"A Giraffe & Her Half" Baby Shower

This shower was a joy to throw. Not just because I love the mommy-to-be, but also because I had the privelege to work with her best friend Jessica. It's always way less stressful when I have people willing to help me put it together, especially when it involves evenings filled with wonderful food, coffee or hot chocolate and plenty of good laughs. Plus, it's so much easier to throw a shower for someone when the person helping you knows that person's likes and dislikes.

It all turned out so cute and God made His presence known throughout the planning and preparation for the shower in more ways than I can count, but I'll share one story specifically. I ordered 2 yards of burlap from JoAnn's Fabric (I had a 50% off coupon to use). Four days before the shower I received an email stating the fabric had been processed and will ship the very next day. When I ordered it I thought standard shipping would do because three weeks was ample time to get it here and complete the project, right? Well, the email specifically noted that with standard shipping I should typically allow 4-7 days, once processed! (EEEEEEEK!) That meant that I'd be getting it after the shower and because I live in a place that does not have a store that offers burlap, I freaked out a tad and wrote in my thankful journal, "Lord, PLEASE work a miracle and get me the fabric here before Saturday!" Well, "work a miracle" HE did. I received it the VERY NEXT DAY. I have been in awe of Him ever since. Yes, it's just fabric, but the fabric isn't the point. The point is that it took less than 24 hours for God to answer my prayer, because He's amazing!

Due to the fact that God is amazing, we were able to complete the projects we had in mind. The Mommy-to-be loves burlap and she seemed to enjoy what we had made, so I'm beyond thankful for that answer to prayer.

This guy was super easy to make. I drew the design I wanted on a piece of cardboard, cut it out and then traced around it on a piece of burlap. I folded the burlap over to cut the two sides (front and back), hot glued the back side onto the cardboard piece, glued the top edges of the front piece on, stuffed it with grocery bags and finished gluing the edges. I then cut out purple giraffe spots out of felt, glued them on, and used pink felt fabric for his face and ears. (The eyes are little green buttons.) Once that was complete, I outlined what I had traced with permanent marker with puffy fabric paint. I used twine to create the puffs for the tail and hair, glued them on and drew a smiley face with puffy fabric paint. Once it was dry I glued twine on the back so this cute little burlap giraffe could be hung up... and voila! This took me a couple hours (not including dry time) to complete. So simple and so cute!

Jessica made this adorable frame, which was the theme for the activity (explained later).

The center pieces were my favorite part. It was so simple and it had special significance. The wooden pieces displayed were used in Ben and Jill's wedding a year ago. We couldn't resist re-using them for her baby shower.

Jessica happened to find the giraffe fabric pieces in a clearance rack and bought them all. We tied giraffe ribbon around the mason jars and filled them with giraffe edibles: twigs and leaves!

Scattered on each table were 10 giraffe facts. For a prize the guest were encouraged to mingle and decide which were true and which were false. Hmmmmm... is this statement true? :)

First thing we did was read a book, which was also the guest book and the inspiration for this showers theme: "A Giraffe & Her Half"

Close Up of the onsie I made...

The book inspired her invitations as well (created using Punchbowl).

The poem I wrote,
"Jill and her half are as cute as can be
So let's celebrate this new mom and her little "mini me"
It'll be an afternoon full of fun-filled laughs
An afternoon to bless "A Giraffe and Her Half"

Jessica had the honor of reading the book, Shel Silverstein is such an amazing author, the kids in the audience LOVED it (which of course was everyone)!

After she read the book we had devotions, where I talked about what Titus 2:3 women are to teach younger women: loving your husbands and children. In a very short few minutes I tried to give a glimpse of that and what it means Biblically. I saw this quote once that stated, "The greatest thing a man can do for his children is love their mother." and explained that also applied to women, "The greatest thing a woman can do for her children is love their father." So what does love look like? We talked about the qualities of love Paul described in 1 Corinthians: patience, kindness, self-less-ness, serving each other, &etc. Still, there's someone that always comes to mind when I think of motherly love and that's Mary, Jesus' mother. Yes, she was the mother of God, so we can (in all honesty) never relate to her, but every time Brielle does something I never want to forget I always think of Mary and how Luke described in her chapter 2:19 and 2:51, "And his mother treasured up all these things in her heart." That statement stops me in my tracks every time I read it. I didn't dive into what it means exactly, what it meant to treasure up the son of God, and I can't imagine the depth of love Mary must've felt for Jesus. Still, every single mother can agree that time flies, you blink and before you know it you're child is 1 and many mothers can attest to blinking and their child is off to college or walking down the isle, so treasure it up. Don't forget.

After devotions the women were encouraged to create something giraffe so that Jill could fill the empty frames as a collage of the wonderful giraffe items made for her. They were to go along with the frame Jessica had made...

Eat, Talk, Create, Laugh, Joke, Have FUN! That was the afternoon. It was so relaxing!

You can never go wrong with yellow cupcakes with chocolate frosting, spinach-artichoke dip with chips and vege's, and a pumpkin pie dip with honey graham crackers. All washed down with hot apple cider (caramel and cinnamon sticks included).

The food encouraged crafting and the giraffe creations turned out pretty cute if I do say so myself.

As the women were still creating, Jill opened presents. The diaper cake made by Rhonda, was my favorite. How adorable is that?!

I'd say it was another successful afternoon!

Jill & Jessica
Most importantly, the mom-to-be walked away with a ton of great stuff and I think SHE enjoyed her afternoon centered around her giraffe themed nursery and her little half.