To celebrate the motherhood of two modern women, we dispensed with the fusty color code, invited the soon-to-be dads, and offered zero-prep-time foods instead of the usual tea-sandwich fare. Here, a crib sheet for planning a party that's cliche-free and easy as ABC.
Make It Personal
Our coed shower was born from the individual styles of Kendra and Rachel.
They both love clean, modern design and bold color. Two of their favorite hues, orange and teal, play nicely together, so home editor Page Marchese Norman and senior home editor Rebecca Robertson started there. They whipped up a pair of graphic mobiles (see image to the left), made from construction paper and embroidery hoops, which served as the party's decor and as take-home nursery decorations for the almost-parents.The inspiration was clean modern shapes that appeal to young, modern mothers and will later stimulate the baby in the nursery or playroom.
Tools and Materials
Art-quality colored construction paper or card stock (available at art-supply stores)
Embroidery hoops or basket hoops (we used 18- to 20-inch hoops)
Colored waxed twine
Eyelets
Mobile How-To
1. Determine the length of your mobiles. Remember, you want the mobile to have various lengths of circles to make it visually interesting. Cut the various lengths of waxed twine. Double the twine strings (as if you are going to thread a needle). Tie the loose ends in a knot.
2. Slip finished end through eyelet and pull through. This will create a slip knot. Repeat with all other lengths of twine and attach around diameter of hoop.
3. You will want to repeat the same slip knot with the waxed twine to hang the hoop from the ceiling or beam (as we did). Once you have doubled the twine and made a slip knot at three points around the hoop, tie the unfinished ends of each in a knot and then tie all three knots together and hang from a cup hook in the ceiling.
4. For the circles, choose varying sizes and colors and cut freehand; you can also purchase already cut card stock in circular shapes. Use a 1/8-inch hole punch to punch a hole at the top (about 1/2 inch from the rim of the circle). Attach eyelets to circles with eyelet punch (available at scrapbooking sites and art-supply stores).
For the Table
Continue the round theme by laying concentric squares of bright construction paper and top them with vibrant dishes of food. "I loved that it wasn't overly girly-girl, which made the guys feel included, too," Rachel says.
Introduce Solid Snack Foods
Rachel and Kendra love Asian cuisine, so our store-bought bites included nori-wrapped rice crackers, spicy wasabi peas, edamame sprinkled with sesame salt, and Japanese party mix. Candy-coated sesame seeds and dried sweet potatoes and a bowl of clementines, kumquats, and tangerines played off the color scheme. JFC "Nori Maki Arare" rice crackers, amazon.com. Seapoint Farms frozen edamame, seapointfarms.com for stores. Eden Organic "Seaweed Gomasio" sesame salt, edenfoods.com. Kasugai nut mix, amazon.com.
Make It Easy
Dumplings are little bundles of joy: portable but filling, adorable on the plate, and pleasing to meat- and veggie-eaters alike. They also satisfied Rachel's and Kendra's hankerings for sushi, which they hadn't been able to enjoy for a while. We ordered chicken, watercress, shrimp, and pork dumplings from a Chinese delivery menu, along with pork buns, pork shumai, and chicken and vegetable potstickers (aim for about six pieces per guest).
Or buy frozen dumplings (we like the Ling Ling brand, available at Whole Foods). For a dipping sauce, mix 1 cup soy sauce, 1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon rice-wine vinegar, 1 teaspoon sesame oil, 1 cup sugar, 2 thinly sliced scallions, and a pinch of dried red chile flakes. One batch serves 8 people.
Let Them Not Eat Cake
Mark the specialness of the occasion by avoiding baby-shower staples (cupcakes come to mind). We capped off our party with a few dozen Japanese mochi, which are ice cream wrapped in sweet rice flour (gourmetfoodmall.com). Dry Meyer-lemon sodas hit the spot (drinkgus.com for stores), and everyone took home a twine-wrapped box of candied nuts (translucentchocolates.com).
Kendra and Rachel also left with artfully understated Binth alphabet posters (gnr8.biz)
Soothe the Baby
When it comes to gifts, let others buy the burp cloths -- you can supply some of the newborn's first sights and sounds. We compiled custom CDs of nursing and bedtime tunes (get the playlist here). And we made scrapbooks to show the baby who's who in her new world: Grandparents-to-be emailed us family photos (including one of Serge and Jane, Doug and Rachel's pups) and we made color printouts and corresponding labels, sticking them into books using double-sided archival tape. Kolo "Lux Cortina" album, aifriedman.com.
Save Mama
The ultimate present for any new mom? Wisdom from those who've been there. We gave Kendra and Rachel each a felt toy basket (nettocollection.com) full of things that other Blueprint mothers have grown to know and love.
Lovely... maybe you would also like to see my mobiles to customise baby stuff!!.. great presents and gifts for babies:
www.flickr.com/photos/muzmuz
www.muzmuzcreations..blogspot.com
www.wix.com/muzmuzcreations/spanish
Mscook. . I may be a late but the eyelets are in the circles that you cut out of the stock cards or paper. :-)
This may be a dumb question, but the eyelets for the mobile aren't actually supposed to be inserted through the hoop, are they? I am a little confused on if they do, and if they don't what is their purpose? Help!
I'm pretty sure that you all know this is for inspiration; a starting point. If you think buying in food is expensive, find it locally or make it! I imagine they try to use vendors that their readers can access, so it is going to be more expensive than a local grocery. Why would you just comment to say it is expensive? Buying some food in for a larger event is often more practical. It gives you more time to focus on things you want to do and cuts back on things going awry in the kitchen.
pheakso: I suspect that the food was deliberately purchased from stores that offer ready accessiblity. Living in Alaska as I do, I can tell you shopping can be darned difficult. I am one who appreciates knowing about vendors who are accustomed to dealing with mail orders, and/or are large enough that they may have opened a store in my area.
You can get mochi for much less than that at the grocery store, or even less that that if you have an Asian grocer nearby.
I agree that it is far too costly. Mochi ice cream for almost $50?!! Very cute themes and colors but if modern means expensive, I'd rather go with traditional.
Far too costly for a shower.
I made this using fishing line instead of the twine for a cleaner look - it lookds great in my baby's room and matches perfectly. Easy project!
You can actually get the twine at Michael's Craft Store, where Martha Stewart Crafts are sold. There are solid colors and multicolored ones (my fav). Hope that helps!
Where do you get the waxed twine>