Storybook Baby Shower

Description

My sister and I are 2 years apart and have always been close. So when her and her husband told me they were pregnant, I could not have been more excited. I immediately got online and started searching baby shower themes. When I came across a storybook theme I knew it would be perfect. My sister loves books and loves to read and I knew she would be thrilled with a more traditional theme.

Design Inspiration

My sister love of reading was the inspiration for this adorable Storybook Shower

Decorating Style

I have more of a contemporary decorating style, but my sister is more on the traditional side, so for this shower I mixed the two.

Project Details

The first thing I had to tackle was the invitations. I wanted them to be perfect, they had to be perfect, it was my first niece! The invitations came from Martha Stewart’s website, which were created by Anna Bond of Rifle Paper Co.  There is a link to the template, and I simply had to print them out and cut them. But that was not going to be good enough for me! The book on the invitation said “it’s a baby” but I wanted it to say “it’s a girl”. So after a lot of photo shopping and working in the paint tool, I was able to erase baby and write in girl using the paint tool. Next all the information for the shower had to be typed in, including Alicia’s name. This all could have been hand written but with a 150 invites to send out, typing it was the only option.

After the actual invitation template was done, I wanted a nice pocket invitation to put them inside. Paper presentations had the perfect ones! They were top open and came in almost every color, I was able to order a hot pink that matched the pink in the invitations perfectly, and then I ordered matching light pink envelopes.  The style was Pocket Invitations Style A6

In the pocket at the bottom of the invitation, I put in the adorable bookplate that came with the template which the guest put inside the book they brought, and also the bookplate part that said “A Library Shower”  We invite you to bring a favorite book for the baby. This part was also photo shopped to say “A Storybook Shower” instead of library. The last step on the invitations was to seal it shut with a cute personalized label in “Mint” green that said “This is Where Anna Lynn’s Story Begins”.

Next I started on the decorations. Martha Stewart’s website had a great example of miniature booklets hanging from decorated garland. I knew right away I was going to do this for the shower, but tweak some things.  First, I went to Michaels and bought 5X7 cardstock in different shades of pink.  Then I bought a roll of light pink hemp to use as the garland. My Michaels and Jo Ann’s didn’t have this, but I ordered it off of Amazon, Etsy.com has it too and other craft sights. To decorate the mini books, I copied 20 different books (front cover and two pages inside) and resized them to 50% of the original size of the book and pressed copied! I then taped on the book covers to the fronts of the pink cardstock, folded it and put the two pages of the books inside and held it together by a hole punch, tied with a green ribbon. These were hung on the garland by mini clothespins (found at Michaels or Jo Ann’s). To decorate the garland I used my sister’s Cricut to cut out different shades of pink stars and glued and taped the stars onto the pink hemp.  

 All the shelves in the living room were decorated with childhood books.

There was a craft table at both of the front doors for the guest’s to help make a page in Anna Lynn’s ABC book, counting book, color and shape book and Zoo Animal book.  I cut out a lot of shapes on the Cricut machine for the guests to stick onto the book. I bought foam animals, foam sea creatures and stamps to be put in the zoo animal book and under the water counting book.  The books for the crafts were bought from Bookblanks.com  

The food buffet table was decorated with pink linens, a bouquet of flowers, mini books and oversized books which were bought from Lakeshorelearning.com

Next to the food buffet table was a 6 ft by 4 ft Styrofoam book decorated with rub on book quotes. The book was cut and made by Foam Masters in Naples Florida. My dad then painted the book off -white and the rim of the book light green. We then got matching green paper to put on the book so we could rub on the book quotes to the paper. 

Next came the delicious candy buffet. I knew I wanted a candy buffet at the shower, and of course a variety of pink candy but I didn’t have the jars, the candy or the time to do it myself. I hired Mary Diaz from That Favor Boutique.com to set up the candy buffet.

The candy buffet served as the favor station for the guests. I ordered pink and green organza bags and had a personalized tag made for them.  The tags matched the scallop label that was put on the invitations, and also the scalloped tags that labeled each candy jar. The tag on the favor bags had a picture of my sister and her husband in their baby nursery and said “Sweet Beginnings” Thank You for Coming. 

Not only was the bag to be filled with candy for the guest’s favor, but each bag also had a bookmark in it that matched the invitations. 

We had four cakes to display. One huge open book cake, and 3 stacked books that had the names of popular children’s books on them. These cakes were made by Mikkelsenspastryshop.com

Decorating the tables was the most fun! Each table was decorated with either light or dark pink linen, a stack of books, a main book standing up, a bouquet of peonies and roses (my sisters favorite) and last but certainly not least a tray of GORGEOUS storybook cupcakes! 

On top of these cupcake stands sat the most magnificent, detailed storybook cupcakes ever imagined, not to mention, all of it was edible!  The cupcakes were made by first picking 12 of the books I wanted to be displayed on the cupcakes. Then on Microsoft Word I shrunk down the cover of the books to the same size I would want it on the cupcake. This document was then emailed to the bakery and they then printed that document through an edible printer and made miniature books out of fondant and white chocolate.   These books were propped on top of the cupcakes, creating a huge WOW factor!

Favorite Items

My favorite item was the storybook cupcakes! They were so detailed and definitely the hit of the party, and a perfect centerpiece for the tables.

Advice

Give yourself months and months of planning! The shower was Janurary 5th and 7th (a friend day and a family day because of all the guests) and I started planning in June.