Panic strikes!

[smokingboot]

I've been invited to a friend's baby shower. Of course I'm delighted, but I'm a bit lost...it's going to be a pudding party, so we bring our favourite dessert. I don't know whether we're supposed to cook it or not. If the answer's yes, I'm doomed!

To make matters worse, pud or no pud, a baby shower's where you bring gifts for Mum and Baby right? So what's good? The only baby shower present I can recall is the nappy cake from Sex and the City. Expected baby is a girl. Mama-to-be is sophisticated, bold, successful and strongly opinionated about what her daughter should wear, so I fear with many a mighty palpitation all that pink for girls, blue for boys horror. Won't go near it - which seems to limit me a lot. Anyone have good ideas/know great websites for this kind of thing?

Thanks for any help you can give!

Comments

[squeezypaws.livejournal.com]

www.nordickids.co.uk are not cheap but have funky unisex or at least non pink and blue scandinavian clothing for babies - go for 3 months+ in case baby is a whopper. It comes in pretty tissue paper so nice for gifting if you do splash out on a tiny babygro or something.

I am not really familiar with this whole baby shower thing (missed a trick there - doh). Maybe the pudding was meant to be the present anyway?

I'd probably buy one but my track record where cakey things are concerned is less than glittering.

[smokingboot.livejournal.com]

Hello, thank you for the tip! Weirdly, I like the idea of baby showers, same as despite my utmost distrust and avoidance of marriage, I love weddings. Guess it's parties I love!

I don't know if the pudding is the present; Are there puds mums should avoid, like anything egg based or cheesey?

Feeding her chocolate's got to be the answer...

[colonel-maxim.livejournal.com]

Make sure that you bake enough baby for everyone, it is terribly gauche to leave someone nibbling at a left-over foot.

[smokingboot.livejournal.com]

Got to find a whopper. Specialist butchers in Greenwich tells me if I avoid the Christmas rush and order right now, I should have a 'ripe plumpy'.

[cyanidemigraine.livejournal.com]

buy it a noisy toy and her some ear plugs?

[smokingboot.livejournal.com]

Ah hah hah hah! Fisher Price used to do a plastic sax which, when blown, would issue a)loud discordant notes and b) bubbles. I will seek out this torturous treasure for the child's first birthday.

[evilwillow.livejournal.com]

Get her a fairy godmother in a jar, my niece still has the one I got for her birth.

http://www.newforesttrading.co.uk/acatalog/Freshly_Caught_Fairies.html

[smokingboot.livejournal.com]

Charming and funny, I want one! Thank you for this link!

[sarahfeeney.livejournal.com]

Hmm its hard to predict without knowing the target market so to speak. I didn't have a baby shower but lots of people bought us gifts. If you are buying clothes for for 9 months plus - so many people buy tiny little outfits or anything up to 6 months and then at 6 months plus you have comparatively little.

Some ideas for things that are not clothes could be some lovely organic baby bath products. e.g http://www.sayitbaby.co.uk/index1.html

this site has some lovely bits - I especially like this one : http://www.bundlesofjoy-shopping.co.uk/proddetail.asp?prod=kaloobright030&cat=59

I personally love this mobile from Ikea and things for baby to look and wonder at are nice for them. http://www.ikea.com/gb/en/catalog/products/20132716

Perhaps another good gift idea is a posh/smart changing bag for mum to take out with her.

If you want to go practical and its her first get her a huge stack of muslin clothes - endlessly useful with a baby. As a mother you find yourself surprised at just how many uses they have.

If you feel totally creative then handmade gifts are extra brownie points. Especially little blankets or a collage to go on the wall.

Hope that helps with some ideas. If you want to take her a gift then maternity friendly bath products are nice and one lady gave me some arnica which is apparently ace for post childbirth. I don't know I did it the wrong way!

[smokingboot.livejournal.com]

Thank you this is incredibly helpful! OMG, nappy cakes really do exist! There are some brilliant ideas here, I'm really enjoying chasing these links. You are Jayyneeeus!

[november-girl.livejournal.com]

I have no ideas, but would just like to assure you that I am not planning the same kind of thing.

[smokingboot.livejournal.com]

Shame! I like the idea. Of course, by the time you read this, you may have other things on your mind xxx

[dreamfire.livejournal.com]

I do books. even inappropriately aged ones. (the first baby I ever gave a book to got an illustrated version of Death in a Nut since I happen to think it is an important story). nice illustrations and whimsical stories.
It is never too soon to start a library.

[jfs.livejournal.com]

It is never too soon to start a library.

One of the many reasons I have so much time for you.

Debbie - there's a great alternative kids clothes shop in Camden; it's where I got my nephew a Sid Vicious teeshirt from when he was about 6 months old. If you're interested, let me know and I'll dig the details out.

[smokingboot.livejournal.com]

Jfs, thank you I would very much like to know those details. As my nippergift obligations grow, so too does my resentment of that whole blue/pink rubbish thing.

[jfs.livejournal.com]

If you have a look on the map on this page:

http://www.camdenlockmarket.com/explore.php

It's upstairs in the West Yard about where the number 51 is.

Hope it's still there - I haven't been there in a while.

[smokingboot.livejournal.com]

That is a true and lovely idea...my first book was a massive tome of nursery rhymes. Even now I recall Hickory Dickory Dock as my favourite. I just liked the way it sounds!

[rebby.livejournal.com]

So much depends on the parents & their hobbies / sense of humour
Something that’s slightly bigger than newly born means even if the child is big they will fit & if the child is small they will grow in to it.

I’ve searched on line & found the monkey suite for Eden that I thought was perfect for Carrie & Jason.

Simplest pudding I know is lemon sorbet & green & blacks maya gold. Put sorbet in bowl, melt chocolate in microwave for one minute, stir & poor over the sorbet.

[smokingboot.livejournal.com]

Thank you! Ooooh, that pudding sounds lovely. But hmm, things could go wrong anytime, so I guess I'll have to test it a couple of times to make sure I get it right;-)

[load-of-flannel.livejournal.com]

I tend to by a condolence card for the expecting couple. No gifts. A baby isnt a miracle or a massive acheivment.



(I am a meany though)

[smokingboot.livejournal.com]

I agree that having a baby isn't a miracle or massive achievement - I consider it a default. But it is a rite of passage, painful and dangerous, with hopefully a positive outcome, and Im all for more rituals to celebrate such moments.

Or maybe I'll just do anything for a party!