Kelly's Baby Shower

Four days before Seth arrived, I helped to throw a baby shower for my sweet friend, Kelly.  She and her husband, JP, are expecting their first child in the middle of May, and since Kelly is not a big nursery theme person and does love girly things, we decided to go with a girly-girl, pretty-in-pink shower.  

I found a beautiful invitation online, and my friend Kylie used it as a guide for creating the perfect tone-setting invitation for friends and family.

We did everything in pink and brown, mostly because baby Reagan's bedding will be pink and brown (and maybe partly because I craved Neopolitan ice cream during my pregnancy??).  ;-)

I ordered different sized paper lanterns online for a really great price, and we hung them over the counter to add texture and visual interest.

Kylie and a few other friends made some delicious food, and I made food tents and little flags to tie in our colors.

My friend Emily was charged with making the cake, and it was divine to look at AND eat!!  I found a pastel layer cake on Martha Stewart that I thought would be perfect in shades of pink, and Emily absolutely outdid herself.  I think hers is one of the prettiest and yummiest "white" cakes I have ever eaten.

Emily used the leftover cake batter to make a belly cake just for Kelly.  It was almost too cute to eat (look at the tiny footprint on the belly!!), so Kelly decided to freeze it and eat it on Reagan's birth day.  Perfect.

We made "Princess Punch" to go with the cake, and it was really good.  It looks so foamy in the picture compared to the recipe online, but it tasted wonderful.

In lieu of a shower game, we had guests each make a hair bow for baby Reagan.  Emily and I covered alligator clips with grosgrain ribbon and left bows, rhinestones, buttons, hot glue, and simple instructions for guests.

My favorite part of the decor was a giant tutu table skirt.  It took tons of tulle and several hours to make, but I think it was worth it.  It looked almost ethereal with the sunlight streaming through it.

 

Plus, it made a lovely skirt for a glowing mom-to-be.  :-)

For favors we gave everyone a chocolate chip cookie mix.  We used baggies to save money (two dozen mason jars were too much for the budget), and I tied simple instructions on with a pink ribbon.  Hopefully everyone appreciated a useful and delicious favor!

This shower was a great way to stay busy right up until Seth's arrival.  Now it's time for Seth to meet his little playmate!  :-)

Baby Shower / Dinner Party

I believe that God gives us different friends at different seasons in life for different reasons.  Some friends help you to laugh at yourself, others walk a few steps ahead of you in marriage or parenting, and still others are great shopping buddies.  In my experience, it is rare to find a friend who knows you intimately, cares deeply about your feelings, your family, and your dreams, and is there for you to celebrate victories, grieve losses, and bring meals when you're sick.  These friends anticipate your needs, work hard to make you smile, and call to check up on you when they sense something is off.  Usually they share your world view and values and help to encourage you to seek God daily.  These friends are priceless treasures.

This past Saturday night, some of my treasured friends helped to throw me a baby shower / celebration.  It was a night I won't ever forget.  It was an intimate dinner party for about ten people (mostly my church community group), and the point was not to shower the baby with gifts as much as to celebrate our new little blessing and pray for him and our family.  It was one of those events that could have been just be dinner and gifts, but it was so much more.

My dear friends Hope and Kylie worked really hard to make the night special, meaningful, and memorable for me.  Hope used photocopies of my nursery fabrics and some of my childhood photos to make an awesome decoration for the kitchen island (the nursery is yellow, gray, black and white).  She also planned a craft that was really fun.  We used photocopied fabrics from my nursery to make scrabble tile necklaces with scripture references on the back.  Later, the scripture on the back of each necklace was prayed over the baby by the person who had chosen it.

When I told Hope, "You didn't have to do all of this!  I'm just honored that people would gather to celebrate our baby!" her response was, "I know, but this seems to be your love language and how you love others best, so we wanted to make you feel loved, too."  So, so thoughtful.

My favorite part of the night besides praying for the baby was when Hope showed this video, which was a surprise to me:

What a keepsake!  The video so perfectly captures my kids at this stage in their lives as they prepare for their baby brother, and I am so thankful that I will always have this to show to our youngest and to remind me of how excited Brennan and Cora were to love on him.

The food on Saturday was amazingly good, and my friend Emily made a divine strawberry cake (one of my favorites!) that was possibly the most delicious cake I've ever had in my life.  I could have eaten half of it by myself.  (For real.)

I got lots of great diapers, wipes, pacifiers, and pajamas for the baby, and I am so thankful for how much money this will save us in the upcoming months!  My most meaningful gift was from Hope.  It was three of the scripture verses we prayed for the baby, written out on vellum and framed with some of my nursery fabric behind it.  It is beautiful on many levels, and it will look perfect in the baby's room.

I am incredibly grateful for the friends God has given me at each stage in my life.  It is good to know that our kids will have other adults to look up to and learn from, and Jim and I will have lots of emotional support and extra hands when we need them.  I am so blessed.  Each day we are a step closer to being ready to meet this little guy!

Myla's Baby Shower

On Saturday I went to two baby showers.  Babies are cropping up everywhere this spring, and it makes me eager to have another one.  (But then I look at my exhausted, achy, nine-months-pregnant friends and think about the stress of caring for three little people and realize that it would be best for everyone if we wait a while.)  The morning shower was for my friend Rachel, and the decorations were so cute I just had to share!

Everything was done in pink and gray, and it was all so classy and elegant.  The food made up most of the decor, and it was just perfect.

There were Hershey kisses, M & Ms, marshmallows (including pink heart ones... how convenient that Valentine's Day just passed), chocolate dipped pretzels, strawberry cupcakes, and, my favorite, little glass jars of milk with pink and white paper straws.

 

There was a wishing tree, and it is one of the best ones I've seen because it had very specific prompts like "I hope you ignore... I hope you become... I hope you learn..."  I really hate being told to just write a general note.  I never know what profound or witty thing to say. 

Here is a picture of me with Katie from Takeoff with Katie.  We both loved all of the cutesy, girly things so much!  Katie and I coordinated before the shower so she could make a few specific, sweet things for Myla's nursery.  (Katie is a great artist!)  I am heading over to Rachel's today with the hopes of completing the nursery, and my plan is to share photos of Katie's sweet gifts and other nursery photos tomorrow.  (Fingers crossed!)

Have a happy Wednesday!

Sharing the Love

Love was in the air on the Monday before Valentine's Day.  In the morning I was invited to Brennan's Sweetheart Sockhop at school (say that five times fast!), which was a dance for all of the four-year-old students and their mommies.  We were told to wear our fanciest socks so we could dance in them to the oldies. 

It was such a sweet, memorable time.  Brennan just oozed happiness at having me there to dance with him, and we both forgot about everyone else in the room as we "danced" to song after song (it was really more like swaying and jumping than dancing).  By the second or third song every child in the room had abandoned his or her mommy to dance with other kids, and the moms were all chatting with each other on the sidelines.  I kept telling Brennan he could go dance with other kids, but he just said, "No, I only want you, Mommy." 

We drank root beer floats (well, Brennan ate plain vanilla ice cream and I had a root beer float), and Brennan wanted to take a picture of me with mine. 

Brennan made me a corsage out of coffee filters that he brought to me when his class first arrived in the room.  Later, when I asked him how he made it, he said, "We painted them.  But I didn't get to pick my colors.  I had to use what they gave me."  I told him that I happened to love pink and purple.  He asked, "How much do you love them?" 

"A lot," I answered. 

He said, "No, show me!" 

So I stretched my arms out wide and said, "This much!" 

Then he responded with the sweetest words ever.  He said, "Wow!  That's a lot!  But that's not as much as I love you, Mommy." 

Such simple words made me feel like the most important mommy in the building.  It filled my heart and put a lump in my throat.

That same night we had a joint celebration for two couples in our community group who are expecting new babies.  Since they are both second children, one is a boy and one is a girl, and it was so close to Valentine's Day, I decided to tie in Valentine's Day and go with a simple "Baby Love" theme. 

All of the guests were asked to bring diapers and wipes for the families.  This kept the men from having to ooh and ah over onesies and hair bows, and it allowed guests to choose how much to spend on two different gifts without feeling weird.  Plus, I asked people not to put their names on the gifts, so the moms didn't have to write individual thank you notes.

We made the babies their first valentines, and there was a prize for the most creative ones.  The winner, our friend JP, actually disassembled a pen to make a pop-up card!!

We had a whoopie pie station with a sign that said, "Let's Make Whoopie! (Pies)"  It might be a little much for a church group, but if any group can handle it, it's ours.  Everyone seemed to get a real kick out of it.

 

I enjoy Valentine's Day more now as a mom than I ever did before I had kids.  There is something so special about paper hearts and polka dotted socks when you're a child, and there is something wonderful about letting everyone know how much you love them.  When you take away the romantic pressure and just focus on loving others and having fun, it's an awesome made-up holiday!  :-)

Did you do anything special for Valentine's Day?