Baby Shower Ideas: How to Plan the Perfect Celebration for Expecting Parents

The most important thing to remember when throwing a baby shower is that you have fun, and the guest of honor has fun and feels appreciated. It's about the good times and memories, not how perfect every little detail is.

Depending on the amount of detail put into planning your shower, it might be beneficial to have more than one person planning it. Siblings, parents, friends, coworkers, or other family members might have some great ideas to input. As well, resources are divided and not just one person is responsible for costs or making sure all of the details are correct.

You can work together or assign tasks to specific people. Have someone take care of the invites, have someone take care of the food and drinks, and so forth.

Start Your Planning:

- Make a list of everything that needs to be done and keep in mind that the list may change and may grow over time.

- Decide whether you will need help with planning and organizing and who is available to help you.

- Figure out a budget and who is able to contribute financially.

- Assign tasks to each individual, although everyone should maintain communication throughout the process to make sure everything is going as planned.

Once you have a general idea of who will be involved in the planning, what your budget for the event is, and how much time you have to plan it, you can start to decide of the details of the baby shower.

Baby showers are very important events for a lot of expecting parents. The excitement of having a baby can be shared with friends and loved ones and guests have a chance to bring gifts.

Not everybody wants to have a baby shower so it's important that you find out whether you should start planning one or not. If you do plan on throwing a shower, the more information you can gather about the parents and the baby, the better of you will be. THere are a lot of things to take into consideration. For example, where should the shower be, who should be involved in the planning, who should be invited, what should people bring, should there be a theme, what food should be served, and should there be games, among other things.

The steps and ideas listed below should help you to plan a wonderful baby shower that everyone will remember.

Start by making a list of everyone that could possibly be invited to the shower. After factoring in budget, and the relationship between each guest and the expecting parents, you can narrow down your list and get a more clear picture of who you might invite.

Decide the way in which you would like to invite your guests. You can simply let them know by telephone, mail, email, or otherwise. If it is just going to be a small group of friends, a simple telephone call may be sufficient. Otherwise you can select from the thousands of styles of baby shower invitations available.

Assign this task to someone and make sure that guests have plenty of time to prepare for the event.

Another important factor to consider when planning a baby shower is where the shower will take place. Some baby showers will take place at the parent's home, some will take place at a friend or family member's home, and some will take place elsewhere such as an outdoor location of sorts.

Determining the location of a baby shower depends on how many guests are expected, whether someone is willing to host the shower at their home, and where the expecting parent's prefer to have it, among other things.

Deciding on the theme for a baby shower can be one of the most exciting parts of planning the event. You can choose to base it around the sex of the baby - pink for girls and blue for boys, or choose to have more gender neutral colors. In addition to color themes, you can have animal themes, seasonal themes, and the list goes on.

It is important to consider the interests of the expecting parents when planning the theme. For instance, would the parents enjoy having a pink-themed party if they are expecting a girl or would they prefer different colors. I they have particular interests you can choose to base the theme around that. The possibilities when planning a baby shower are endless.

You cannot have a baby shower without having some kind of food or snack. When deciding on the food you have to take several things into consideration. It may depend on the location, the theme, the types of foods and snacks that the parents eat, among other things. If you have the baby shower at a restaurant or similar location, there may be food provided already. If you have it outdoors or at somebody's home, you may have to decide what should be brought or prepared.

A variety of foods and snacks is a good idea so that everyone can find something they like. You can go extravagant or keep it simple. You can go with typical appetizers or try to incorporate the food into the baby shower theme.

Some ideas might include:

Color themed snacks
Baby food (i.e. baby carrots, baby corn, mini pretzels, cocktail wieners)
Soft or blended food placed in empty baby food jars

Aside from chatting with friends and snacking on yummy treats, there needs to be some type of entertainment at every baby shower. The important thing to remember is to make the entertainment or games appropriate for the shower. There are games specifically designed just for baby showers. You can get pretty creative and have a lot of fun.

Here is a sample list of baby shower games:

Chug a Baby Bottle: Bottles are filled with water, juice, or other liquid and participants race to see who can finish their bottle the fastest.

The smelly diaper: Clean baby diapers are filled with different types of melted or softened candy bars. Each diaper has a different type of candy bar placed inside and participants have to guess which type of candy bar it is by smelling and tasting it.

Revealing the Sex of Baby: Parents can have fun when revealing the sex of their baby at the baby shower. There are multiple ways of doing this. Parents can simply tell the guests or choose to have a guessing game of sorts. It's always fun as a quest to hear the exciting news.

How Many Items Do You Remember: Have a tray or table with multiple items on it, preferably baby items, and have guests try to remember each of the items. Then remove the items from view and have the guests make a list of the items they remember seeing. The person who guesses the most correct items wins.

Shoot The Pacifier: Guests place pacifiers in their mouths and see who can spit theirs out or shoot theirs the furthest.

Birth Story Exchange: Have guests describe the birth stories and experiences with their newborns.

Baby Drawing Game: Guests close their eyes and try to draw a picture of a baby. The parents choose their favorite picture as the winner.

Some expecting parents request that guests do not bring gifts to their baby shower. However, if you are planning on a baby shower in which the guests do bring gifts, there are some things you should consider and plan out.

You may wish to set a spending limit so that everybody feels like they are contributing equally. You may also want to decide with the other guests on which guests are bringing which gifts so that nobody gets the same thing. You can also ask the expecting parents to make a wish list.