Baby Shower Help Please!

I probably would make my own invitations. Kinkos will make copies pretty cheap. You can buy paper with cute borders at Kinkos, Mardel's or a stationary store. Here is a website with different wording. http://www.invitingsmiles.com/baby-shower-invitation-word...
One baby shower that I went to had a really fun gift idea. They had a white onsie for every guest to decorate. They had different sponges (animals, letters, etc.) and paint colors and everyone that wanted to could make a onesie for the baby. You might consider buying different sized onesies if you go with this idea.
Have fun!

Cucumber sandwiches (cream cheese (will she eat dairy?) with a slice of cucumber on the small square bread you can find in the deli), hummus and veggies, egg salad sandwiches, chicken salad on mini croissants for those non-vegans,fruit tray. hope this helps.

Hi There!
My favorite that I've had and seen at baby showers is the following poem, that is printed on separate paper and inserted into the invitation. It urges the guest give their favorite children's book in lieu of a card. A GREAT idea for the mom to be to start a fantastic book collection for her new baby!

Here is the poem:

I want to be a bright child
As smart as I can be.
That is why I'm hoping
My mom will read to me.

If you plan to bring a card
Please take another look.
I would like to learn my ABC's
From your favorite storybook

Please sign your name
As your personal touch.
Baby (last name) thanks you
Beary, beary much.

OR replace the last paragraph with the following:

Please add your name and a note
Then I'll know you've done your part.
Some day I'll surely thank you
From the bottom of my little heart.

A couple other things coming to my head are pink and/or blue m&m's as favors, wrapped in toile or something. You can get m&m's in many colors at walmart.

A good, not embarrassing game is to get a collection of baby items and lay them all on a tray, ie: thermometer, bulb syring, gas drops, pacifiers, etc. Make sure you have several items, at least 15 or so and cover them up. Give them a time limit, paper and a pen and when you say, uncover the items and ask them to study the items for 1 minute. Once the minute is up, cover the items again and give them 3 minutes to recall as many items as they can in the alloted time. Whoever recalls the most, wins a small prize, ie: starbucks gift card, hand lotion, etc.

Hope that gives you a good start! Have fun!

For the most recent shower I did, we took our friend to a tea at the arboretum. It was beautiful. You could recreate something like that fairly easily. There were several "courses" including soup, salad, tea sandwiches, and desserts, and everything was bite-sized. No games necessary.

If you are set on doing something gamey, another thing we did at a different shower was we asked each guest to bring a photo of herself when she was a baby, then the photos were displayed and everyone had to guess whose picture was whose. It was interesting and it got conversation going.

It doesn't have to be fancy, or embarrassing! :) You don't have to have her open gifts in the presence of the guests, you don't even have to eat much.

Serving suggestions:
Fruit tray
Veggie tray
nuts & mint bowls
pretzels
creme puffs (sams or walmart has them in the frozen section)
chips and dip
cheese and crackers

Games
Baby word scramble
misspell words associated with a baby or pregnancy and have people unscramble them.

Never say "Baby": (Materials- baby safety pins or another type of baby object you can place on a string for each woman at the party as well as string or yarn, enough for each woman to wear as a necklace). Have each woman place the necklace with the baby safety pins around her neck when she gets to the party. The rules for this baby shower game are given out at the beginning of the baby shower that whenever someone says the word "baby" during the shower, any woman who calls it out gets a pin from the other woman who stated the word. At the end of the baby shower, the woman with the most pins wins a prize.

Guess The Gerber's: (Materials - Gerber's infant food, pads of paper and pens). Take the labels off of the baby food jars and have the women at the baby shower guess the food (carrots, peas, sweet potato). Most fun to play up to 10 jars of different kinds of foods. If there is a tie, blindfold the women and have them taste one of the jars and guess the right flavor to win their prize.

Guess How Many Safety Pins: (Materials- Safety Pins and Jar). Pass around a jar full of baby safety pins. The one who guesses the closest wins a baby shower prize. A baby shower game favorite!

You have received some great responses, but here is my two cents....If she is a vegan, she probably appreciates all things natural. I can understand her desire for no games. I felt the same and my bgf's granted my wish. Everyone had more time to just visit and hangout. For invitations you could go with a recycled paper invitation you can make on your computer at home. For favors keep it simple with a package of wildflower seeds, a tree seedling, individual dark chocolates (vegan friendly), or beeswax candles, etc., which can all be tied up or wrapped with a cotton or raffia paper ribbon. For food, you could have a buffet of different salads, i.e., fresh fruit, spinach with almonds and mandarin oranges, cold bean and rice salad, crabmeat salad, chopped salad with fresh veggies. All can be served with vinegarette dressings...no mayo, etc. For decorations again, you could keep in natural with just lots for small bouqets of fresh flowers, branches, etc. For dessert you could do a sorbet in wine/champagne glasses with a spash of sparkling water and fresh mint. Good luck, and remember to have fun!

I have assisted in throwing over 30 bridal and baby showers. We usually do a brunch and there have never been games at my showers. Everyone enjoyed the time visiting, watching presents be open and eating. One of my friends became a vegitarian while she was pregnant. She did still eat eggs and cheese. We served fruit and veggie trays, blueberry and banana nut muffins, egg casserole without added meat but loaded with viggies, and veggie role ups. It was a hit to all including the guest of honor. We have handed out cards before and asked everyone to right a note to the baby or give a word of advise to the mother to be. We have also asked for quick easy recipes to fix after the baby is born. All have been greatly apprecated. I hope this helps a little. p.s. you could always ask what she enjoys eating?

i second the no games plea! i hate games! give me food, time to hang out with the others, eat cake, and watch opening of presents...and i'm fine. add games and i'm making up reasons to leave. seriously.

as for the food, ask her what her boundaries are. i'm a vegetarian and am more flexible than other veggies. she may be very flexible or very rigid. likewise, she may not care if you have non-vegan food available. if you don't want to ask her, ask her hubby.

I am a vegetarian mom, so I can probably help you out with the food. I realize your friend is a vegan, but I can still offer suggestions. I have been a veggie since June 2001.
Fort Worth has one of the nation's best vegetarian restaurants (yes, ironically, in cow town). It is called Spiral Diner, and they could probably bake a vegan cake for the shower. Google the name and their website will come up.
As for food, it is not as hard as you think. For side dishes, I would serve Chips and salsa, Pita squares and Hummus, and Spinach Salad with strawberries/almonds and balsamic vinigarette (not sure if that was spelled correctly). For something more substantial, do a bean and rice dish (something simple, like black beans and cilantro lime rice) or add veggies (yellow rice, with bell peppers, cauliflower, broccoli, etc.); like a paella but without the meat or fish. I am from New Orleans, so I do a lot of red beans and rice and vegetarian gumbo. You could also grill vegetables and sliced sweet potatoes. Dark chocolate is usually vegan (check ingredient list), so you could have dark chocolate squares laid out for dessert, to go with the vegan cake.
Good luck!

One of my favorite baby shower ideas is the whole group makes a baby scrapbook for the mom to be. My friend did this and it turned out great. Depending on the size of the party, this worked well for 10-12 guests. The hostess(es) bought a scrapbook, pages, stickers and had all the scrapbooking things set up at tables. All the guests came and did a two fold spread to put into the scrapbook. By the time the party was done, all the mom to be had to do was put her pictures in the book once the baby was born. I am not a scrapbooker, but this was a very fun shower. IF you are not, maybe someone else you know is and can help you organize the pages. As far as food, she just had finger foods out like fresh fruit , chips, hummus and veggies, cheese and crackers. That way the guests just ate while they were working when they wanted to.

Hope that helps. Good luck!

Please, for the love of all that is holy, if she asked for no games, DON'T DO GAMES. Many of my friends feel the same way - we just don't like them. I'd rather talk baby stuff and have a nice time visiting than playing some silliness that just annoys me.

We did do a cool "blessing" thing at one of my friends - each person wrote out a prayer or blessing for the new baby and then read it out loud. Some of them had wise advice and some were just sweet. Lots of tears and sweet memories! They gathered all the cards up and put them on a ring so the mom could hold onto it.

You could do an afternoon tea pretty easily for a vegan diet - fruit, veggies, dip, finger sandwiches, etc.

Enjoy some girly time!

invitations: e-mail or preprinted information from hallmark
food: veg/fruit trays; www.marthastewart.com for ideas
have a large trash bag for discarded wrappings
paper plates/cups/plastic utensils
light instrumental music playing in the back ground...
maybe a photo of the parents as infants on display

I can't help with the vegan diet, but if you are looking for unique party favors I do a lot with Baby Showers. My role is to pamper the mom since the baby gets a lot of the gifts and attention. Remember, "When mom is happy, everyone is happy"
If you would like more help with gifts or a pampering session for all the guest at the shower I do a Mary Kay Bahama Mamas spa session for showers. This is where we all get to pamper our aching feet or we can simply do a hand treatment instead.
I would love to help if you need.
R.
____@____.com
www.marykay.com/rkuipers
###-###-####

I just hosted a shower for my sister who is having twins. If you will send me your email I will send you some of the pictures. Hopefully you can get some ideas. As far as the vegan diet. I would host it at an off time like 3:00. This way you can put out a few trays with fruit and veggies and be done food wise. Most people are not to hungry at this time as they have already eaten lunch and will probably have dinner after the shower.

My email is ____@____.com if you would like to see some pictures

Good Luck,
K.

Party favors could be as simple as baking cookies and putting them in cute bags tied up with ribbon. For decorations you could tie down groups of 3 balloons in your theme colors to baby bottles, pacifiers or lotion bottles and place around the room. Also, a nice flower arrangement from Sams or Costco makes a good centerpiece and the mom-to-be can take it home to enjoy after the shower. Another decorating idea is to take some twine and hang it up like a clothesline and hang up some little onesies, socks, hats, etc. Diaper cakes are also very popular for decorating as well as useful to the mom-to-be. You can google directions on how to make them. They're very easy and fun to do and you can get really creative with it. And here's a link to a game we played at two different showers and everyone loved it! It's not cheesy or silly at all. The website is http://baby-shower.yeahbaby.com/game.php?page=candy-bar-b.... We did a slight variation of this where we made the clues into a memory game and handed out the related candy to whoever got the match for that clue. Also, be sure someone there takes lots of pictures and you have someone to record all of the gifts for the mom as she opens them. Another nice gesture is to have thank you cards at the shower and have each guest fill out their address on the envelope to save the expectant mom some time. Enjoy the planning...baby showers are so much fun!

My sister threw a baby shower for me and I heard of a really neat idea that was a must for me. Everyone was to bring their favorite children's book to start a book collection (library) for the baby. It was great!! My sister made an invitation to look like a library card with the title of the book being "Great Expectations" and the due date as my due date, etc. Then she had a great poem explaining the whole idea on a small separate paper and attached it with a paper clip in the shape of footprints that she found. Everyone commented on what a cute invitation/idea it was.

I was the same way, in the sense that I didn't want any cheesy baby shower games. But the guests all wrote down on a piece of paper some advice or words of wisdom for the mom-to-be or baby. It was really cute and touching and I have kept all of them and plan to put them in a scrapbook eventually.

I can't help you with the food, because I am very much a carnivore and have no idea what a vegan would eat/like!!

Hope this helps a little!! Good luck!!

Vegan is all raw, no dairy or meat. But the other guests can probably eat anything or they will choose like at any party. Just be sure and include raw fruit trays and raw veggies and you will be fine.
One idea I saw at a shower I attended was cotton fabric blocks (any size from 6 1/2 inch to 12 1/2 inch) were pre cut for each guest. Then fabric pens and a hoop (3-4 hoops)to hold the fabric taunt were passed out for guests to sign and draw or put a saying or a blessing or a scripture from the Bible. Then a friend who quilts put them together and made her a quilt for the baby. Use 3-6 colors, all coordinating and this will really be a hit.
Pigma pens can be bought anywhere there is fabric or scrapbooking supplies. It is permanent and won't wash out.

If you need invitation help, I create custom invitations:

www.WorksofaWink.com

I create invitations to match the theme of your shower for no additional customization charge. I am local here in McKinney, and all of my work is printed from a professional lab (not from home). I would love to make something special for your niece.

Hello. I can't really help with the vegan food part but I can offer some help with favors. I make soap and I happen to have just done favors for a baby shower. They are guest size soap with little baby feet on them. If you know if it is a boy or a girl, you can customize the color. Or just do a neutral yellow. If you would like to see a picture of what I am talking about, please email me at ____@____.com. I offer these at $1.00 a piece with a discount for every 10 you buy. I also make lotions and such. You can see them here www.havenssweetscents.webs.com. The new mommy like something like that. Take care and have fun planning!

H. V.
H.'s Sweet Scents
Handmade Bath and Body Products
www.havenssweetscents.webs.com

i threw a wonderful baby shower with getting most everything from the walmart in highland village. they have a whole isle for baby showers and weddings. you could get cute inviations there too. and games, which are fun and not embarrassing to her. look online to make something for her but you have to think of the other guests too. i got a veggie tray and some dips from costco. i got a glass pitcher, filled it with water and cut up a lemon and an orange, placed those inside the pitcher and it looked so pretty. walmart is very affordable and they have a great selection. good luck and have fun. also is anyone interested in hosting with you? this way you could split the cost