We’re in the final countdown for baby arrival over here. Last month, I was able to get back to the great state of Texas to visit with family and friends where the awesome Rebekah Epstein (you know, the super chick that runs this blog and Glamptrepreneur) threw my Texas-themed baby shower.
When I arrived back in Florida, my stellar USMC family made my Pool Party Baby Shower dreams come true.
So without further ado, here are the details for your pinning pleasure…or whatever.
A Texas Shower for Maximilian Dallas
Decor Details:
The mantel was the main focus of the theme.
Banner: I cut some leftover burlap that I had lying around into pendants and painted my baby’s name on it. I sewed the burlap pieces to a strip of blue fabric to complete the bunting. Voila! A cheap and easy banner.
Mason Jars: Again, I used leftovers from previous projects – this time it was mason jars. I painted all the jars completely white first, then used tape and stencils to get my Texas flag look. We filled the rest of the clear empty mason jars with red, white and blue glass beads and put fake bluebonnets in them to spruce the place up a bit.
Boot painting: Pure luck. My mom painted this back in college and I completely forgot that it would be there hanging above the mantel.
Sonogram pictures: My mom took my first sonogram picture out to a field of bluebonnets during wildflower season so that the baby would have a picture in bluebonnets. It’s a Texan thing.
Food Details:
– BBQ is an excellent choice for any occasion, if you ask me. Picking up BBQ catering means you get all the fixin’s, plenty to go around and it’s hard to go wrong with BBQ in Texas. Bekah picked all this up from PoK-e-Jo’s in Austin. This spread included: beef brisket, turkey brisket, sausage, mac & cheese, potato salad, and sweet tea of course.
– I was so excited about the paisley bandana table cloth she found at Party City.
I used a cowboy-themed border for this sign to tie it into the grand theme of things.
Supplies: Blank onesies, sponge brushes, fabric paint, cardboard cut to place inside onesie whiile painting, stencils, water cups and plates for paint palates
The final products from all of the guests.
Guests playing “Who Knows Mommy Best”
Activities
I’m not one for shower games, really, so Bekah incorporated crafts into my shower and short games that don’t require embarrassing acts or gross-guessing stuff.
Design a Onesie: The hit of the shower. Everyone loved painting their own onesie for baby Max. We used it as a away to give out prizes too – cutest design wins. Tips: 1) Bekah didn’t buy any newborn sizes – babies rarely stay newborn sized for very long and in my family history not many of us even came out newborn-sized (gigantic babies: file that away in one of my current pregnancy anxieties). 2) I found cheap fabric paint at Tuesday Morning.
Who Knows Mommy Best: (Click for the PDF Download of the cowboy themed activity I made) This was an easy game that was fun for me to explain why I chose my answers. I made a list of 20-or-so characteristics with two columns for party-goers to choose either “Mom” or “Dad” next to each feature depending on which one they would guess that I prefer for baby to inherit that feature from. Person who guesses closest to my preferences wins. Takes like 5 min.
Baby’s First Portrait: (Not Pictured) This takes less than a minute. Pass out index cards and pens to each guest. Their instructions are to draw a picture of what they think baby will look like…the trick is they can’t look at what they’re drawing. Have them hold the card on their forehead and draw blindly. Momma’s favorite portrait wins.
Prizes: I grabbed some Texas-shaped cookie cutters from HEB, wrapped them in bandana with twine – BAM – super cute Texas prizes. (Again, I forgot to get a picture of this.)
Texas shaped cookies for gift bags: Texas, Longhorn, Cactus
To send-off guests with the Texas theme, I found rustic looking tags for the gift bags, stuck baby blue stickers to them and wrote “Thanks, y’all!”
The finished gift bags.
Parting Gifts: My largest labor of love in the baby shower was making the Thank You gifts with my mom. Baking and icing cookie cutouts are not for the faint of heart. They look and taste awesome though!
Pool Party Baby Shower
Next up, the fantabulous Mallory Morris (you remember her, right?) incorporated my favorite summertime activity into my Florida baby shower: swimming. Growing awkward belly be damned! It’s effing hot outside and all I ever want to do is be in the water or at the beach!
Like I mentioned above, I’m not big on games, so this was all about chilling out next the pool with refreshments and great company. As military spouses, this was great timing because it’s time for several us to PCS again, so it was perfect to see everyone in the same place one last time!
Here, I’ll let the pictures show all the great little details she thought of to pull-off the pool party baby shower:
Mallory used balloons as bubble decoration in the pool.
Soooo, I had this vision of getting a picture of my big ol’ belly floatin’ around in a tube the pool…but once I was actually able to climb into the tube, keeping my belly cute and round and looking serene wasn’t as easy to achieve as I thought…Mostly I’m trying to stop laughing here and keep my limbs afloat so I don’t look “dead.”
There were cute little baby shower themed rubber ducks all over the place!
Ducks on the wrappers, ducks as cupcake toppers….so…many…ducks!
Don’t forget the sunscreen! Cute display for protecting yourself from the sun’s harmful rays.
Ducks floatin’ in the drinks. Also – a grass table skirt for some added decor.
Sweedish Fish
The food was served from sand buckets and fishbowls.
Goldfish served from a fishbowl!
Snacks ready to be served.
This was a game simply for my own amusement – the goal is to just come up with as many names as possible for…ahem…boy parts. Keep it classy, ladies…
It was such a treat to have friends and family shower me with love and gifts for my first baby!
What shower themes are ideal for you?
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