When I was pregnant with my son, my sister provided blank pieces of material to shower guests that they decorated. I then sewed them together and now have two amazing keepsake quilts (there were alot of people there!) from all my friends and family that love my son.
Since we already have just about all the baby items we need but are having a girl, a friend is throwing me a "sprinkle," which will be a much smaller affair (about 10-15 people), and I'd love to have something like that for baby girl. My sister made me a scrapbook with pages decorated for each month of his first year, and all I have to do is put in the pics. She is doing one for baby girl too.
So, I'm looking for ideas along these lines for the guests at my upcoming shower. I've seen things like decorating onesies, but that idea doesn't really appeal to me. It would be great if we could keep material cost and need for artistic talent low :0) Any and all thoughts/ideas are appreciated!
I think these are great ideas! I would also suggest to mail fabric, onesies, notes, diapers etc. to family members that cannot make the shower. This way, all family is included even if they live far away.
When my sister threw my shower she brought a package of diapers and some sharpie markers. Each guest wrote a saying on a diaper (or two) and signed their name. Most of them were hilarious! Then, after my daughter was born, every time I put her in a diaper that someone wrote on (I mixed them in with plain diapers so they'd be a surprise when I pulled one out), I'd take a picture of her in it, and email (or print & mail) the picture to the person who had written on it. The best was one from my aunt. She had written "when you poop in this diaper- please don't call me!". My daughter ended up having a TOTAL blowout (I think the worst one ever!) in that diaper and I took a picture of the poopy diaper with the writing on the front (no baby) and emailed it to her!!!! LOL! She thought it was hilarious and my cousin even called her mom and told her to forward the email!
Maybe you could provide cotton or satin ribbons. Go to the upholstery section of a fabric store and also look around. Have people write their favorite sayings, Or best wishes, or hopes for your baby and make sure they sign them. Then you could use these ribbons for different outfits or hair bows.. To decorate trims on pillows, curtains, blankets, towels..
a friend of mine received decorated picture frames for each major holiday of the year for the babies 1st year of life. She hung all these frames in the babies room and added the picture as the year went a long. The frames were all the same (small white 5x7) but the holiday decor was so cute. Maybe each guest could decorate a frame with cute scrapbooking embellishments. They even have wooded letters, or decals you can scrape on the frame for the label ex: "Hannah's 1st Valentine's day".
One idea that I loved for my baby shower.. was for everyone to brought their favorite children's book and wrote a message to me or to my son. So now everytime we read books I always read the inside cover message to let him know where the book came from and who gave it to him.
Congrats~
why not do the same thing but add extra "blank" squares of floral fabric, or have each guest bring 1 yard calico fabric of their choice & then sign their name to one square & leave the others blank or write a message
something fun I did for my children is I got 13 plain colored inexpensive 5X7 picture frames, & 13 mats for a 4X6 photo. Each month I took a picture of my baby with the theme (& wrote the month & theme on the mat - Jan, Happy New Years, etc). I now keep them on my wall going down to our playroom. the 13th frame is a place holder & says something like my child's name and the years of the pictures. Each month I display the current months photos, like right not I have June's photos in my living room.
You could have guest "paint" the frames or create the mats for these photos.
Hi A.,
We've made very simple baby quilt keepsakes at the last few baby "sprinkles" we've done. On of the co-hostesses was in charge of the project. She picked out a baby quilt kit to match the shower or nursery theme at JoAnn's (around $20 for the kit with all the fabric pieces and instructions, the only other thing she needed to buy was thread. We'd wait for a sale or use the 40% off coupon in the mailer or online, so we usually bought it for about $14 - $16). She would do the cutting and pin it together before the shower. Then at the shower each guest used a fabric pen to write a message or sign their name. Each guest was instructed to sew one seam (usually on the square they signed), the sewing machine was set up and the project cordinator stayed with the project encouraging and helping the guests, even guests with no sewing experience sewed. Then the project cordinator finished the quilt, the ladies that did this at the three showers had some sewing experience but weren't especially skilled, the kits were simple enough that the project was finished and we were able to get photos of the Mom with her finished quilt and she could take it home. The quilt could be finished after the shower though. This has been a special keepsake and I know that all 3 of the babies use their quilt.
Another keepsake we do at baby showers is the photo album. All the supplies are out on a table and each guest puts together 2 pages so that all mom has to do is add photos. Sounds like your sister has this one covered though.
Another idea I've heard of is to get ceramic Christmas Tree Ornaments and paints and have guests make "first Christmas Ornaments" for baby. This may be especially nice if baby is due anytime around Christmas.
Have a fun shower and congratulations. -K.
Hello, I don't have any suggestions for the showers, but I have framed one baby outfit from each of our kids as well as one of mine and one of my husband's. We have two boys and two girls. Therefore, I put my outfit and each of our daughters' outfits in one large frame, then my husband's and the two boys' in another. My daughter framed the outfit she brought her daughter home from the hospital in.
Good luck with your precious baby.
K. K.
Why not do the same thing? Maybe have guests paint with fabric paint instead of drawing with fabric pens. We just made my boys' kindergarten teacher a beautiful quilt made with all the kids handprints. Every kid chose a different thing to make using only their hands or feet and fingers etc. Google handprint quilts. We did a girraffe, american flag on a flag pole, tree, heart, fish, butterfly with hands, butterfly using the feet and a bunch of others. You could have your guests do that, even you, your son and daddy could make one. Print out a bunch of ideas and let your guests chose. Or even better, have everyone make a heart using their 2 hands. I have seen that too, it looks really nice and uniform with the same theme. That would keep your cost down too, by only having one color of paint. Chose the main color in her room. This way no one has to be artistic, just paint their hands and have them put them together in the shape of a heart and press on a precut fabric square. Make sure everyone writes their name, black fine tip fabric pen worked for us. Have extra fabric squares in case someone messes up. Good luck, let us know what you decide to do.
I found the links...
http://www.originalquilts.com/memory_gallery.htm
http://wildonionstudio.files.wordpress.com/2007/10/heart-...
Hi A.,
What about personalized notes to the baby? You could provide nice blank notecards (about 4x6) and have each person there write a note to the baby. You could then intersperse it into the scrapbook your sister is making. You and your husband could also write a note yourself. While it wasn't done at my shower, I kept all the congratulations e-mails and printed them out in one document and put it in my daughter's scrapbook. I think your daughter would enjoy reading this when she was older. This is a pretty inexpensive idea (cost of notecards and pens) too. Congratulations and have fun whatever you end up doing!
