Julianna's mommy JoAnna has been a long-time client of mine. We first worked together many years ago on her wedding invitations. Since then, I've been lucky enough to create baby shower invitations, a birth announcement and birthday invitations for her oldest son. Her second baby is here and we're so happy to welcome her to the world!
I have changed their last name to protect privacy.
Welcome Julianna!
As if there weren't enough bicycles throughout the decor and printed items at Melissa and Patrick's wedding, we took it a step further with their baby shower, and even added a bike trailer.
We took the same two bicycles that I used on their wedding invitations and I added silhouettes of the two of them riding the bikes and a baby trailer. The result was a super fun design theme for their baby shower and gender reveal.
These were printed at their local Office Depot and they purchased Papaya envelopes from Paper Source.
For this baby shower, we had signs ALL over! First was a sign on the front door of the venue:
They had Burt's Bees lip balm as a party favor, so it made it fun to add the "what will it bee" schtick throughout, but without doing a full-on bumblebee theme.
Guests were encouraged to mark their guesses on the board for the gender of the baby. I guessed girl, but was really second-guessing myself. Even on a chalkboard that was printed on paper, it served well as a real chalkboard.
Guests were also encouraged to fill out a card leaving their wishes for baby. I LOVE these for a wonderful keepsake for both the parents and the baby.
Rather than have a guestbook, we did this thumbprint tree instead. This is the same tree I created for Patrick and Melissa's wedding, including the two bicycles leaning against the tree trunk. I flipped it around and added a tricycle and the Dr Seuss quote. It's one of my all-time favorite quotes:
Today you are you, and that's truer than true.
There is no one alive who is youer than you.
This was such a FUN sign to make. We looked up as many gender-predicting folk tales that we could find and asked Melissa to do all of them. I love the mix of results.
Melissa and Patrick created a series of games and deemed them the Baby Shower Olympics. Events included guessing a baby item by feel only, Blindfolded Diaper Changing, Pin the Sperm on the Egg, Bottle Chugging, and a test on the pregnancy duration for multiple animals.
Participants kept track of their own points with the scoresheets we created and the top three winners won a gold, silver, or bronze "medal" that Patrick made by glueing a bottle nipple to a medal and spraying it with metallic paint.
The mimosa bar just made the day that much more fun. By the way, POG mixed with champagne is a stellar combination (POG = passion fruit, orange and guava juice)!
This was such a fun and entertaining baby shower, and I really love how Patrick and Melissa made a huge effort to make it a fun event for both men and women among their friends and family. Just like their wedding, their baby shower was truly a reflection of their personalities. Congratulations!!
I've been lucky to be able to design a lot of fun items for this family, one of my favorite families. From their wedding to the birth announcement and birthday invitations of their oldest baby and now the announcement for their daughter!!
All of the names have been changed to protect privacy.
For the back, I made a photo collage similar to one I saw on Minted.com a while back. I loved the diagonal lines for everything. It made for a much more dynamic collage.
A heartfelt congratulations to this beautiful family!!
When my dear friend Cari was expecting her second baby, she wasn't thrilled with the concept have having a baby shower since it was her second baby. Instead she opted to have a sip n see.
Never heard of a sip n see? I hadn't either until recently. It's basically an open house that Mom and Dad host where friends and family come to meet the new baby and wish Mom and Dad well. They come by to enjoy a snack or a "sip" of something bubbly, and then go on their way, keeping the visit short. Gifts are not expected and there's rarely a registry involved. It's a tradition that I have been told is more common in the eastern United States and growing in popularity, especially when a family is welcoming their second or third (or more) baby.
Cari and her husband hosted their sip n see when their daughter was about one month old and we created a simple invitation for the occasion. I had some fun with my watercolors getting the right shades of purple to Cari's liking.
Their address has been changed to protect privacy.
Welcome to the world Emily!!!
My husband's family is Chinese and it's a Chinese tradition to celebrate when a baby turns one month old. This tradition dates back to when infant mortality rates were high and new moms would spend a month in postpartum confinement. At this one month birthday, mom rejoins the world and they announce the baby’s name to family and friends.
Red represents good luck and happiness. Eggs are symbols of fertility and renewal of life. Ginger is representative of the postpartum mama; an ingredient that’s beneficial for her postpartum recovery.
It’s also tradition to celebrate when a baby turns 100 days old. Since we live two states away from most of our friends and family, we chose to have Matthew's Red Egg & Ginger party closer to his 100 days birthday.
Here's the invitation I created:
I had originally created a simpler invitation. When I showed it to my husband he joked that I should create a cartoon of our son riding a horse (it's the Year of the Horse), holding a red egg and some ginger. It was too awesome of an idea to NOT do!
We invited about fifty of our friends and relatives to join us at a local restaurant for a traditional Chinese banquet. I created a centerpiece that was made from an 8.5x11 piece of card stock that I tri-folded and put information on each of the three panels. One panel listed the evening's menu, one listed the names of everyone sitting at that table, and the third panel briefly explained the history behind the shindig for our non-Chinese friends and family.
Since a Chinese banquet is serves family-style on a lazy Susan, these centerpieces were easily moved once the food started coming out.
Lastly, I created this fun favor tag that adorned red, plastic eggs that were filled with ginger candy. My older son loved having the responsibility of handing these out to guests.
It's often common to give dyed, hard-boiled eggs to guests, but neither my mother-in-law nor I wanted to boil and dye that many eggs. They never really end up truly red either, they usually end up pink.
If you'd like to see more from my son's Red Egg and Ginger party, check out the full post on Mama Say What?!
Lindsey's BFF Carrie contacted me thru Etsy wanting to customize a cootie catcher as an invitation for the baby shower she was helping plan. The shower was to have a travel theme with lots of maps and globes as part of the decor. Unfold and you can read the details for the shower.
Carrie folded each cootie catcher and then placed them into cupcake boxes to be mailed. I LOVE how these turned out!!
Nora's mommy, Laura wanted a non-traditional birth announcement for hey daughter (she already did a fun Top Gun movie poster for her older son). I was thrilled to get to play with this fun theme!
I love that pouty face!!
Welcome to the world Nora!!
Sara and Michael were welcoming their first baby with a fun baby shower shared with friends and family. Sara picked a color scheme and wanted the invitations to have a storybook/library feel to them. We immediately thought of the library pocket cards that used to be in library books and the ideas took off from there.
Funny enough, our kids will never know and understand what those library pockets were for!
The front of the invitation mimicked a page from a storybook.
Flipping the invitation over revealed a pocket and the faux library card. It included important dates in their history along with rsvp and registry information. I used the Plum card stock from Paper Source to make the pockets.
The back of the library card contained a map to the baby shower venue.
In lieu of address labels, I was able to rig my printer to print directly onto the white envelopes. The front lists some of Michael and Sara's favorite book titles.
I LOVE how these turned out! Congrats guys!!