Baby Shower Roundup

I realize I have neglected to give an update on the baby shower I hosted last August for my best friend who had her second child and first son! After talking in various posts about ideas, here’s what I ended up with:

The tone all started once mama had Jack, because Carlie and her husband decided not to find out the gender until he arrived! So fun (I’m hoping Brian will go for this idea when we get there)!  Obviously blue it was… And the invites we decided on set the tone for everything else.

I chose Tiny Prints “Floating Away” invites:

And then the details started falling together. The biggest (literally) piece of decor were jumbo 36″ balloons. I think this made the room really feel festive and fun, and of course set the theme. I wasn’t aware of the lights being an issue beforehand, so we did what we could to get those balloons on the table. Also, I thought it was fun to decorate the honoree’s chair with various ribbons to set her apart and reserve her chair.

I mentioned before I always wanted a dessert buffet at my wedding but for 130 people it was just out of the question. Well, for 20 ladies, it was certainly doable! It wasn’t desserts, but it was a candy buffet. It acted as the ladies’ favors as they could bag up some treats and head home. I brought a lot of white serving pieces (cake stand, bowls vases, etc) to make it feel cohesive enough. If I had more people to provide candy to, I would’ve wanted to buy some apothecary jars and go all out on the table, but luckily for my budget that wasn’t called for.

The centerpiece of the table was a diaper cake I made (and showed off here with a different ribbon and stuffed animal). I placed it on a white Martha Stewart cake stand and used a stuffed animal that Carlie had registered for as the topper. I made some jumbo chocolate covered marshmallows, but with the valley’s summertime heat, the chocolate turned spotted. If you look closely you will see them because Carlie forced me to still serve them on the table since I dipped them all. Also, the bags for the candy were blue and yellow sacks from the dollar store that I cut down to an appropriate size.

I made cupcakes in a jar which saved me from buying dessert at the restaurant, and also saved the per slice cutting fee the restaurant was going to charge me if I brought a cake in.  I colored a butter cream frosting blue and used white cake mixes to keep it easy. Then I just layered two cupcakes with frosting in each mason jar, tied a ribbon on and slapped a sticker on top to cover the Mason jar logo. Super quick and easy, and a great way to include dessert and even use as a favor as they head out the door if you are serving a brunch or something where dessert seems more difficult to pull off. I think next time I will include a wooden spoon tied on with the ribbon.

Since I was hosting at a restaurant, I knew costs could get out of hand so I minimized the menu selection (and thus price of items available for guests to order) onto a cute and theme-oriented menu card. Also, I was uncertain of the table linens the restaurant would have so  I made a table runner. The shower was planned from afar and I had no idea of the table size or orientation, so I made three small runners and just placed them all together to form one long runner. This worked in case it was one long table or multiple smaller tables.

We didn’t have standard baby shower games except for having the guests fill out “Wishes for Jack” in the above photo and a Bingo card to fill out while Carlie opened gifts. This was a fun way to incorporate a game and a keepsake without taking time away from socializing, and since it was a second baby, I didn’t think games were really necessary.

The last touch was a “Welcome Jack” pennant banner. I didn’t think this was that essential, but I’m just tickled that Carlie loved it so much she hung it in Jack’s nursery

Baby Jack was perfectly content – seems that he enjoyed the shower too, because we didn’t hear a peep from him the entire time!

Overall, this was so much fun to plan and execute – I’m hoping Carlie will have Baby #3 so I can do it all over again