Baby G’s Shower

It’s rain, rain, and more rain over here in Portland, Oregon!!!  The sun is TRYING to poke it’s head thru the clouds. In fact, WAIT!  I have to run out and grab that ray of sunshine right now!!!!

Ahh…I’m back! 🙂  Crazy Oregonians drop whatever they are doing in order to enjoy their outdoor time!  (or in this case, the Californian that doesn’t like to go out in the rain!) 🙂

SHOWER DECOR

With all these rain showers, it made me think back to the last baby shower I hosted.  Jenni over at A Well Crafted Party asked last week, “What was one of your favorite party details in the past?”   I immediately knew it was my gold, spray-painted animals.  Two and a half years ago, my girlfriend, Jessica, was pregnant with her Stella and I insisted we have a dinner to celebrate!  I instantly started thinking of ideas.  I don’t know where I came up with the the final theme but all of a sudden there was a color explosion of flowers and ribbons and polka dots in my head with the highlight being gold figurines!  More is MORE!  The challenge is on to make this all work!

(Isn’t he cute?!!!)

For months I popped into Goodwill and wandered antique fairs looking for fun whimsical figurines that screamed, “baby Stella” in my head.  My husband (and my kids) thought I was going to the old lady nuthouse with all the quirky things I came home with. Actually, my daughter proceeded to stake her claim on some of the finds when the party was over! 🙂  She’s a more-is-more kind of girl too! 😉

Once I found all my creatures, I put them in a box and started spray-painting away!  I have used a few products but I find I like the Rust-oleum Metallic Gold the best!  It’s not too yellow, not too brown, just right.

INVITATIONS

Next came the invitations, because every beautiful event begins with an invitation!!!  It sets the mood and makes the event feel 100% special.  2+ years ago I would have never sent an electronic invite for something special.  Actually…you want to know my trick for last minute invites?  I send a “save the date” via email as soon as I know the date and invite list and then I send a snail mail invitation. It’s the best of both worlds.

I really do like the electronic invitations, especially for the convenience of being able to see if the recipient actually got your invite, opened your invite, and then RSVP’d to your invite all in one location.  That, is an organized (or not so organized) party planners dream!!!  One less thing to follow up on, right?!!!  But, I have to say, there is a little southern girl in me that says there’s nothing better than a beautiful gift of a snail-mailed invitation.

THE TABLE

The shower was beautiful, just like the mommy-to-be.  We had the best time sipping and mingling and filling up a beautiful gift basket of gourmet baby goodies for her little Stella.

THE FAVOR

At each place-setting I made individual mason jars filled with pink-tinted sugar scrub.

“Sugar and spice make everything nice, that’s what little girls are made of!”

To customize them to the color-scheme of the party, I grabbed my handy dandy Rust-oleum Metallic Gold and sprayed the lids of the mason jars gold, wrapped a pink bow around the rim and stuck a custom sticker I made in Illustrator to the jar.

Here’s the recipe for an quick, easy and very girly favor:

Homemade Sugar Scrub

• baby wash
• baby oil
• sugar

In a bowl, combine 1/4 cup baby wash, 1/4 cup baby oil and 2 1/2 cups of sugar.  Add desired food coloring, stirring and adding more till you get the color you desire.  Divide among your mason jars, add desired details and gift away!

Original recipe from personalcreations.com

GUESTBOOK/GIFT

The final detail was the ‘guest book’.  With guest books, do you ever think, “What am I ever going to do with this?”  I love a documentation of who was at the party but I don’t always have a place for another, half-filled book.  What I love is making the guest sign something useful!  In this case, the theme of Stella’s room was going to be elephants.  So I painted a whimsical baby elephant that was going to be hanging from a “bouquet of balloons” but in place of the balloons were the guests’ fingerprint!  And not just their fingerprint…fingerprint times 2 to form a heart.  Cute, right?!!!  I had a card that everyone signed which I mounted on the back of the final framed piece and I gave it to Jessica later that month.  I loved how it turned out, don’t you?!

I hope y’all are surviving the winter showers and finding some LIGHT in your days (and memories)!

xo, Melissa