Patriotic Red Velvet Cupcakes

For the Memorial Day dessert table, one of the things I made were Patriotic Red Velvet Cupcakes.  Now y'all know me well enough to know that 1) I went to Pinterest for ideas & 2) I totally used boxed cake mix.  : )  My inspiration was these cupcakes from Good Housekeeping & these fruit tarts from the Food Network. 

So here are my red velvet cupcakes with cream cheese icing (of course).  : )  And here are the cupcakes all dressed up like the American flag.  

I only made 24 cupcakes & I think the flag would have looked more legit had I made more, but I didn't have enough cake mix & my crate was actually the perfect size for only 24 cupcakes...so we made do.  I switched around where the strawberry cupcakes were vs. the plain iced ones a couple of times & finally decided on this look.  For the blueberry cupcakes, I just stuck a bunch of them on top of the iced cupcakes.  For the strawberry cupcakes, I sliced them almost all the way through but left them completely attached at the top of the strawberry, so I could fan them out & cover the entire cupcake.  I am not the biggest fan of blueberries, but I did try the strawberry topped cupcakes & they were delicious.  Strawberries & blueberries are so easy to decorate with for patriotic holidays & you can then count your dessert as a fruit in the food group discussion, right? : )