[chookie83]

Hi everyone

My mum is looking to plan a baby shower for us - but i wasnt sure where to start (she has asked for some ideas / help)
Do you invite male partners? children?
Any ideas for games that areant too tacky?!
Has anyone written a 'baby shower gift list'? (listing some items you dont already have) And if so when and how do you give it out?
Are you meant to provide favours/gifts for guests?

Thank you to you all in advance

[Taffatups]

Hi everyone

My mum is looking to plan a baby shower for us - but i wasnt sure where to start (she has asked for some ideas / help)
Do you invite male partners? children?
Any ideas for games that areant too tacky?!
Has anyone written a 'baby shower gift list'? (listing some items you dont already have) And if so when and how do you give it out?
Are you meant to provide favours/gifts for guests?

Thank you to you all in advance

Male partners - generally not
Kids - depends on their age but I have beento a few with kids, maybe havea dvd ready and somewhere they canwatch it thats kid-proof and a bit separate
Games - google is great, there is a story-type one that is quite funny where you fill in the gaps
Gift list - my friend whose shower I was organising gave me the list and I forwarded it on to ppl who wanted ideas
Favours - none of the showers had these but they were all pretty low key events. We did have prizes for games that had a winner though

Hope it helps and have fun

[CarlieB]

I have my baby shower next weekend so have recently gone through trying to answer all these questions! As to males - I'm not into things being stereotypically 'girly' so initially really wanted to have men there, but I spoke to a few of them (including DP!) and they just aren't interested in baby stuff. I think it can still be done successfully, you would probably just need to make it more of a BBQ type thing or something.

I'm not having any games as I find them all tacky, but what I am doing is having a table set up with onesies and bibs and t-shirts of various baby sizes where guests can go and paint or add transfers, paint in stencils etc so we end up with a lot of clothes that our guests have personalised.

Gifts - I made the contentious move of creating a registry. I did it through a website - thankyou.com.au, where you can add all sorts of items that come from any shops. I was also quite clear on the home page that it was just if people wanted ideas and they didn't have to purchase any of those items if they had their own ideas. That may have backfired though as a week out only one item has been marked as purchased! I then included a small piece of paper with the invite that just said something like, for gift suggestions go to www.thankyou.com.au. However, for another shower that I was involved in organising our pregnant friend gave us a list and we sent it to people. My mother, who is technically 'organising' my shower, just isn't that organised though.

I'm still undecided on the gifts for guests. The last shower I went to gave out small gifts, but I'm not sure what I would give and as I don't have much time now and would need to do it myself, I think it will probably end up being left out.

[PrincessPeach]

At my friend's baby shower the few games she had was to guess how wide her belly was - done with wool & guess the number of jelly babies in the jar!

She too had a heap of singlets with fabric crayons - so everyone decorated these for her.

As for gifts, she just simply asked for childrens books.

There were a few kids there, but most were infants, as for partners, they were invited, but the boys that did come ended up down at the park with their dog & a football

[sara1212]

I think male partners is not good idea.

[Guest_Starletta_*]

I think favors are a nice idea. They don't have to be complicated or expensive but they are a cute personal touch

[dizzy-anne]

I think you should just do whatever is going to give you a fun day.

For me it looks like this:

My friend is hosting the party for DH and I
We are inviting our friends and family of both sexes
We are having a BBQ and drinks
We are not having baby games or particularly a baby theme - it's just a celebration

That's just the type of day I would enjoy - not everyone's cup of tea but I think that's the point. What would you enjoy?

[cboyd]

I have arranged a shower for a friend and invited male friends and kids. I actually got a good idea from a video I've seen online. I also set up a gift list suggestion on thankyou.com.au for her.

Perhaps this video will help. good luck!

http://www.5min.com/Video/Baby-Shower-Tips-252800724

[MrsWright]

When I helped host my friend's shower we had some games. There was guess the number of jelly babies in the jar, pass the parcel where the parcel was a teddy bear, the layers were baby clothes, the prizes were small sweets/cosmetics and you had to answer baby trivia to unwrap a layer (guest of honour got the teddy and clothes), a "guess the pregnant celebrity" slideshow where I blocked the faces out and a "match the celebrity baby name to the parents" thing. I think that's all we did. We didn't give out favours to guests but I think everyone went home with at least one prize from the games. We didn't have any males there nor kids for that matter, but I think it just depends on your guest list. My friend did up a list of gift ideas and gave it to me, so on the invitation I just said "I have a list of gift ideas, please let me know if you are interested" and some people were and others weren't. I also tried to get people to bring a favourite family recipe to create a recipe journal for her, but only one person did that

I think it depends on what kind of gathering you have, what's going to be fun for you, etc. No rules or anything - it doesn't have to be super girly, or have games, or presents. Whatever you like!