On a lighter note, we had a baby shower last night for a sweet new mom, who is rather new to the area, to feel some love and meet some ladies from around here. Her darling little girl, Sapphira-same name as the dragon in Aragon :0) is 7 weeks old. None of my children have ever been that small, ever. She was like 5 lbs when she was born. At 7 weeks, I think she is 7 something. Anyway, I just thought I would run down some of the decorations since I did such a horrible job of taking pictures last time. We re-used some decorations since we decided to do the shower like two weeks ago, and then I made some new ones.
This was the table. I should have put the extra cupcakes somewhere else. Technically I was not in charge of this shower, thank goodness, so I just put things where told. That is my first attempt at a cupcake bouquet.
A little closer...
I made those fabric baby blocks out of scraps from Madison's Paris quilt. I was thinking about making them and then, like two days ago, I saw that one of my favorite bloggers POSTED them on her site! Thanks for the info and encouragement! I put bells in mine so they would be noisy too. Had I thought about it sooner, I would have appliqued some kind of cutesy flowers or something on the sides.
I made cake pops. I have quite a lot to say about that. They were a pain, and I had a casualty! My last glass bowl, the only one not broken by the children-sniff, sniff :0(
So, you bake a cake, any kind of cake. Let it cool. Next, take two forks and rip that baby to shreds. That is right! Tear it apart until all that remains is a pile of crumbs. Dump it into a large bowl, along with a container of frosting. Honestly, I chose carrot cake(usually do chocolate) because I had a box that had been hanging around a while and was begging to get off the shelf. Added a container of cream cheese frosting. Wasn't sure I would like it, but the pops were a HUGE hit. Anyway, mix the crumbs and frosting together until completely combined. Roll(I use my cookie scooper) into balls about 1 1/2 inches, stick a sucker stick in the business end, then freeze. I froze mine over night. That is the best tip I can give you! When I was dipping the pops, I had the tray on the counter. When the bowl hit the floor, dip splattering everywhere, mom crying, a whole lot of time went by. The balls ended up thawing, then the sticks were popping through the tops, through the chocolate. Aaarghh! I even eventually pulled the sticks out and just dipped them as balls. I have been making cake balls as a Christmas treat for a couple years. Adding the sticks definitely adds stress. Just make sure your balls stay frozen. Clean minds ladies!
As far as dipping, the pink were dipped in the Wilton Candy Melts. I personally think it is too thick. The next batch was dipped in almond bark. That was way better. It is thinner, spreads over the places you miss. Only problem is that it keeps dripping. I was resting the balls on my cooling rack, sticks down through the holes, and the bark dripped and cooled to the rack. I lost several pops when I tried to pry the balls off the rack. I am so glad you don't have a dirty mind like the rest of my friends and family. I am not sure I can take much more of this ball talk. Oh, if adding sprinkles, sprinkle when the chocolate is still wet.
Long story short, have chocolate nearby for emergency stress relief...and don't be to set on the professional results the Bakerella gets...at least, I know I am not that good! She definitely has a Fairy-Cakepop Godmother!
Finally, you can see the top of my beaded ball (there you go again) behind the sign. At someone else's house you can't just go punching holes in ceilings to hand your decorations, I guess, that is what they tell me anyway.
I made this sign for the baby. I took a scrap piece of wood, drilled holes for the ribbon you can only barely see (there for her to hang it with at home), and painted it brown-all sides. When dry, painted it pink, three coats. I printed out her name in a font I liked, cut out the letters and used the paper outside as a stencil. I stippled the letters with the same brown I used to paint the sign. When dry again, I sanded the whole top lightly to make it all blend in and bring out some of the base brown. Finally I hot glued the flowers, gems, and tied on the ribbon. I loved the look of it on the table and the mom was WAY excited to get to take it home.
Here is my cupcake bouquet. I posted the instructions last night if you want to know how I did it. Next to that are the cake balls I dipped in almond bark. YUMM!
Last minute I decided to make this banner. It was rather quick. I finally decided to do it in paper cause the shower was at someone else's house and I know how funny some people can be about putting nails in the wall so it needed to be light enough for tape.
Our lovely host hung our flower balls from the sides of her curtain rod. Here is a closer look, finally.
This is the one Madison did, bravely sacrificing most of the flesh on one finger to the glue gun. She did rolled flowers out of streamers. This picture doesn't do it justice. It is simply breathtaking.
Here is my rather lame flower one.
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I made over a hundred flowers that did not turn out breathtaking. I will not be making one of these again.
On the table a few pictures back is the third ball. We hot glued a string of beads to it and then spray painted it white. Very cute!
All in all, a cute, shower on a budget of scraps for a sweet new mommy in the neighborhood.
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