Planning a Baby Shower

Last Updated on January 23, 2020

Whether you are planning a baby shower for a friend, family member, co-worker, or even yourself, there are a lot of decisions to be made. I have made it easy for you with a checklist and some ideas! You can get as elaborate as you want or keep it simple with these basics. Let’s assume this is a party for someone else and plan accordingly.

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Where to start

Planning a Baby Shower Step 1:

Pick a date and time. As long as it is not a surprise shower, make sure to coordinate with the mom-to-be. She might want to confirm with other people close to her to make sure a certain date works. Depending on the location you might need to get a few date options. Ideally, you will want to have a baby shower when the mom-to-be is about 6-8 months along. You don’t want to have it too early but also not wait until it gets too close.

Step 2:

Pick a location. Depending on how many people you plan to invite and who will be invited, there are lots of options. You could have the shower at someone’s house (doesn’t have to be the host’s), a restaurant, an event venue, a place of work (usually only if this is for a co-worker), or even a church (usually best if someone at the party attends that church).

Step 3:

Decide on a guest list. Is this going to be a co-ed shower or women only? Are children allowed? Do you want to include everyone that the mom-to-be knows or just a specific group? I personally prefer to have a couple of baby showers with more specific groups like 1 for co-workers and 1 for family and friends rather than 1 very large one. If it gets too big then it is hard to play games, open presents or even talk to everyone. If you are going more for just a party to celebrate the mom-to-be, then 1 big one would work.

Step 4:

Decide on food. Will this be a morning shower or afternoon? Do you want to provide a full meal or just appetizers and dessert? Will there be guests coming that have dietary restrictions? Also, this will depend on where you are holding the shower and what you can bring. Many restaurants won’t allow outside food except for a cake. If you go with a mid-morning time then a brunch theme would work well. You could include mini quiches, fruit, yogurt parfaits, pastries and more. A mid-afternoon could be great with little tea sandwiches, mini desserts, fruit, vegetable platter, and a cheese tray. You can be as simple or elaborate as you want.

Step 5:

Send out baby shower invitations. It is best to send out invitations 3-5 weeks ahead of time. You want to give everyone enough notice so they can make plans but not so far in advance that people forget about it. On the invitations, you will want to include the location, date and time as well as information about where the mom-to-be is registered. I recommend the Amazon Baby Registry. The majority of items on the registry that aren’t purchased by the cut-off date will be available for a 10% discount. Plus there are a lot of other awesome perks. You can even get a free welcome gift.

Extras for Planning a baby shower

Some fun things to also potentially include on the invitation are, information about being entered into a raffle for a prize if they bring a pack of diapers, and if the mom-to-be would prefer guests to bring a children’s book with a note to the baby inside instead of a card. I love this idea because cards can be such a waste of money and books can last a lifetime.

Step 6:

Start planning the agenda for the party. What games do you want to play, how long do you want to allow for everyone to mingle? Do you want presents to be opened there? Is there a sit-down meal or just munching the whole time? You don’t want guests feeling awkward because no one knows what is supposed to be happening. At least one person should be the one moving guests from one activity to another.

Related Post: All You Need for Baby Shower Games

Step 7:

Prep time. Get everything you need to get for the party. Some things to consider (depending on where it will be held) are: Plates, utensils, cups, napkins, tablecloths, decorations, balloons, game prizes, food, drinks, items for games, cake/dessert, pen/paper to write down gifts for thank you notes, cards for guests to write down thoughts for the baby or mom-to-be, raffle tickets for those that brought diapers, and more.

Planning Baby Shower Games

Here are some great games you could play:

• Baby word scramble
• Baby food game- Have jars of single item baby food and have guests smell (or taste) each one to try to guess what they are.
• Candy in the diaper- Melt a chocolate candy bar in a diaper. Guests get to guess which candy is melted into the diaper and it looks like baby poop. Yum!
• Who’s who? Make a list of celebrity moms on one side and their baby’s names on the other. Guests have to match up which baby goes with which mom.
• For co-ed baby showers, you could even do the beer bottle chug. Who can drink beer out of their baby bottle the fastest?
• Gift Bingo– Take a blank bingo sheet and have guests write in which gifts they think the mom-to-be will open. Then, as soon as someone gets 5 in a row there is a winner!
• Guess how many– Fill up a baby bottle with skittles or other small candies and have the guests guess how many are in there. (Make sure you pour them out and count the total ahead of time). The person who is closest to the total wins!

Prizes

Games are definitely more fun when there are prizes. They don’t have to be elaborate or expensive. Some options could be, a small candle, lotion, $5 gift card, flower seed packets, something personalized to remember the shower, candy or even this cute pedicure kit. I would recommend having extras though because you might have more than 1 winner on multiple games. You could even have prizes instead of having a little gift for each guest.

Have a great Baby Shower!! Send me photos of how yours turned out!

For some great gift ideas for the Mom-to-be check out my All about Breastfeeding post.