Garden Shower

Once upon a time, two fabulous friends were expecting baby girls.
Everyone wanted to celebrate with them, including Kathryn and I!
We got together with friends, made invitations, planned and made decorations.
The preparations were a blast in and of themselves.

The invitations were Kathryn's assignment.  She found cute floral paper made a pocket for the simple yellow invite.  The colors in the paper are what we based our color scheme on.  She used her cricut to make these cute branches and blooms.  We had some good laughs as we assembled them together with friends.
invitation

The group effort continued with decorations.  Kathryn and another friend slaved away over tissue paper flowers and pompoms.  And when I say slaved,  I mean it in the most fun, "crafting slaving" way.
pom poms

Hmmm...  Where have you seen these shelves before?  Oh, here!
I pulled my normal decor off and my friends came to decorate while I tinkered around, doing a little cleaning.  They actually went and cut these darling branches and added small tissue paper blooms, to match the invitation.  They think of everything, I tell you!
shelf

shelf 3

Kathryn whipped this baby out the day of, in between carpools, set up and tissue flowers.
shelf 2

Oh, and she whipped out this and put it in the large frame above my buffet.
I think she has a secret personal assistant I don't know about.  She does projects so fast and so cute!
buffet

Another friend came up with these adorable favors which also doubled as decor!  Genius!
shelf 4

Who knew a simple brown box could become so stylish?
favor

But don't worry, the theme doesn't stop there.  Look at the colored chocolates inside!  Fabulous, Lauri!
favor 2

Who doesn't love some bread and salad?  I planned the menu and the many friends who wanted to help brought ingredients.  When you're hosting, it's hard to remember to get good pictures.  Good thing my friend grabbed some shots of the table!

(Pretend my ugly calendar isn't ruining this picture and pretend my table cloth is ironed...thanks!)
table

My cake stands are going strong.  Here they were, painted pink.  They are now all red.
table 3

I had these menu's out for directions on how to make two different kinds of YUMMY salads.
They were just suggestions and people could treat it like a salad bar if they wanted, but I couldn't resist trying to be bossy with their food!  ;)
menu

I made these menus by painting a simple, unfinished frame from Michael's.  I took the glass and paper out.  Then I sprayed several coats of chalkboard paint on the back piece of wood (that is meant to hold the picture in place).
menu 2

The chicken and tri-tip are on the wrong sides in this picture, but you get the idea, that they could start on either side and and grab a roll too.
table 2

Now comes the fabulous cake skills of my friend Kristy.  She's been taking classes and made this beauty for dessert.  She matched the invitation/theme perfectly with those branches and blooms!
cake

I wish I didn't wait to take pictures until dark.  But the point is to enjoy the party, right?  Well I did!  I thoroughly enjoyed getting together with friends who were excited to get creative and throw a party.  The cute pregnant girls appreciated every detail and most of all, the great company!

The best part of this story is that they lived happily ever after.
Two healthy baby girls have blessed two great families!

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