick out a cake recipe that we want to try. A lot of them come from pins on Pinterest or online websites that we love. (The one that we made in this post is this delicious grapefruit poppy seed cake!)
We break the recipe down, split up the needed ingredients, and pick out something to snack on and sip for the evening too. Each one of the girls brings a few things that contribute to the overall recipe and/or food and wine for the evening. We snack, sip, and get to baking!
And then, once the cake is fully baked and decorated, we cut it up into sections and each one of the girls takes part of the cake home with them. It’s the perfect way to enjoy some cake without feeling like you have to eat the whole thing or waste it!
The type of wine we drink and the type of cake we bake changes each month depending on the season, our moods, and what flavors we’re craving.
Tip: If you’re having a few girl’s over, you can snag some larger 1.5 liter bottles of white and/or red wine from Costco for under $10! It’s actually really decent and a great price, especially when a group of girls can go through a few bottles each time. Also, for the record, I have become obsessed with the red wine sangria from Costco that we had for a cake and wine night a few months ago. If you haven’t tried it, RUN and grab some. It’s soooo good!
We usually end up spending most of the time talking and catching up, and less time baking, but we always manage to finish the cake! Although, it does seem to take a lot longer than a cake normally should and sometimes we end up a little tipsy. Ha!
But it’s great because we end up eating the cake and it doesn’t have to be perfect. Just delicious. (There was one instance where we actually threw a cake away because it was that bad. Haha. Hey, it happens. At least it was only for girl’s night!)
This girl’s night in idea could also work for a meal instead of a cake, or for fancy cocktails too, if you and your girlfriends are not into sweets!
It’s a great way to spend more girl time together, relaxing, switching things up and doing something different! And honestly, if cake’s involved, I’m there!
If you need a good cake recipe, I love this one and this one!
