On the Farm Baby Shower

My dear friend Joanna is about to hatch a little chick, so I threw her a baby shower on Saturday. While storks and pink can be sweet and cute, I wanted to do something a little different, but still childlike. So, where else to draw inspiration from than one of children’s favorite places — a farm!

It was a great success (if I may say so myself), despite the dark wind and rain kind of day. I’ve never had so many folks in my teeny house, but we stayed warm and dry, laughed a lot and had a grand time!

Our dear own Becky came over and took some pictures so we could share with y’all.

Becky -- good grief, she's so cute!

The invitations were from Swoozies. The started off the soiree sending a message of the farm theme.

Invites from Swoozies - possibly the greatest party store of all time!

Welcoming guests to “Come on in!” was a chalkboard easel propped up on bales of hay with the message that the door was open.

Come On In!

Then guests had to pin on a clothes pin and henceforth not say the word “b-a-b-y” for the remainder of the shower. If they said it, the first person to catch them could snatch the pin away and have it for herself! Our guest of honor, Jo, was somehow the winner (but I secretly think folks gave her a break… wink!)

Clothespins for games!

Our winner - the guest of honor herself, Joanna!

I’m sure most of you have seen this idea of hanging fabric for a mini-photo shoot with guests by now. Many weddings are doing this, but I just couldn’t resist this precious red and blue liberty print fabric, hung from a window… gives guests an excuse to pose away to remember the day!

Pretty fabric, pretty guests, camera available - the rest is easy!

Pretty girls and a handsome boy!

I begged or borrowed much of the cute decoration from folks. My boss whose house is like a warehouse of entertaining treats contributed tons of goodies to display! You’ll see many quilts, made by her too.

Playing another fun shower game - fill-in-the-blanks nursery rhymes. Like a baby mad libs... you'd be amazed at what folks came up with! Hilarious!

The napkins were simply classic print bandanas and we bought simple paper plates and red plastic forks. (Fewer dishes to clean-up makes the end of the party so much more enjoyable for the hostesses!)

Fresh flowers were everywhere – sunflowers, daisies, Delphinium, Hypericum, curly willow!

Nothing says country to me, like big, yellow sunflowers.

Daisies are the friendliest flower. Don’t you think?

I simply ordered green-grass cupcakes from Publix, then placed them around a classic tin Fisher Price farm with dollhouse picket fence surrounding.

Cupcakes make the green green grass that hold the flowers

that surround the farm.

The menu consisted of biscuits with apple butter, chicken tenders (in honor of little “Nugget” – the real guest of honor), oatmeal raisin cookies, devilled eggs, cheese and crackers, a veggie tray, popped corn on the cob, — good down on the farm food.

Carmel popped corn on the cob, veggies and other yummy food.

Beautiful and patient, co-host enjoying the yummy biscuits.

Drinks went into large buckets, and extra flare was added with my

cowboy boots and yard tools.

We had a couple of kiddies join the party, so I stashed away some kids books, toys, and craft supplies from my teaching days in our sunroom, along with rice krispie treats, and their own mini-fridge full of drinks to keep the younger revelers busy while moms played games and watched Joanna open prezzies!

Hours of entertainment for the kiddies - crafts!

Books to keep the kiddies occupied...

... while Jo opened her presents!

While I searched high and low at every Hobby Lobby/Garden Ridge/Party City for decorations everywhere, these scrapbook pages actually came from Wal-Mart in the Martha Stewart collection. Guests signed the pages, and decorated with stickers. We’ll paste pictures on the blanks for a scrapbook for our soon-to-be mommy to remember her day.

Bandana scrapbook paper - from the queen, Martha Stewart, collection. Guests wrote a sweet message to Jo and Nugget to include in a picture scrapbook of their day!

For favors, cut circles of pretty liberty-print fabric and topped jars of jams with a little string of twine.

Do me a favor?

Don’t forget to download a playlist full of bluegrass, your favorite country tunes, even a lullaby or two in there!

Friends!

Most importantly, Nugget recieved lots of cute (and useful) things!

Gifts!

Joanna and Ginger

Feel free to steal this idea. It would be cute for any party – birthday, shower, just for fun… I definitely had some inspiration from a few of my favorite blogs.

I’m sure you all know about Party Perfect. It’s an endless source of fantastic party ideas. Be careful, you’ll start planning continuous parties as soon as you visit. I also love and adore the Farm Chicks, so I perused their entire blog while making my decoration list and got lots of creative sparks. And while I know she insists that a ranch is different, this city girl doesn’t know too much difference between a ranch and a farm, so there were definitely touches of my idol, the Pioneer Woman – inspiration for yummy recipes (I just got the new cookbook for Christmas – from myself), and you saw the boots tucked in the corner over there. And my personal favorite part of the party I get to keep – the flower on my shirt is from a newly discovered obsession, Emersonmade. Check them out too!

Me - by the food table, of course! (Sporting my Emersonmade flower!)

Thanks for reading about our day! It was a good ol’ time!

About these ads