OK TROOPERS! This is LONG overdue. Our nephew is almost a month old, and we had this a month before he was born. So you do the math. ;)
Oh, and strap on your seatbelts because there are about a million photos with this post. So it's a long one!
Since A) my sister knows everyone on the planet and B) we sent out 50-ish invitations, we decided we'd have her shower in our church's social room instead of at someone's house. The bigger benefit to this was one person was not expected/inconvenienced with cleaning and being sure their house was pristine. :)
We decided to go with cupcakes instead of an actual cake for a few reasons. 1) cupcakes are better portion control. 2) I wanted an activity, and I'd been at a party where cupcake decorating was the activity, and I thought it would be fun.
Our friend (we should really call her cousin, but she's not *technically* a relative) offered to make the cupcakes. In two flavors! :) Vanilla bean + chocolate. The DAAARK chocolate. Just like I like.
She also brought several kinds of icing: peanut butter, vanilla and chocolate.
Let me just say the chocolate cupcakes with the peanut butter icing is truly the best dessert I've ever eaten IN MY LIFE. The end.
Left is the cupcake table all set up. Right is gifts, but we'll get to that.
You might notice on the tables that there are balloons (we'll get to that later, too!). They're tied to bottles. And you might think "not really classy" ... but know what? I am into functional decor. Since it was a baby shower, we got some baby shampoo and lotion and stuff that Robin could actually USE, then tied balloons to it. So when the shower was all over, she'd be able to take it home and it wouldn't collect dust.
Food table. Just light snacks. And may I say I LOVE the lemonade container? I'd love to find one of my own, but keep scouting for the best deal!
Ok, so there WAS some confetti. But it was left over from a shower Robin's college friends threw for her. So we were reusing it.
The welcome table. With Grandma Carol (left) and Grandma Judy (right). Judy isn't *technically* our grandmother. She came into our house and was our nanny, but she has no children of her own, so she's calling Baby Theo her grandson. :)
An overall of the seating/visiting area. I love how everything came out! I knew I wanted to make the little flags with "Baby Laws" on it .... and use balloons. But I wasn't sure how we'd situate everything. I think it came together nicely.
(If you look closely, you can see that I tied a string between the two tables - behind Robin's chair - and then tied the balloon strings onto it. I just used different lengths of string to get different heights).
Gift table.
More gift table.
My mom loves making fruit kabobs.
Blanket on the left was (I think) made by someone in Leoti. Blanket on the right was in works by Grandma Judy.
This was from Grandma Carol (Chris' Mom). And I think it's really adorable. Since Chris' dad is working on his EMT certifications and such, they made an "emergency" cell phone for the baby's room. I don't have the exact language they used, but it was something along the lines of "GRANDPARENT PHONE: In case of emergency, break glass." It was really cute.
More phone (left). On the right is a bib + spoon. Even though we didn't know baby's gender, there was a fair amount of aviation stuff in the gift pile.
Gifts.
More gifts (note the clothes pins, something else we'll talk about later).
MORE gifts.
This one is a little silly. I think someone nabbed this from Robin's room at my parents' house and wrapped it up as a bit of a gag gift.
You can catch a glimpse of Auntie Theresa and Grandma Carol!
This is sort of cute. :)
Jourdan (left) and Jennifer (right) assist.
What I really loved about this shower is that it really seemed like a team effort. On some invites, it says "hosted by blah, blah, blah." I didn't do that for a very good reason. Because SO many people helped. I did invites, decor and planning. Mom did food. Kristine helped out with decor and food presentation. Marie did all things cupcakes. And Jordan and Jennifer pitched in and helped with the gift stuff (writing down names so Robin could write thank you notes).
I really liked that this shower was a community effort. :)
Purple for K-State. If your name is Chris and you're reading this, notice how there's nothing orange for Oklahoma State. ;)
Not sure what it is, but I guess she liked it. ;)
Like I said, a bit of an aviation theme going.
Overall while people are mingling.
Overall during gifts (notice the HIGH ceiling. I have a story to share in a minute about this).
I couldn't resist creeping behind the balloon curtain to take a quick photo. :)
And because I'm silly, here's robin hiding in the balloons.
Robin with the grandmas. Our mom is on the left, and Chris' mom is on the right.
Our mom, "Momma Judy," Robin, Chris' mom.
The dynamic duo. :)
This is a little fun. I was wandering around a craft store, trying to come up with ideas. And since Robin and I shun pretty much all shower games, I came up with this. When people came in, they could choose a blue or pink stone and drop it in the glass ... to vote on if they thought Baby Laws was a boy or a girl. The boy vote was slightly higher than the girl vote, but not by much.
You might recognize these glasses ... I used them for our formal tea party to put in loose tea leaves ... love using what we already have!
Yes, we all know Robin was the mommy. I'm a bit of a dork, but I love nametags. I just want to say it was a complete coincidence that the font on the nametag was the same as the font on the invitation. It was TRULY a happy accident. But seriously ... with 30+ people at the shower, there were people from every walk of Robin's life there, and I'm more comfortable talking with someone if I know their name. Not because I feel badly, but because I will pay attention to what they're saying, instead of spending my mental energy trying to come up with their name. If that makes sense.
A last few notes here. Bear with me all. This is a monster post and if you've made it this far, you're probably my sister. I bet everyone else quit after 8 photos. ;)
But here are my notes.
1) Balloons. I'm not sure why, but I was determined to have balloons at the shower. I went to get them, and initially thought 2 dozen would do it. But then I thought "GO BIG OR GO HOME!!!!" So I ordered 3 dozen.
Now, balloons aren't like flowers. That is to say they aren't an easy fit into the car. I mushed and pushed and FINALLY was able to get all 3 dozen balloons into the car. But let me tell you, it was NOT easy. And it was NOT easy driving down Rock Road, basically unable to see out of the back or sides of my car. I didn't feel really safe, and my lesson for the future with balloons is to take a bigger vehicle.
2) Balloons and high ceiling. Well, I was tying the balloons behind the chair (because I wanted a nice backdrop for anyone wanting to take pictures of Robin opening gifts). And I thought I lost a balloon. But I didn't look too closely. Then once Kristine arrived, I looked up, and there was a balloon. All the way at the top of the 20-ish foot ceiling.
Shoot. Big shoot.
Luckily for me, they had long ribbons on them. Maybe 4-5 feet long. But not long enough. So I stood on top of the gift table (remember, there were no gifts on it at that point). And did a quantum jump off of the table, made a mad swing to try to grab the ribbon and at the same time thought "I hope I don't land on that chair, because I'll break my body" ... and know what? On the FIRST try, I caught the ribbon. Yeah, I could never do it again if I was paid, but it was a herculean feat and I feel pretty bad-ass about it.
3) Greeting table. Where we had the name tags + vote on baby's gender. Also on that table was envelopes. Now, I'm not sure if everyone does this at showers, but at ones I throw or attend, I try to do this. I have the envelopes for the thank you cards right there and have people put their address on a card on the way in. This is my lazy way of getting around addressing envelopes after the shower. Just write the thank you and add a stamp! Yes, I'm lazy, but with more than 30 notes to write, it was SUCH a time saver for Robin.
4) Clothespins. Ok, I think I mentioned above that Robin and I basically shun shower games. Seriously, who wants to look at a mushed up chocolate bar in a baby diaper and identify it? NOT ME!
I don't remember where I heard or read this, but I knew there was a clothespin game for a baby shower. I looked it up on the Internet, and there are several variations. But the one we used was simple. Here's the rule: Once the game starts, if you say the word "Baby" and someone catches you, you get to take their clothespin. The game starts with everyone getting 3, and at the end, the one with the most wins.
It sounds silly, but not saying "baby" at a baby shower ain't easy. Robin was REEEALLY good at it. Until it came gift time. And with "baby" on about everything, she lost all of her pins pretty quickly!
