My sister, Sarah, known in the blogoshpere as Scissorina, is having a baby. Any day now, in fact. Her due date just passed, leaving her three sisters in constant anticipation. It won't be long now before we have a brand new baby to kiss. Sarah's boy will be the first grandchild in the McNally family. Scott and I have been blessed with an abundance of nieces and nephews on his side, and we're god-parents to my best friend's three kids as well. Sadly for me, all of those sweet kids that I love so much are very far away. Since we moved to Texas there has been a serious lack of children in our life.
All of this will make this new little guy all the more special to me. Being the first McBaby and the first Texas baby, guarantees this kid some serious star power. I'm eagerly awaiting that first sniff of warm baby head, the first tickle of tiny baby toes, and the soul snuggling sensation of holding a precious new life in my arms. I love babies, a lot. Nothing compares to the feeling of hugging a kid that you love. It's like snuggling a million kittens all once.
So you can imagine that Sarah's baby shower was a real proper celebration. My Aunt Nan came all the way to Texas so that she could attend, which was a real treat. Our Dad's mother passed away when we were all really little. Her sister, our Aunt Nan, has taken great care of us over the years, loving my sisters and I with all her heart, and making us feel special to her. I think we would all agree that she is one of our most loved people. She has four grandkids of her own now, and she loves them to little tiny pieces too. They are lucky to have such an amazing person as their Grandma. Aunt Nan has an elastic heart. I'm pretty sure she could fit the whole world in there.
We share a love for things that are cute and pretty. She helped us with our flower arrangements. You can see some of her handiwork up there in the second photo. I took even more photos on Instagram. Check them out here, here and here.
We created plant-centric centerpieces too. Plain plant-pots were painted white and embellished with black lines to mimic birch bark. We filled the planters with dried moss, tiny forest plants, glitter birds, and itty-bitty mushrooms. The mushrooms were handmade too. We painted corks white, and covered styrafoam balls (cut in half) with polka dot fabric, then glued them together. Toothpicks were stuck in the bottom of the corks to secure them inside the pots. Presto!
The real magic happened on the dessert table. My Mom and little sister, Caity, whipped up a whole army of colorful cupcakes in a woodland theme. Paper birds and sugar flowers were placed on green frosting. Upside down white chocolate chips and red frosting made little toadstools, and Chinese noodles were paired with chocolate mushrooms on white buttercream. Heather, my other younger sister, created a super cute cupcake tower using white birch and blue striped paper.
Heather also made these incredibly cute acorn candies from Hersheys Kisses, mini Nutter Butters and mini peanut butter chips. What?! So cute! I put together a badass cheese-scape, and a fruit plate decorated with mushroom radishes. They were actually pretty hard to carve. I think I lost about 25% of the radishes while figuring out the technique. If you're brave, check out the tutorial here. I would suggest getting plenty of radishes to practice on.
The biggest hit of the party were the Robin's Egg Oreo Truffles Heather made. They were so pretty, especially after we nestled them in little nests around the buffet tables. Also, they tasted freaking amazing. I guess that's what happens when you mix cream cheese and oreos. Who knew?
Of course there were party games! We were unsatisfied with the suggestions we found online so devised a couple of our own instead. First, we played pin the handmade diaper on the baby. I drew a funny looking cartoon baby, then my sisters cut out a bunch of diapers from scrapbook paper. Add in a little double-sided tape, a blindfold, and viola! Now you have a great way to embarass and confuse your guests.
Our second game was a little weirder. We download a bunch of photos of Sarah and her hubby (and their dog, hehehe), printed them out, then cut them into strips, separating their hair, eyes, nose, and mouth. We armed the guests with glue sticks and paper, then let them build their own imaginary versions of the baby-to-be. The results ranged from hilarious to creepy. Sarah picked the best and worst (which seemed to be interchangable) and each won a prize.
I almost forgot to mention that we also played "Oops! My water broke!". We froze little plastic babies inside of ice cubes, then handed out drinks with them inside. The first baby to melt free from his cube won. Baby shower games are totally creeper-iffic, huh?
After prizes were presents! We asked the guests to bring books instead of cards. As a result, Sarah wound up with quite a library for her nursery. Our family is pretty much obsessed with books. Since we were all avid readers as kids, it was a lot of fun to search out our childhood favorites and gift them to Sarah. My crowning glory was locating a few Perlorian Cat books
Does this ring a bell? It's from the Perlorian Birthday Book.
Handmade gifts were also given in plenty. My Mom made a cross-stitched quilt with a pair of cute bunnies on it, and an amazing snail stuffed animal using a pattern from Amy Butler's Little Stitches for Little Ones
I stole these photos from Sarah's blog, Scissorina. On the left, you'll see my fox quilt, and my Mom's stuffed snail. The right side isn't actually baby shower related, but it was too cool to leave out. Sarah and her hubby, Steve, built this amazing toadstool for their nursery! Actually, their entire nursery is filled with adorable handmade and vintage details. If you are into that kind of thing you should really check out the nursery tour Sarah shared on her blog.
