From left to right: me, Deepa, Jessica, Brandi & Shannon
Last month, I hosted a baby shower for my good friend Jessica. Even though I've attended many baby showers, this was my first time to host one, so I thought I'd share how I pulled it off. Jessica didn't want a traditional shower. She wanted it to be co-ed & she wanted alcohol. Oh, and no games. She provided the guest list & the date & I took it from there. The first thing I did is start an inspiration board on Pinterest.
This was an easy way to keep track of all my ideas. I found lots of great examples of baby shower decor & food. I also immediately started shopping for invitations. I wanted an actual invitation that guests would receive in the mail, but I didn't want to spend a lot of money. My friend Alexis, baby shower hostess extraordinaire, turned me on to design templates. There are all of these templates online where you can email the designer your info, they plug it in, email you the jpeg & then you print the invitation yourself.
I found a bunch of designers on Etsy. I went with Designed by Jae Custom Creatives. I can't say enough great things about Jae. I'd use her again in a heartbeat. She immediately responded to all of my emails & even tweaked the design a little bit for me. It was so easy! And cheap! She emailed me the jpeg & I took it on a flash drive to Kinko's. They were ready the next day!
Since this was going to be a co-ed shower, I needed heartier food than you would typically find at a baby shower. Here is what I served:
Chips & salsa
Veggies with veggie dip
I highly recommend the ham & cheese sliders for your next party. People kind of lost their minds over them. For the drinks, I had non-alcoholic punch that could be "spiked" with champagne, champagne cocktails & a few different kinds of beer.
And then of course I had cake! Alexis, again, came to the rescue here. She has a good friend, Danielle, who designs cakes on the cheap. I had no idea what kind of cake I wanted. I emailed the invitation to Danielle for inspiration & she had the brilliant idea of matching the cake to the invitation. Done! She emailed me options, I picked one & then I had Jessica choose the flavor. So easy! I would definitely use Danielle again. It was kind of the cutest cake in the world. Everyone was super impressed. And the flavor! It was the best cake I've ever tasted. We went with a lemon cake with lemon curd filling & a mild buttercream frosting. Delish!
I hosted this shower by myself, but I had A LOT of help. Alexis helped me with planning & logistics. She also came over before the shower & took over so that I could get ready. My mom also came over the day of the shower & spent all morning cleaning my house to a degree of clean that it hasn't seen in the 3 years we've lived here. She also brought much needed extra seating. Lynn, Jessica's mom, helped a lot, too. We brainstormed over the phone & she brought a lot of necessities to the shower: punch bowl, veggies & veggie dip, beer, etc. Shannon, Jessica's sister-in-law to-be, helped tremendously. We emailed back & forth about what kind of drinks to serve. Shannon graciously took over that part. She found a punch recipe, brought the ingredients, made the punch & then re-filled it as necessary throughout the shower. It was a huge help. John even helped! The morning of the shower, he went & picked up the cake, got ice, got balloons to put on our mailbox, got Alexis & I lunch & cleaned up the yard. And he did all the post-party cleaning. Thank you all so much!!!
I love hosting & I loved hosting this shower for Jessica & Brian. I met Jessica in 2008 when we were both taking our first graduate class at TSU. We had to stand up & introduce ourselves & that's when I learned that we worked across the street from each other, which would come in handy when I quickly realized I bought the wrong book & would need to copy someone else's pronto. I spent that first semester walking across the street to borrow Jessica's book on a weekly basis & we became fast friends. We also both got engaged that first semester & then married between a week of each other. We hilariously honeymooned in the same place, too. From that point on, we were inseparable. We took all of our subsequent classes together & took turns convincing each other not to drop out. We also started running together. Jessica is who introduced me to East Nasty. She is also the originator of my favorite phrase, Go HAM. Jessica is a great friend & I know she'll be an even greater mom. Ben, you're one lucky little guy.
Full baby shower photostream here.