Almost two months ago, I c0-hosted a baby shower for my dear friend, K. My love language towards others is service. This was an event that I put my whole self into because K is an amazing person, friend and mom and I wanted her to feel so loved and blessed by this day. She assured me that she did. So, mission accomplished. :)
I could not have pulled everything together without the help from my two co-hosts–thank you Christy and Kelly! And thank you to my friend, Sally, for taking these amazing pictures. You captured my favorite details perfectly.
I kept meaning to get this post up sooner. The timing seems appropriate right now because Baby B was due yesterday and I have a feeling she will be gracing us with her presence any day now…any hour? Come on, Baby B!
I posted the invitations what seems to be a very long time ago. And now, here are the vintage-feminine details { almost completely inspired by Pinterest discoveries }:
Ross had to drink a LOT of Starbucks frappuccinos for the glass milk bottles to be a success. I had to use a LOT of Goo Gone, which during my first trimester become one of the scents I could not stand anymore! We will use these for many parties to come, I think!
Flowers were done by a local flower shop using blue Ball jars as the vase. It’s a fact that I am a horrible flower arranger.
Aside from the bowl of pita chips, the food was completely gluten-free and included some of K’s favorites. The cake balls were done by my co-hosts and were delicious. They followed this informative, but hilarious video tutorial.
K introduced me to white chocolate drizzled popcorn. It’s amazing. A dash of sea salt over the melted chocolate is essential.
Also on the menu: fruit salad drizzled with coconut balsamic vinegar, peppers and chips with hummus, and three different flavors of cake balls. Drinks included water with lemons and limes, decaf sweet iced tea, decaf coffee and Laura’s hot apple cider.
These amazing { and stackable } metal tins came from Ross’s mom. She was an invaluable resource for me as I planned this shower.
She let me borrow all of the old boxes, too. The antique pink dishes also came from her stash, but I get to keep those!
Don’t you just love a good baby bump?
Once plates were full of food, guests came down to the family room for some mama wisdom, a few games, and gift opening. Although, the shower was held at someone else’s house, I brought almost all of my throw pillows from home to add to the decor. I have many. The window frames were borrowed from a friend–thank you, Jenni!
I had my heart set on creating a fabric strip banner from the very beginning. Actually, it’s this photo that inspired the “sugar & spice” theme, too.
There were many other mamas of new babies at the shower. I love this picture. Little Allie { on the left } is awake here, but all three of them slept just like this for a long time!
Praying for you, K! You are going to rock your labor. Can’t wait to meet your sweet little girl!
Back at the beginning of 2011, I made an unofficial and unspoken New Year’s resolution to read more. My primary plan for doing this was to simply read for a few minutes before going to sleep at night rather than opening up hulu to watch my favorite show or just close my eyes to sleep. So, was the resolution a success? What did I read? Can I share an in depth and insightful analysis of each book?
Yes, I think that it was a success, and if you know my history of book-reading, you’ll be surprised that the list is longer than 1 :)
Here’s what I was able to make it through this year, in order of completion:
- Crazy Love by Francis Chan
- HTML 5 for Web Designers by Jeremy Keith
- The Reason for God by Timothy Keller
- CSS3 for Web Designers by Dan Cederholm
- Jesus Among Other Gods by Ravi Zacharias
- Seeing and Savoring Jesus Christ by John Piper
- The Elements of Content Strategy by Erin Kissane
- Responsive Web Design by Ethan Marchotte
- Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis
- Designing for Emotion by Aarron Walter
- Shepherding a Child’s Heart by Tedd Tripp
Finally, I intentionally titled this post with “list” rather than “review,” but if you have specific question about a book, feel free to comment. And FYI, I’d recommend any of the books above to a friend.
Merry Christmas!
Every year it’s a challenge to design our Christmas card. I spend many months designing cards for pipe|up, but then need to stir my creative juices to come up with just one more for our own card.
This year was no exception. I really love so many of the designs in my shop this year. (Is that ok to say?) I loved designing them and I feel so honored when an Etsy shopper scours through thousands of possible card designs, adds mine to their favorites–usually among many other very talented card designers–and then purchases one of MY designs. It brings me such delight. I also had some great text and layout ideas shared with me by close friends who just want to help me succeed in what I love to do. There’s really no reason, other than the surprise element, that prevents me from just using one of the designs that already exists.
{ front }
But, you see, I do love a little surprise. And this year, in particular, we have fun news to share with friends and family and I knew exactly how I wanted to share it. No, the “+1″ is not referring to Parker. We’ve been gifted a brand new little life and will soon be a family of four. We feel so blessed.
We also wanted our card to reflect the true meaning of Christmas–the birth of Jesus, our Savior and light of the world. ”May they know He came for them” is from “Christmas Christmastime is Here” by Rosie Thomas. It’s a perfect message that we want you all to know and believe.
A few weeks ago, our church held a Women’s Christmas Tea. My dear friend, K, shared with the group some holiday traditions she and her family have begun. She closed with this:
I hope you know tonight that He came for you. Because of Jesus, I have complete forgiveness of sins and I don’t need to earn anything. For those who have a relationship with Christ, He came for you. For those of you who are still deciding what you believe, He came for you. He came for all of us that we might know the love of God and experience His grace.
{ back }
He came for you. Merry Christmas.
Yesterday, while I was working at the computer for a bit, Analiese occupied herself with some toys. I glanced back and saw this arrangement:
A further head turn, and there was this (notice her real milk in the background):
Then, I started roaming the rest of the house to see what else she had lined up and found this in her room:
My little organizer!
This evening, she came out of her room with her arms full of lovies. We have a collection of a few that didn’t make “the cut”, but she still likes to play with them. She also put on the headband herself.
It wasn’t too long before she was lining them up to take a nap on the floor. She’s telling the last one “night night” in case you can’t tell.
I just ordered our Christmas cards and I can’t wait for them to arrive. We went the fancy-shmancy route this year and ordered actual cards versus printing them as photos which is what we’ve done in years past. However, since the cards come with envelopes, we may actually be saving money since I won’t need to order them through my beloved Paper Source. They just have such pretty colors…it’s hard to resist.
But I digress. The purpose of this post is to offer a free printable download. The inspiration comes from the back of our Christmas cards, which I will post once they’re in the mail to friends, family and neighbors. And they’ll probably make their way to pipe|up in next year’s collection.
Consider this a sneak peak…and a treat…for you….or for your wall, which is where mine is:
The window to the left is very white because we woke up to SNOW when I took this picture yesterday morning!
Here are a few colors for you to choose from:
{ Click on the image to open the color you want in a new screen. Then, click on it again to download the 5×7 printable. }
