Watercolor Baby Shower

Hey party people!
Last weekend, I threw a watercolor baby shower for some sweet friends of ours. Austin went to University of Florida with my husband. He and Candice got married over a year ago and are expecting their first baby.

 

The reason we decided on a watercolor theme is because Austin & Candice are both artists. Austin is an amazing painter. In fact, we have a gorgeous piece he did in our living room and we love it! Candice is also an artist, through dance. I thought the watercolor theme would fit perfectly with their  personalities but also be a great metaphor for celebrating a new life.

Thankfully, it was a beautiful day. A little windy but a beautiful day. Don’t laugh at our yard. Okay, you can. Our yard is pretty pitiful because of the massive amount of trees in our yard. We love our big yard in the huge city of Atlanta but the trees make our yard look like the beard attempts of a young teenage boy.

You barely see it in the picture but there’s a streamer I made that ran across the backyard. I made it from one of my new toys. I got a 2″ and a 1 1/2″ circle punch with a Michael’s gift card & I love them! The streamer was made using tissue paper circles, glued onto a string with a glue stick. It probably would’ve been quicker if I sewed them but I don’t have a sewing machine so my handy dandy glue gun did the trick.

One of my favorite parts of the shower was the backdrop for the food table.

I took three foamboards (that I got from the Dollar Store) and used watercolor paint to add some color. Then I added a cascading arrangement of paper plate flowers. They’re really easy to make. I did a tutorial on them, here.

In total, my backdrop cost about $4 plus the cost of the watercolor paints. They were only about $6 but I was able to use them on a lot of my party projects.

The shower was at 2:30pm so I tried to keep the menu light and easy.

The vegetable tray is almost always a go-to for me. I love the healthy options it provides and how easy it is to prepare. The quinoa is actually supposed to be couscous but I forgot that we used the last of our couscous awhile ago. Substituting the quinoa actually turned out fine. It’s a super simple recipe from Trader Joes, found here. The watermelon salad is not only easy but really pretty, as well. You simply take pieces of watermelon; mix them with 1/2 (or so) of feta cheese; take 1/4 cup balsamic vinegar mixed with 1 tbsp sugar and heat until disolved; then sprinkle the balsamic vinegar mixture over the watermelon and garnish with mint.

The sandwiches ended up to be the most time-consuming menu item. The main problem I had was that I couldn’t assemble them until right before the shower (I didn’t want to serve soggy or stale sandwiches). I offered turkey & provolone on toasted tuscan pane with lettuce and tomato; apple, brie & arugula on toasted tuscan pane; and blt’s on toasted challah bread. If you’ve never tried BLT’s on Challah bread, you are missing out! It is delish!

For the dessert, I set up our own little marble slab creamery.

How can you do this? Simple.

All you need are two marble (or if it’s a small party, just one) tiles from your hardware store. Mine were $3.99/ea (which is AMAZING since most marble serving dishes are $40+). Clean them really, really well & then stick them in the freezer. Let them sit in the freezer at least overnight. When you’re ready to get the party started, take them out, give your guests a couple scraping tools and they’ll be ready to mix their own creations.

I offered the guests: reese’s peanut butter cups, chocolate chip cookie dough, oreos and berries.

It was a really fun interactive dessert.

But…that wasn’t the only dessert!

I tried my first ombre cake. I did it a little different, though. The bottom layer is strawberry, the second layer is vanilla with just a little strawberry added and the third layer is plain vanilla. It’s covered in vanilla icing and I did a watercolor effect on the outside. For some reason it looked a lot better inside than outside in the sunshine but it still worked.

I had planned on making pink lemonade to serve but when I passed by Trader Joe’s sparkling lemonade, it called my name & asked for an invite to the party. How could I say no??

Instead of a guest book, I set up an easel with a piece of watercolor paper and allowed the guests to paint whatever they wanted. My original idea was that it would look like the backdrop for the food table & I had cut out (with my Cricut) the letter J (for Judah, their daughters name) to impose over the art. The artwork took a whole different direction but it ended up beautiful and unique.

Like I said before, I used the watercolors for a lot of projects, including this sign. I just painted around the edges, let it dry, then fed it through the printer.

These were my table centerpieces. I did some simple & cheap flower arrangements and added a DIY easel (made from popsicle sticks) with a quote from an artist.

Here are all four…

Slowing down & just enjoying art or creating something without a deadline is something I need to do more of!

Since I had that handy dandy watercolor set, I bought for $6, I decided to DIY my own watercolor wrapping paper. The wrapping paper was actually just plain white drawing paper I got at IKEA a year ago. The paper didn’t allow the watercolor paint to absorb like actual watercolor paper but it still turned out okay. Then, I topped it with one of my paper plate flowers.

Party Favors…oh what shall I do?? Hmm…have this $6 watercolor set I just bought. Ding, ding, ding…I’ll make DIY watercolor stationary sets for the guests.

I did two different kinds: spots & stripes. The beautiful thing about watercolors is they’re very gracious. Throw some colors onto a page and it looks beautiful! The stationary favors worked great & were inexpensive.

Here’s a breakdown of my party budget: 

Food – $60

Party Decorations – $25

Plates, Cups, etc – $15  (for the ice cream cups & wooden spoons…I already had everything else from other parties)

Favors – $11 (including stationary & watercolor set)

Invitations – $0 Sent via email because of a time crunch

Total: $111

I was shooting for under $150 (because we were planning on 25 people coming) so I was under budget.

Here are a few tips, based on this party that you can use for any party –

Are you planning any baby showers in the future? Have you ever done watercolor paintings?

Hope you have an awesome weekend!

p.s. This is YOUR official invite to the party… on the PartiesforPennies facebook page!  Click here.

Linking To: DesignDining&Diapers

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