“Oh, Baby, the Places You’ll Go” Travel Baby Shower

During our time at home this summer we were given two of the most beautiful baby showers anyone could imagine! My heart just swells every time I reflect back upon these special events and I am just so, so thankful for the wonderful people in our lives who care about us so much.

My mom and Aunt Joanie hosted our first baby shower, appropriately themed Oh, Baby the Places You’ll Go! This darling travel shower was absolutely perfect and designed to coordinate with Isla’s travel themed nursery. Many of the sweet aqua, peach and coral decorations will be used as accents in her room, which will serve as a constant and beautiful reminder of our happy day. While I know most mommy’s aren’t usually involved in the shower planning process, the “dual purpose” nature of some items allowed me the opportunity to help select a few of the details. SO much fun! Mom and I found these darling paper mache suitcases on Amazon and purchased sheets of travel themed papers from Paper Source. She cut out details from the papers and glued them to the suitcases. In addition to decorating the tables, these suitcases served as prizes for the game winners. Inside the suitcases my mom placed a collection of aqua and peach colored travel sized items, as well as a beautiful hand towel, on which she had added a sweet decorative strip of the fabrics that we used for Isla’s bunting (seen later in the post). The same decorative travel paper was used, along with burlap ribbon, to decorate the centerpiece vases. Most of the flowers came from my Aunt Joanie’s gorgeous yard, and they coordinated perfectly! My mom purchased several travel themed children’s books (which will be added to Isla’s library!), and scoured her home for unique and interesting travel souvenirs to decorate the table tops. She also sewed these turquoise runners from darling cotton travel fabric we found at Joann’s. My incredible hostesses! One of the greatest gifts I received was my cousin Lizzie flying in from Connecticut for the shower! Hooray! Wouldn’t have been the same without her.

My mom even found my baby and childhood passports, and silver baby rattles from Dubai, which added to the decor. A woman of incredible detail, my mom covered all of the pens used for games with travel paper, jute twine and a little piece of aqua confetti! I absolutely LOVED all these wonderful details. Okay, seriously, how darling are those elephants?! Above are detail shots of Isla’s gorgeous bunting and the table runners. Mom and I had way too much fun selecting the bunting fabrics from Spoonflower. This incredible site has thousands of unique fabrics, and also allows you to design your own! We selected 8 fabulous pre-designed prints in shades of aqua, peach and coral. Mom’s friend, Stacy,  generously sewed the darling bunting for us, and Mom is going to use the remaining fabric to create Isla’s quilt and crib bumper. I cannot wait to see them all together in her nursery!!! My Aunt Joanie created this adorable sky writer! She painted an old model plane, fashioned the banner out of a copper sheet, and decorated both with sweet aqua lettering.  She is going to replace the ‘baby’ with ‘Isla’ and we’ll hang it in her nursery. SO cute! Now, the food. Oh, the spread was absolutely amazing and so delicious! The three of us brainstormed an “around the world” menu, that included:

Sushi- Japan

Dumplings- China

Sliders and mini fries- USA

Vegetable samosas- India

Taquitos, quesadillas and guacamole- Mexico

Meatballs, tortellini and pesto crostini- Italy

My Aunt Joanie’s German chocolate cake bites (to die for!)- Germany

Almond petite fours- France

Chantilly cream cake with fresh berries- England

Fresh fruit salad- Oregon, USA

Beverages served were lemonade, peach ice tea, and ice water

Each food item was accompanied by a cute little tag that showed its geographical origin.

My mom made those darling mapped letters which will also go into Isla’s nursery… seriously, preparing for this shower turned that lady was a crafting machine!All of the dumplings were hand made by my mom and dear family friend, Sonja. They used a recipe Mom and I received from a cooking class during her first trip to Shanghai =). Even the chopsticks were adorned with darling little details! My favorite almond petite fours from Ja Civa’s, custom designed to fit the shower theme. Yum! Mom crafted these darling pacifiers out of life savers, jelly beans, and icing. Everyone enjoyed snacking on these while playing games.

Our first baby girl, Bella =)

Our sister Leah also made the trip to Oregon for our shower, which was such a sweet treat! SO thankful to have had her there =)True to the name of the event, we were SHOWERED with so many thoughtful and wonderful gifts! Thank you, thank you, sweet friends!!!

Our awesome travel-friendly stroller!!! And it coordinates perfectly with the fabulous Pack ‘n Play we also received at the shower. Daddy was SO excited about our Ergo carrier! He couldn’t wait to test it out, and our Aunt’s wiener dog, Greta, was close by and just the right size. Being a total cuddler, she loved it and didn’t want to get out! Let’s hope Isla feels the same way 😉

Speaking of Isaac, I couldn’t miss the opportunity to share the beautiful shower invitation he designed! The envelopes were purchased at Paper Source, and we used even more of that wonderful travel paper to line them, with the help of this handy envelope liner template kit.

Just putting this post together makes me teary eyed. A HUGE thank you again to all our friends and family who made this very special day possible for us! We are so lucky to have you in our lives! Also a big thanks to my hubby and sister, Rachel for taking photos of the shower and all of its wonderful details. I will treasure these images for years and years!

Up next, amazing shower #2…