Shabby Chic Tea Baby Shower

I was honored to be able to plan and host a baby shower for my very best friend.  She is expecting her second little boy, so early in the planning we decided it would be a small intimate affair at a local garden restaurant. 

As guests sat down they were greeted with a packet. I found an adorable poem:

Inside the packet was a few games for the guests to play while we waited for lunch to arrive.  There was a celebrity baby matching game and a fill in the blank “mother” game.  Since we were not playing for prizes I included the answers at the back of the packet. The best part of the packet was the labor story mad lib game that I found.  The mom-to-be actually collected the stories at the end because they were so funny.

I knew that the tables would be small, so I made a small topiary for each table and limited the “extras” to a water bottle and favor.  We did bring our own tablecloths.  The ones at the restaurant are a fruit pattern that didn’t match my color scheme.

The water bottle labels were very simple and only said “Welcome Baby Ben”

The favors were little boxes that I cut out of kraft paper with my Cricut.  I attached a teacup to each favor and instructed guests to write their name on them to be used during the drawing for door prizes. The candy inside was a miniature Take 5 bar – the Mom-to-be’s favorite candy bar.

     

The shower was exactly what I had hoped for, a small quite affair that honored the Mom-to-be.  The best part was that there was very little clean up!  That is always my least favorite part of any shower.

Boo Bash - a Recap

Our Boo Bash was fantastic.  We had 22 kids plus parents attend and the party was rocking!
As guests entered I took their picture at the Photo area we had set up.

Then they were directed around back for some beverages and food inside.

  

After most of the guests arrived we started playing games with the kids

Pin the Nose on Jack (o' Lantern)

        
Cupcake/Treat Walk:

Spider Web Bulls Eye

Ring Around The Pumpkin

Bobbing For Apples:

The Candy Bar was a huge hit.  To keep it organized we divided the kids by age and let them “Trick or Treat” at the candy bar.

 

 

And some close up’s from the cupcake & treat table:

I loved how our candy corn tissue poms came out:

and the Ghost lanterns

The party was such a hit and I know the guests enjoyed themselves!

35th Birthday Party

I had hoped to be able to throw a fantastic birthday party for my husband's 35th birthday this year. He had never had a birthday as a child growing up, so I wanted his 35th to be special. I had it all planned in my head. A San Diego Charger's theme with a yellow and blue color scheme to match. I hired Sugar Mama Cakes to make him a lightening bolt cake. I asked our friend at HD Audio to set up his DJ equipment so that we had music. I planned a great menu of all his favorite foods (carne asada, faijtas, chile con queso dip, jalepeno popper dip and all the trimmings) I did not expect life to get in the way. His first birthday party ever was not what I thought it would be, but we had a wonderful time with the friends that were able to come and celebrate with us.  We had LOTS of cake left over, but I don’t think that is a problem when you have a chocolate cake with peanut butter filling.

 

Friends ... Vendors - It's all the same

I am SO very blessed to have a wonderful collection of VERY talented friends to help with our wedding. Since these friends have all been confirmed I thought I would share our Friendors (thanks for the word Mrs. Hummingbird)

First up - Invitations
In town there is a (not so small) scrapbooking store called Mementos. She has expanded a few times since I originally met her in 2004 and it is much more than just a scrapbooking store. The owner, Lisa is a wonderful and VERY creative woman. I can't wait to sit down and put together our amazing invitations. She is an Envelopments dealer so we will be using their product line. I did some work for Lisa creating her blog so we are bartering some of the price of my invitations. What an awesome deal!

Photography
The 1st time I got married my mom tried to convice me to use this photographer that she met in our hometown in Arizona. At the time I lived in Orange County and wanted "the finer things in life" and we ended up booking with a larger photography company in Southern Arizona and was NOT pleased with the service we paid for. When I moved back to Arizona we started having family pictures done by my mom's photographer, Bill Bulter. He was so much fun to work with. Here is a family picture from that session:


Since then he has done a few more family sessions, a grandkid session and has even photographed a few of my kids birthday parties. I love when he captures the "real" moments:



Because we are returning customers (and we refer a LOT of people to him) we were able to create the package that we wanted for a price in our budget. He will be with us all day and has even promised to capture a grand exit photo for us (a little more on that later). We will also get DVD's of the high res images that should be ready when we get back from our Familymoon.

DJ Services will be provided by a close friend. You saw his wife's baby shower before on the blog. (She was the kid's nanny for years, and now they are expecting their own bundle of joy any day.) D-man has such a great personality and since he really knows Mr. B and I we are not stressing about music at all. D-man and his pal B-Man are better known as FranzAnelli Audio Services and are just starting out. I had the pleasure of seeing them DJ a wedding in March and they did a wonderful job.



The kids and I with D-Man on his wedding day.

D-Man is not the only one from his family that will be a Friendor. His FIL (Father In Law) will be our officiant. I have known him since I was a teenager and Mr. B is very comfortable with him as well. He was ordained a year or so ago and has only done one other wedding, but I am confident that he will be able to give us the relaxed yet meaningful ceremony we want to have. We will meet more with him in the upcoming months.

{source} ignore the bad church directory photo LOL

His son has also agreed to perform our ceremony music. He is a very talented musician and he and his friend have performed at other ceremonies. I still have to get them a list of music but I am not worried. You can hear a sampling of his music on his MySpace page

with his sister on her wedding day

Hair & Make Up
I already mentioned that my friend and long time hair stylist will be doing my hair & make-up for the big day. She is coming to us, since her house is about 30 min from my parent's house. We will be doing a trial as it gets closer and I am SURE I will need your advice & opinions about my hair. What I didn't mention is that her mom is a florist and if my DIY flowers are not coming together when we get them in I can call on her for emergency help.

There are some other "Friendors" in the works as well and once they are confirmed I will share those with you as well. Are any of your friends doubling as vendors for the day?