Planning a Baby Shower? Here are some creative ideas that will wow your guests!...

Penny_Whize · 18 September 2013 at 9:50AM

Ok so I have just joined this group and some super people have supplied me with very helpful advice and so I would like to try my upmost to pay it forward with the thing that I am best at – creative ideas!

A couple of years ago a friend of mine was hosting a baby shower for her sister and invited me along for the celebration. I asked if I could be of any assistance in brainstorming some ideas for the buffet to which she was extremely grateful for in knowing just how creative and thrifty I can be…I half wondered what I got myself into but I dothrive on a good challenge!

So here is what I came up with and I promise you WILL amaze your friends and family all at a low cost…

A buffet plays a large role in most house parties and celebrations so make sure you have a large table or your kitchen work top free to lay out your fabulous food.

This next part is important – label cards! They can be as pretty or as plain as you like and it only takes a small piece of thin card to allow you to be as imaginative as you like and will create the most magnificent of reactions!

I’m certain by now you are dying to know how a piece of card can do all that….and here is how (you can use as many or as few of my ideas as you like depending on what you can get your hands on and your budget):

For your buffet you will want to theme your food and label cards to the celebration. In this case it is a Baby Shower. Why not try:

A bowl of marshmallows with a label card reading: ‘Cotton Wool Balls’
A plate of mini doughnut rings with a label card reading: ‘Teething Rings’
A plate of biscuits with a label card reading: ‘Adult Rusks’
A bowl of milk bottles with a label card reading: ‘Formula Bottles’
A bowl of gummy teeth with a label card reading: ‘For: The Tooth Fairy’
A bowl of chocolate money with a label card reading: ‘From: The Tooth Fairy’
A plate of Kit-Kats with a label card reading: ‘Have A Break’
A bowl of chocolate buttons with a label card reading: ‘Cute As A Button’
A bowl of gummy dummies with label card reading: ‘Dummies’ or ‘Pacifiers’
If you can get your hands on gummy dummies (I think there are some in the Haribo varieties) – you could pop some edible strawberry show laces through the middle and tie a knot at the end (so it forms a sort of edible necklace and pendant) and buy bags of sherbet (stick a label on the bag reading ‘Edible Talcum Powder’) – pop them in a plastic party bag (the cheapy kind you get for kids parties) a sliver of cake, a lollipop, a box of Tic Tacs with a label that reads ‘Rattle’ and a party sized bag of Jelly Babies – hey presto – your guests have baby themed party favours to leave with

Amongst the above you are going to want a collection of savoury foods so here are some further ideas:

A bowl of cocktail sausages with a label card reading: ‘What you find in a nappy’ (if you think people will see the funny side and aren’t easily put off! :eek: )
A plate of pigs in blankets with a label card reading: ‘Pigs in Blankies’
A plate of McCain Smiles with a label card reading: ‘Captured Smiles’
A bowl of crisps with a label card reading: ‘A Bundle of McCoy’
A bowl of salad with a label card reading: ‘Off-Spring Onion Salad’
A bowl of baby new potatoes with a label card reading: ‘Baby New-Born Potatoes’
A plate of pork pies with a label card reading: ‘Cutie Pies’
A plate of cherry tomatoes with a label card reading: ‘Ball Pitt’

Finger sandwiches could include:
‘Ovary Mayonnaise’ (Egg Mayonnaise)
‘Cute-cumber & Soft Cheese’ (Cucumber and Soft Cheese)
‘Ham & Tickle’ (Ham and Pickle)
‘Tuna & “How Sweet”-corn’ (Tuna and Sweetcorn)
‘Squeeze & Onion’ (Cheese and Onion)
Plate them up separately and if you can get your hands on some sticky labels you could flag them around a toothpick, write their funny fillings on (…and the actual filling underneath in case people are uncertain) and pop them into one of the finger sandwiches for each separate filling.

For the desserts you could serve:
A plate of cupcakes with a label card that reads: ‘Buns from the Oven’ …and if you are making them yourself you could mix a nude colour buttercream and palette knife the mixture on top of the bun , pop chocolate chips for the eyes and stick a real dummy where the mouth would be – SIMPLE! :j

You might also want to serve beverages amongst your fun food – a great idea is to toast the Mother to be with a glass of Baby Cham and as a non-alcoholic alternative for the Mother to be – Schloer or similar.
Another fantastic idea is to put non-alcoholic punch in the middle of the table with small rubber ducks floating on top!

It also might be a good idea to pop some wet wipes at the end of the table for people to clean their hands down with afterward – it’s also in keeping with the theme.

You might want to make the table look extra inviting with some table confetti, I think a great alternative to this is to scatter Smarties or Skittles and bring lots of rainbow colour to your table!

If you have lots of time on your hands and the patience of a saint you could attempt to make your own mobiles hung from the ceiling with pictures of the Mother to be hanging. You could also string up your own homemade bunting – how pretty!

There is so much you can do with regards to entertainment, think of anything playful but keep in with the theme of the celebration.

Some ideas could be:

Pin the dummy on the baby! – this game speaks for itself

You could provide name tags for everyone attending but give them a word relating to the themed party such as ‘Placenta’ – everybody then has to call each other by their name card, if you fail to do so, the person who’s name you said instead of the name on their name card collects your name card…the person with the most cards by the end of the day wins the game. It’s a variation of the ‘don’t say baby’ game.

You could ask everyone attending the party to bring a photocopied baby photo of themselves to give to the host. The host then numbers each picture and tacks them to the wall. Assign each guest with a piece of paper to guess which numbered baby picture belongs to which grown up. If the guests don’t know each other very well, name tags can help the process.

For those amongst the crowd that have a strong stomach – why not play the food guessing game…only this food will be blended like baby food! Blind fold your victim and spoon feed them the concoction…it’s even worth throwing in a “HERE COMES THE AEROPLANE!” – ya know… just so they know it’s coming

Bob for nipples! – Very much similar to the bobbing for apples game. Fill a large bucket with water and pop baby bottle nipples in. Have your guests take it in turns on a time limit of who can fish out the most using just their teeth. Hilarious! :rotfl:

Set up a Baby themed Trivia, split your guests up into as many groups as you like. Get them to make up a baby themed team name and write the team names down on a notepad to keep score. In order to answer the questions, instead of using a buzzer, each group must shout whatever funny phrase has been assigned to them such as “MY WATER BROKE!” or “PASS ME THE GHERKINS!” …questions could include. Q: In what famous movie would you hear this quote… “I ate his liver with some fava beans and a nice Chianti” A: Silence of the Lambs. Q: From which Nursery Rhyme would you find this line… “To fetch a pale of water” A: Jack and Jill.

The Dirty Diaper Name Tag Game: This is great idea not only for your guests to know who each other are but a hidden prize game that everyone is unaware of. For every guest attending, cut out a paper name tag in the shape of a diaper but make sure it is can be doubled up when folded in half. Fix a safety pin to the reverse side with a piece of tape and use a glue stick or staple to seal the opening end. Before sealing them all, draw a line in one with a brown felt tip pen, you might want to stick a small cutting from a sticky label to draw on so the felt pen doesn’t ‘seep’ through the paper and give it away. Mix up the badges so even you don’t know where the dirty diaper name tag is! Write the guests name on each diaper and hand them to the guests as they arrive. At some stage during the shower, ask your guests to ‘open’ their diaper tags to find who has the dirty diaper tag amongst them, the winner receives a bit of a prize. A great prize to give them and is inexpensive to make is something I like to call ‘poo cake’ …melt chocolate and mix with Madeira cake until pliable and mould into the shape of a poo to set in the fridge. If you want to make it even more gross – pop some unsalted crushed nuts in!

If you arewanting to play a few of these games or ones of your own but are on a bit of a tight budget for buying so many prizes, you could always buy cheapy novelty prizes or you could buy one nice prize for the overall winner with the most points at the end of the shower.

Well I hope this has been of some inspiration to you. Please feel free to add any ideas to the forum you may have yourself, I would love to hear them and especially if anyone is going to make use of them

Have fun ladies and Congratulations to all those Mothers to be out there! xxx :T