Baby Shower

So this past Saturday (December 1st) my baby shower was held. It was so much fun to have a group of people come together to celebrate the life that will be coming into this world so soon. Even though my mom and sister were the hosts for the baby shower I did a lot of the planning since I don't have as many responsibilities to worry about as they did. It was so much fun to plan. When I was younger I used to be such a party planner, but as I've gotten older I haven't had as much time to plan events. For the baby shower I new right of the back that I wanted to have an owl theme since that it what Chloe's room will be, but to make it more festive instead of traditional colors you would think of for a baby shower or owl themed shower I decide to go with Christmas color (reds, greens, whites). I really like the way everything turned out. I wish some things I could have done more with, but there is only so much a pregnant person can do.

Leanna flew out to California a couple nights before the shower and then Brian and I drove down to my parents to pick her up so I could have her around the house on Friday to help me bake the different treats for us to eat at the baby shower. I am so so so glad that I had her around to help me. We were going to make a Berry Cake Roll and a Peppermint Cake Roll, but since neither of us felt confident enough to actually roll the cake we ended up using the same recipe, but then just cutting the cake so we could do layers. The other thing that we had fun making that day was the different flavored popcorns. River did not like the sound of the air popper. We made a Cajun popcorn (Brian wanted something more savory), a Caramel popcorn, and a Heavenly Hash popcorn. I wish I had thought to take pictures while we were baking all day, but it slipped my mind, which is probably good since my kitchen was a wonderful mess. It was funny to have Leanna in the kitchen baking with me since the kitchen is narrow and we both have our baby bumps so we kept bumping into each other and the counters.

Here are some photos of the decorations from the baby shower.

Banner that I made. I might shorten it now and put it up in her room somewhere.

The room where the shower was held. Nice big comfy seats.

The table with things for guests to do when they arrive and  we wait for others.

This was to give each guest an opportunity to write down their wishes for our baby girl. I am putting them all together into a book that I will keep for her.

This wasn't as popular as I thought it would be. We had sharpies for guests to write words of encouragement or a funny message on a diaper. I think some must have thought that what they wrote had to do with poop.....so only about 20 diapers were written on.

The favors that I made, and a sheet for guests to write their guesses for when the baby will arrive.

One of the many cute owl decorations that I made.

Balloons hanging from the ceiling.

 Here are pictures of the food that we served at the baby shower:

The more healthy food.

And the sweets. :)

These pinwheel cookies were fun to make, and luckily I could make the dough in advance and then just bake them a couple days in advance.

Closeup of the Peppermint Cake

Closeup of the Berry Cake

I was really happy with the turnout of guests, I wasn't sure what to expect since I have not been living in California for the past 4 years, but it was great to see people that I hadn't seen for awhile and celebrate the coming of our little girl. First we played "Baby Animals", the guests had to guess the name of what the baby is called for a particular animal, such as "kitten" for "cat" or "gosling" for "goose". It was funny to see how many people were stumped for some of the animals, I guess I made it a little too hard. The next game we played was "The Price is Right". It was funny to have Leanna walking around to show everyone the product because she kept accidentally flashing the actual retail price to some of the guests. Next we had everyone cut ribbon to the length they thought it would take to go around my belly. That was entertaining because as people were walking in they kept saying that I look small, but then many of them made the ribbon too long. But we had 3 people that were so close to matching the correct length that we ended up with a 3 way tie. Originally after playing that game we were going to play a game of "Guess the Baby Food", but because of the demographic of the crowd we decided to skip that so as to avoid having several unhappy older ladies in the room. It would have been fun, but I think it was a wise decision.

Instead of playing the last game we skipped straight to opening the gifts. Honestly I preferred the moments that we were playing to games over opening the presents since I hate being the center of attention, but it was so much fun to open all those presents and see the many cute outfits that I can dress Chloe in in the future. I am really grateful for all the gifts that we were given, they will help out so much. Now I have the fun  task of writing thank you notes. I should probably get on those before the baby arrives so I'm not overwhelmed with all the work. I had so much fun at the baby shower and I hope that those that came had fun as well. It would not have been as much fun if others had not come to show their love and support.

Here are some pictures of people during the shower.

Here's my lovely mother. I definitely appreciate her help.

Leanna cutting the ribbon to my belly.

High school friends

"I have a present for you!"

Flashback to colorguard days.

Not the best picture, but funny because we were joking that she was ready to pop with twins.

Planning baby showers is a little different than planning birthday parties, but now that I have planned one I know more of what to expect of future baby showers. It was so much fun. I can't believe that Chloe will be here in possibly less than 2 months now.