{8.29.09} stephanie's "cute as a button" baby shower

I love planning showers.  It's great to be able to tailor the event to the bride or mommy-to-be's personality and style.  Not that it can't be done for a wedding, but the shower is an opportunity to focus the attention on the gal - whereas a wedding is the time to celebrate the couple jointly!

I thought I would start off this new blog by sharing a baby shower i was honored to be able to design for a friend and her cute mommy-to-be friend Stephanie.

When it came to inspiration for the shower, my friend told me to be creative and just go for it. For whatever reason the button theme popped into my brain and we ran with the theme - "cute as a button.".... And I must say that I'm so glad we went in this direction, everything was darling and "cute as a button." {sorry I couldn't resist that one} 


We started with her invites - using multiple pinks and purples, button and stitching details - I felt that since it was a shower for a baby girl, it was time to really play up the girlie-ness! {did i make up that spelling?} =)

For the shower we tied the pinks and purples through the decor with white hydrangea, and multiple types of paper from my second home {paper source}.  My friend was hosting the shower on her own, so I really tried to make the shower as cost effective for her as possible, since she was being so sweet to her friend and hosting solo!

I made a few different sizes and color variations of tissue paper pomanders to hang above the food buffet area {pictured below} second photo from food area looking into living room where we set up the dining table.

Speaking of food, I love food and we had a great late lunch sampling of asian cabbage salad, finger sandwiches {we gambled on a cream cheese, sun-dried tomato, & black olive option, and it was a hit},  fun-fetti cupcakes complete with a purple & pink fondant buttons {which I was determined to make}, and what would a shower be without chocolate dipped strawberries? below are some photos of the food are and the goodies...

To the right is the cabbage salad and to the left are the cupcakes with their fondant buttons - so proud i figured out how to work with fondant for not being a baker!

Also I just wanted to show these uber cute pink plaid cupcake liners and mini purple polka dot liners from etsy seller Cupcake Social.

Below are the dipped strawberries - I also made little signs for all the food in the cute abermale swash font we tied throughout the invites, and the event - then I stamped them with the button of course and lastly gave them a cute scalloped edge!

We placed a food label with each of the offerings and also on the beverage table, pictured below- excuse the mess - somehow I didn't manage to take another photo after the table was tidied up! oops

In the berage dispensers we served lemon & orange ice water and fresh squeezed lemonade 

{made by my gal pal's handy boyfriend!}

We also, offered a shower standard - sherbet punch, if you haven't had this before, it may look funny but it's fantastic! In a pinch I used one of my salad bowls as our punch bowl since we never got the one we registered for... but more on that story later =)

If you happen to like those cute little hydrangea arrangements - here are more to take a peek at! 

We set the table with the hydrangea arrangements  and sprinkled various colors of pink & purple buttons down the table to create a "table runner-like" effect.  At the last minute my friend decided rather than use throw away plates she snatched up some white Ikea plates - however we had settled on using white table cloths... so I created pink and lavender place mats out of construction paper and alternated colors at each seat.

Speaking of those cute hydrangea tins - here's what they were in a former life:

Yep, that's right they were various soup cans, mega sized tomato sauce, etc. This was an inexpensive and very green way of doing things, we recycled all these cans and repurposed them into cute decorations - which we then gave away to the game winners and actually to each of the guests.

Below was our game vignette as guests entered - complete with "baby button taboo,"  the shower invite, and "match the mommy to her baby" game... also complete with a cute anthro cup to hold the pens for the game... we also had a few of these around the shower filled with hydrangea puffs. 

{can I just say I couldn't resist picking these up at  Anthro for the shower}

I also thought it'd be cute to make drink flags for the straws that read "cute as a button" with the button stamped design... i just love how sweet they turned out!

Here's a photo of Stephanie, the mommy-to-be, opening her gifts - we chose to hang some ribbon and tissue pomanders behind her, along with sitting the gifts behind her to help provide a little color for a backdrop while she opened them.

Meagan {the hostess} and I with some of the cute puff arrangements at the end of the shower - and some  of us gals after the shower.

Overall, it was a sweet, personal and fun shower which everyone enjoyed despite the hot hot weather we have been having here in So Cal!