Baby Shower Planning

great gift ideas.... for every baby shower I go to, I make a diaper cake.... they are super useful because everything you put on it is something they will probably need (ie. diapers, onsies, hats, washclothes, toys, blankets, etc) they are always the hit of the party, and then I get TONS of people saying "we are trying for a baby, when we get pregnant will you make me one?" lol they are really great, and you can get as creative as you want!

Hi S.,
I have a unique and thoughtful gift idea that will work wonderfully for a baby shower. I create custom cast shadowboxes and statues out of baby hand and foot impressions. The casts are life-size and the details are amazing. Any mom would love to have a keepsake like this in her nursery. Please check out several examples at my website - www.weebabies.com You could get her a gift certificate on your own, or pool in with a few friends so she can get larger custom pieces. Also, friends can call and contribute towards her 'registry'. This is the one of those unique baby shower gifts that she can never forget and that she will keep forever. ###-###-####
T. - Artist/Owner Wee Babies

baby showers can be so much fun. When I had my baby shower ( & ones for cousins in the family) everyone young and old really loved playing a few small games during lunch. We played Baby shower bingo. We made our own cards, but now I see they sell them at Micheal's, we also did a game where everyone looks at a tray of baby items for just 10 seconds and has to write down what they saw on the tray. The person that got the most items correct gets a small prize. These games are great at home or at a nice rest. because they don't require a lot of moving around and don't take a lot of space. A great party favor or centerpiece that young and small always seem to love are cookie favors. ( Not to toot my own horn but I run my own cookie business from home and making personalized cookies for just such events. I'm also a listed on mamasource) My favorite gift for the mother to be is always meals. When I had my first baby a few ladies from my husbands office made us a weeks worth of meals and frozen them on divided plates so all we had to do was take them out and put them in the microwave. What a God send when you're up every 2 hours and sleep deprived its great!!!!! I usually do this and give a small keepsake gift to go along with it say a gift certificate to get the baby's picture done or a frame for the baby's first picture. I hope this info helps, best of luck! If I can be of any further help with anything please feel free to call. ###-###-####
Sincerely,
K. O'Connell
K.'s Sweet Creations LLC

Hello S.~

Wow the other moms have great Ideas thus far!!! But I just wanted to give you a gift Idea. My best friend threw my baby shower and I have to say that she tried to do everything as special and unique as she could. She had a guest book made for me ( http://www.guestbookstore.com/baby_shower.html ) I cannot tell you how much I LOVE this book. There are so many different pages in this book. There are pages for gifts received, a page for the invite to be glued in, pages for the guests to sign in, (then I took it with me to the hospital for the guests to sign in (and my mom logged gifts for me in it as well which was great because I had a c-section and I was pretty out of it but it was nice after the we were home to know who brought what to me in the hospital lol), then there are individual pages and each guest fills one out at the shower and I cannot tell you HOW MUCH FUN my husband and I had reading these after my shower then rereading it again a few months later when we had it in the living room after the hospital, and everyone who stopped by to see us once we were home with the baby read it as well and laughed too especially over the delivery prediction!! I know these books can be a little pricey but the meaning and love you feel from rereading it is totally immeasurable! I loved this book so much I designed one for my son’s baptism that I plan to pull out at his first communion and other religions milestones just to relive those special memories. If I ever get the chance to do another baby shower or am a guest at a good friends I will be giving this gift, I LOVE mine and truly treasure it to this day!

Have a fun shower!!!

Hi!

I was just going through some old boxes and found pics and other things from my shower. There was a piece of paper with all the comments that I had made while opening my gifts. I read over it and the memories made me smile. :-)

Whenever I go to a baby shower, I like to put together a little care package for mom. I include things that she may not think of ahead of time, but that will come in very handy. Here are some of the things I include: a baby thermometer, mucus extractor, infant Tylenol, a movie (Barnie, Wiggles, Dora), a cloth book (red, black and white since those are the first colors baby can see), and since she is a great friend you might check out the "Member Perks" section of this site to find a nice, personalized blankie (I think the site is www.snugglebunny.com).

Hope this helps! Luck!

C.

Put a little card in all of your invitations that say, "Please bring a pack of diapers (size newborn--3) to enter the diaper raffle."

Then hold a drawing with all people who brought diapers and award a prize or two.

Hi S.,

I design baby shower invitations and also do baby shower favors. I'm located in Boynton. If you're interested, email me and I'll send you my website link.

Just as a suggestion, I would first come up with a theme, then everything else just sort of falls into place. For example, my friend wanted to do monkeys as the theme, since that's what the baby's bedding had on it. So I designed an invitation that resembled the bedding. It has become one of my most popular invitations too! I also did matching candy favor tins in organza bags — they looked great. You can also take the invitation to Publix or any grocery store and they will do a design from that.

I also have a link on my site for a great baby shower gift. It's a monitoring device that goes off if you leave your baby/child in the car and walk away. It's not very expensive and you get a discount when ordering from my site. This is the best gift I think you can give anyone — something that could save their child's life!

I also have some good games I could share with you. Hope this helps.

L.

Hi S. I own a cake buss and make custom made cakes for all ocacions. If you need a different cake, not a grocery store cake. email me at Creative Cakes by ____@____.com. I can send you pictures of the cake I have done for baby showers

Thanks

This idea may or may not work, depending on you friends, but I planned a surprise baby shower for a group of tutors, and the theme for gifts and activities was Brainy Baby. I planned a Jeopardy quiz game with questions about babies and kids, and also a fun game where guests suggested names for the baby from a list of items such as named after a song, a famous actress, a goddess, a flower, a romantic place, a Biblical figure, etc. It would be fun to involve your girls, such as having them pass out pencils and papers, keep a list of gusts and gifts, etc. Another special thing you could do is have your guests bring baby pictures of themselves and have everyone guess who it is.

If she is a great friend I would have a professional make the food...simple I mean like a vendor you go out to eat at that you know she likes. Order a couple menu items that all will enjoy. Make a large salad and have drinks, wine, water etc out in ice etc. It makes it simple for you and you will find it is not that expensive. A local italian place we all loved did mine...

There are lots of sites that have ideas for games etc. Get saftey pins for each person coming in the door. Have them pin it on and if they say the word "baby" they have to give up the pin to the person who caught them. At the end, the person with the most gets a door prize. Just one example. Have prizes for the games etc.

You could also have out disposable cameras letting people know they can take pictures of the shower events, her, her gifts etc. Then have them developed for her and do a scrapbook that is a lasting memory she will always cherish.

Best of luck! All of this was done for me (and I did not want a shower!) It turned out so nice! I loved it all.

A. B

I own The Dinner A'Fare in Winter Park. We are a "meal assembly studio kitchen". What we do is help our customers...mostly busy moms....get a variety of quality, delicious, and nutritious dinners on their own dinner table - in a convenient and affordable way. The meals are planned, prepped and assembled in our kitchen (by you or by us), but cooked in yours!! Our gift certificates make the perfect gift for a new mom. We also have hosted several baby showers and they have always gotten great responses. You are welcome to visit our website for more information - or call or e-mail me also. www.dinnerafare.com ~ ____@____.com ~ ###-###-####.

Are you done with the baby shower..if not email me I have some great ideas for you?

D.
____@____.com

Hi S.,
These are some of my favorite ideas for baby showers:

1) Put a plain white (or whatever light color you like)tablecloth on an empty table. Leave a permanant marker on the table and have guests sign it like a guest book. You can make it a theme (i.e. advice for mom) or leave it open-ended. My favorite is open-ended and people can write whatever they want: major news events for the day, the weather that day, pieces of advice, simple well-wishes, celebrity births that day, etc. It's fun to collect thoughts or random facts about this moment in time, kinda like a written time capsule. Then you give the tablecloth to mom with instructions that she should use it every year on the baby's birthday (for the gift table or cake table or whatever). It's a very memorable, thoughtful, and CHEAP gift!

2) My favorite theme is A Bedtime Story baby shower.

Turn standard 6-ft banquet tables into "beds" using sheets, blankets, inexpensive duvet covers, and/or tablecloths in the style and colors of your choice! Use a white tablecloth to act as the bottom "sheet" once the bed is made, top it off with a pillow, stuffed animal, story book, and your place settings. You can have each guest bring a book and put them all in a big basket to give to mom. Display bedtime story books throughout the party using small display easels/plate stands. Create a "Milk and Cookies" dessert buffet with several different types of cookies and individually-sized milk bottles or cartons. Tie a straw to each bottle or carton with colorful ribbon. Party Favor Ideas: Small boxes of a "sleepy time" or bedtime themed tea paired with honey sticks and a gift tag that reads "Sweet Dreams, Little One" Or sleep Masks embellished with a bow and gift tag that reads "Sleep tight...don't let the bed bugs bite!" If you aren't tied to idea of traditional shower attire then you can even have guests come dressed in their PJ's!

3) If you aren't going to use a theme a unique party favor/thank you gift for each guest is a small potted herb: thyme. Buy (or spraypaint) pots so they are all the same color and use a pretty ribbon to attach a card that says something like: "It's almost thyme! Baby XXX is almost here! Thanks for helping us celebrate this wonderful event."

4) Playdoh baby game. I'm normally not a huge fan of games at showers but my friend did this and it was hilarious! Buy a bunch of Playdoh and the idea is that everyone (except mom) gets a certain amount of time (3 minutes) to build a baby. (At the shower I went to we did this in groups of 6 while everyone else at the party still got to mingle and eat so it wasn't like we had to stop the party to play a silly game.) When everyone is done all the babies are placed on a tray and mom picks her favorite. That person wins a prize. It's so funny to see what some of these creatures end up looking like!! It's quick, easy, very little clean up, and fun.

Hope you like some of these ideas. Have fun!!
~A.

A great gift would be to have nice gift basket of items to pamper her. Sometimes we put more focus on the baby, but mothers still need to pamper themselves.

You could put a gift basket together with a gift certificate for a preganacy massage, and some great personal care products.

If you would like check out some great products, contact me at ###-###-####.

Hi S.,

As far as some gift ideas go, here is a gift for her. I own BABY BOOT CAMP, a stroller fitness class for baby and mommie. I will donate 2 weeks free classes with no obligation at all. This is perfect for all babies because we are all moms in class. This is SUPER for moms so we can get out of the house, get fit, be with baby, and bond with other moms. You can check out my website- babybootcamp.com for South Florida classes or email me direct @ ____@____.com fit. Be strong. Be together. Baby Boot Camp. Sincerely, H. McBride

hello, a great idea for a baby shower would be to have
a Tea Baby shower party, Butterfly Dreams Theme Parties does them, they are really nice, I went to a tea wedding shower and everyone loved it and thought it was so nice and different.
For gifts, your guest goes where ever the new mom signed up and buys what she is asking for.
If you need any more info for the tea party contact
Butterfly Dreams at ###-###-#### or look at there website at
www.ButterflyDreamsParty.com to see some pictures of her different events and they can give you more info.
good luck

Hi S.,

Here is a link that shows you how to make a centerpiece out of diapers and other baby items that looks like a tiered cake.

http://www.plan-the-perfect-baby-shower.com/diaper-cake.html

When my mom did my baby shower she made one of these and everything in it came in handy later with the baby. Another idea was she had a scrap book and everyone who came wrote down "the best advice they had ever been given" about having - or taking care of a baby. Each person came up with one thing to put in. It was fun to read after the party was over.

Since my husband and I are theatre people, she came up with a little invitation / announcement in the shape of a babies shirt and she created that listed the "producers" (my husband and I) and herself as the "director" of the party. I have a copy in my daughter's baby book I can look at and give you more details about if you are interested.

Playing simple games is always fun. We always make the prizes baby gifts (rattles, teethers, etc.) everyone can choose to leave their gift for the mom to be, or if they have your children of their own keep them for their children.

Good luck and feel free to e-mail me if you have any questions. There are lots of sites that have ideas for party games - I just did a googlesearch for baby shower ideas and had lots of hits!

Have fun!

M.

I planned my sister's baby shower our theme was sesame street and our center pieces were bath products with the character faces as part of the cap-I think Johnsons and Johnsons makes them but not sure. The centerpieces were then placed in a basket for the mom to be. We also gave away inexpensive terracotta pots with a sesame street character glued on it and inside the pot we place a package of baby's breath seeds.

I LOVE Kelly O's idea about bringing meals frozen for later when she's sleep deprived and not wanting to cook. I usually shop from the registry the mom has created. That's because you never know what she's already got and what she just doesn't like.
If you buy diapers, go with a size 1, not newborn. The hospital will give them newborn size and I had a couple babies that were too big for that size anyway, or they grew out very quickly.
If she's the laid back kind of woman do a bbq lunch and have snacks and cake and just relax. If she wants the whole theme thing, go with that. Just keep in mind that this shower is to honor her and should be catered toward her own tastes.
One thing that would be sweet is if you were to make a mix cd of really sweet songs. Like What a Wonderful World, etc. Play it during the shower in the background and let her keep it. Keep all the songs kind of low-key or relaxing and she may just use that in the labor room.
A game I recently did was a big bowl filled with rice and those small plastic diaper pins or safety pins. Each person gets a blindfold and a bowl of their own and one minute to try and pick out, just by touch, as many pins as possible into their own bowl.

My baby shower was island themed and called "A Womb with a View" it was so cute. We had a cupcake "cake" that was frosted like a desert island in the ocean and everyone wore lays...lots of fun island themed things.
Also if she doesn't have Clouds & Stars Zip Sheets...they make an excellent gift
You can also bring a picture frame that has a matte in it and have all the babies "aunts" sign it and put messages of love on it, and put a picture of the baby in it to hang in the nursery.
Another things a friend did at a shower I was at was have a crossword to do while the mom-to-be was opening gifts. It kept people busy and not as "bored" sitting there for an hour while she opened gifts.