I think because the day after the party, I posted all of the pics on Facebook, and so it feels like I've already shared the details! But I want to share them here as well, since this will be a keepsake space for memories of the baby. (There is a company that will print your blog for you in to a book! I think I might have to do that!)
So.... the party!
I had so much fun decorating!
Here are some pictures of the decor **(click on the pictures to see them larger!**)
Amy tied the bows on the little baby onesies (to be hung in the window)
Me decorating the table:
The finished product of the onesies in the window! This required much advance planning! We bought blinds just in time for the party! Before, we just had sheer curtains covering the windows. Just one panel per window (3 total). But the panel in the middle had been torn in half by our dogs, because they love to look out that middle window. So we just left the curtain torn because it tore right at their height to look out the window! I think we grew accustomed to how it looked and it did not bother us, but we had been told (ahem... mother), that it looked tacky and yes, especially with my clients coming to my house sometimes, I'm sure it did. So we used our credit card points to get gift cards to Home Depot and bought really nice blinds! It looks much better in there now! But I wouldn't have even thought about pursuing blinds if it weren't for this idea of hanging onesies in the windows for the party! :)
I had 3 boy onesies and 3 girl ones, and we alternated them. I wanted to incorporate the special "baby birdseye" onesie my assistant had made me, so it went perfectly in the middle!
We (really Amy and my mom) also made this voting poster! I had seen this on other blogs for their gender party, and I just spruced mine up a bit with the idea of putting some ribbon on it! I also wanted to incorporate the phrase "A Little Birdie Told Me It's A.... " somewhere for the party, so I used it here! I just printed off the wording (using a "girlie" font and a "boy" font!) and Amy cut it out and taped it on the board!
My mom is the one who glued the ribbon on, and I love how she glued on the different colors in two different patterns. One more girlie than the other!
I bought Sesame Street stickers to use as the voting tool, since that is babyish.
All of my helpers! Stuart and his mom went to the store to buy flowers for the party, and Stuart picked out this great bouquet! I wanted a bouquet that had both blue and pink, and this was perfect!
The mostly finished table decor. Still had to put cheese on the plate with the crackers, and fill the cups with blue and pink punch!
I love this idea that I found somewhere of hanging pacifiers from the chandelier! I wanted to do them at different lengths to add variety to the table area.
The coffee table! I just made a little sign that asked for parenting tips, and then made little cards, backed in pink and blue vellum, for the guests to write down their thoughts.
I spent forever at Party City picking out candy that had only either blue or pink wrappers! Thankfully, they had a candy station where you could choose from tons of candy, and just pay per piece of candy, so I only had to buy exactly what I wanted! I couldn't imagine buying a bulk bag of candy, and just picking out the pink and blue wrappers, and then being stuck with tons of other candy as well!
I had this empty frame, so I asked Amy to put one of the sono pictures from that afternoon in to it. Kind of hard to see the baby, but still cute!
I love the little curled up pink and blue curlies in the bottom of the advice jar. Very cute!
Oh, also, that pink polka dot paper behind my sign, that was wrapping paper that Amy had given me a gift in a while ago! I just saved the paper because it is made of real paper, (stiff) so it held up well, and it was so cute, I knew I would find a use for it! :)
The pink candies!
And the little monkey that has the baby's heartbeat recorded inside of it! I love pressing that every now and then and listening to him!
The little green booties I bought at a craft fair the DAY after finding out I was pregnant! It was the high school's annual Christmas craft fair, so I since I had known I was pregnant for all of one day, of course I had to buy something for the baby! So I chose a neutral green. :)
Some more decor.
That is the little hippo that Stuart (the Baby!) bought me for Valentine's Day. I also set out the sono pictures from that afternoon, as well as a little colorful, caterpillar rattle I bought about a year ago, I think...
A little banner over the doorway:
A better view of the poster:
A friend had sent me a card the week before with this saying on it. I loved the little rhyme, so I wrote it on our chalk board in the kitchen!:
Then guests started arriving, and it was time to dine on Stuart's wonderful cheesy, chicken enchiladas with green sauce, as well as rice, and borracho beans! So delicious!
Of course leave it to my mischievous big brother (with that gleam in his eye!), to be the one who puts his gender vote sticker right down the MIDDLE!
As people arrived, we ate first. Some ate on the back patio, but the majority ate in chairs spread out in the living room.
Amy & Allison
Our good friends Lori & Josh and their baby, Grant. (who by the way, Grant's due date and birthday !!! - he was born on his due date! - is Aug 11th - OUR due date!!! So crazy!)
"Little" brother Joel (he's so tall!)
The Birdseye/Ramsel clan. Mother in law Cissy, Cousin James and his wife, Amy, Stuart, me, and sister Mary (yes, she is a nun... hahaha)
Mary with her boyfriend, George
Cissy talking with Amy's mom, Sue
(one past teacher retiree talking to one soon-to-be teacher retiree)
Then it was TIME!!!!!! Time for the reveal! Once people had finished eating, we were ALL ready!!
:)
Here is the video!
**Okay, the video is posted in the post after this because I can't figure out how to put it here!**
I can't tell you how many times I've watched this video! Hundreds probably! I am SO thankful the moment was on video because there is just so much JOY captured in this little 2 minute blip of life! My mom said that I was glowing, "incandescent"! And watching the video, I can clearly see that. For days after, it was hard to put into words the joy I felt. It was a true joy coming out from within that, when talking with my mom on the phone the day after, out of no where, tears started coming when we were reminiscing of the night because it struck me that I do remember feeling that way, truly joyful, one other time in my life. That was as I was walking down the aisle of my wedding, looking around at all of our loved ones, and most especially, walking down towards my husband for the first time. (making me cry right now thinking of that!) I remember describing to a friend right after my wedding that in that moment, walking down the aisle, it felt as if "my whole body was smiling". That was the only way I knew how to put it into words. I could feel myself radiating with joy from my head to my toes. Literally. And I felt that same way that night, with close friends and family, discovering just who it is who is growing inside of me. Our baby, made of Stuart and myself. It was such a special way to find out all together. I am so SO happy we did it that way. I wouldn't change a single thing about how we did it.
Okay, enough sappy stuff! Here are some more pics from the night!
Here are two pics from us actually opening the present:
(LOVE how happy of a moment caught this is!)
It's a BOY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
After the big reveal, we took a group shot of everyone who wore pink (who thought it was a girl), and everyone who wore blue!
The blue group (the correct guessers!)
*Stuart and I were in both pics, since we are the Mama & Papa!
Then we dug in to the oh-so-chocolate-y cake that Cissy made! YUM!
(Also pictured is the sweet birdie family decoration Cissy gave us that afternoon!)
I grew up hanging out at Amy's house and came to know her parents as my "2nd set of parents"! BFF's for 17 yrs! Whoa, that is a long time!
With "Birdie". (what the baby will call her. Love that!)
With Grampa and Meme!
After finding out it was a boy, somebody went a little crazy with the boy votes! (But all night long, the boy side did have more votes than the girl side! Just like us, so many people always told me - before the night of the party - that they thought our baby was a boy!)
Proud Papa with our gift from Amy that told us whether we were having a boy or a girl! I love it! So glad we found out this way with a gift, so that now we have that blue keepsake to keep forever to look back on and remember that special night. It will be hung in his nursery! (The baby's name is not David! That is just the example. We will put the stickers on that spell our baby's name after he is here! But we joked, since we are not telling the name, we could just have people call him David until he is born! Ha!)
All of our parenting advice we received. So glad people played along and wrote down thoughts for us!
And the final picture of the night. Just the two of us, after everyone had left, reveling in the moment knowing a SON is coming to us very soon!
I have a confession... the party was nearly two weeks ago and I have not taken down the decorations yet, because it's fun to still reminisce of the night! It will all come down today though because my family is coming over for dinner tonight to celebrate my Mom's birthday today!
Happy Birthday, Meme!
No comments:
Post a Comment