A Very Sweet Baby Shower

My sister in law Jessica is expecting her first little baby girl and our family is RIDICULOUSLY excited to meet the newest member!  My little brother is gonna be a DADDY!  Isn’t that crazy?!  It’s like when you realize that you are the same age that your parents were when you thought “dude they are old”.  It’s one of those moments.  But a whole lot sweeter because a new squishy baby is on the way with that soft hair and the dimply hands and the smell…oh the smell!

So it was only right that my little sister and I throw her a baby shower to celebrate Jessica and their bundle of joy!

We decided the date and then we poured over every single baby shower invitation known to man.  In the end, we chose this one from Shutterfly because it matched some pink, green and yellow tablecloths that I had on hand.  I actually used these same tablecloths for another baby shower many many years ago and since then they have been my go-to-coverings for Easter.

With the color scheme picked and the invites ordered, Norn and I divided up the responsibilities and got to work.  That is why I love throwing a shower with someone else – it helps manage the workload and keeps the cost down.  For decorations, we took all the cues from the invitation.  The plaid pastel tablecloths with grocery store mixed flowers did the trick.

We also used grocery store greenery and baby’s breath for this welcome board that we had at the front door.  We placed the chalkboard on the front porch and it looked so pretty with the matching polka dot fabric and spray of greenery.  Since we used the basement for the actual event, it helped people identify that indeed they were at the right house!

For the walls I wanted to add polka dots (like our invite) so I decided to grab a bunch of white, pink and yellow paper plates from the Dollar Tree and just used a loop of tape to stick them randomly to the wall.

I spent about ten bucks on the plates but in the end, we still get to use them so yeah – best ten buck decorations ever.  Also – I had allotted an hour to get this ready and it only took me about fifteen minutes for the table decor and the plates on all the walls!

The only other decoration we had was a diaper cake that I made with leftover size 3’s and Dollar Tree blooms.  This was my first ever diaper cake and I learned SO much about them.  Maybe I can do a tutorial if you were interested?

The cake we put on the gift table and all the presents were SO sweet….girls clothing is amazingly precious!  Half of the items, I literally wanted in my size 🙂

For the menu, we chose items that were finger-food approved.  We wanted to offer plates and silverware but keep with the casual feel!  My sister was in charge of the fruit salad, the veggies with dip and the pinwheels (she did all the hard stuff!) and I made some cheese trays and picked up those nuggets like a champion.  And when I say “I” I mean, I sent Jeremy to do it 🙂

Neither Nornie or I had ever made punch before!  We both started throwing stuff in that bowl and it was AMAZING.  In the end, it was about half a carton of Raspberry Sherbet, 1/3 of a container of orange juice and most of a 2 liter of sprite.  As the sherbet melted, it got more and more delicious.  Seriously get-in-my-belly nectar!  Some of the ladies got smaller glasses and had to pop to the full size with refills….SUCCESS!

For dessert, we did a big tower of glazed donuts and chocolate chip cookies (Jessica’s favorite!).

My mom asked if she could bring stuff so were assigned her the cookies and to make Jessica’s corsage.  Thanks mom!

As folks arrived, we had two things for them to do….first, sign the most adorable book known to man-kind.

And then head over to the bow-making station to make the baby-on-the-way a bow!

 

My sister gets full credit for coming up with all the doodads and flowers and feathers and bands.  She even had them sorted by size so that the Hughes baby would get everything from newborn to bigger bows!  Jessica is modeling the flapper bow 🙂

Here is a picture of just SOME of the bows that were made!  So fun, right?!

We had a special seat for Jessica during the gift-opening portion (I got the chair years ago at Goodwill) and we played a version of gift-bingo.  Every one had to write their first name down vertically on a piece of paper and whatever she opened could earn you a letter depending on what it started with.  So in my case, I wrote K – A – T – I – E on my paper and if she opened a thermometer, then I got to write in the T spot with Thermometer.  Whoever got their whole name first, won!  It actually was hilarious and fun because vowels are HARD!

The adorable mama-to-be with all her goodies…

And one with the soon-to-be grandmas  – they already have grandkids but this one is special because this is the youngest daughter and youngest son both having their first (I made them little corsages quickly with extra flowers and washi tape!)…

And Nornie and I got a photo too!  We actually got a picture of Jessica with each guest so I am gonna make her a little book of all the photos 🙂

And yes, this might be our first picture ever where Jessica is the one with the bun in the oven and not ME!  Although I did warn her that I am totally stealing that baby just so I can dress her up and take a bazillion photos 🙂

So that is our recent party!  What was your favorite part?  Mine was the plate wall!  It shocked me how cute it turned out and how simple and easy and fast it really was.

And I made some pin images for you!

 

Jessica and Tim came back over the next day to have me take some maternity photos and of course, STUNNING.  Can’t wait to share some of those with you!  And if you are the mood to see some more baby shower recaps – I got those!  Here are some of my favorites :

• Irish Baby Shower
• Woodland Themed Baby Shower
• Lemon & Lime & Lily Baby Shower
• Teacher Themed Baby Shower