Paul and Ashley decorated Connor's nursery in a darling blue whale theme so our delayed baby shower followed suit :) Baby Connor decided to make his entrance into this world a tad early while daddy Paul was on the mountain at his summer National Guard training camp. It was quite an eventful day to say the least. The cord was wrapped about Connor's little neck four times and around his feet so I guess he realized he had to make his presence known! Ashley's friend Jen and brother Cam were with her at the hospital and literally only three minutes to spare Paul had been located, tore down the mountain and made it to the delivery room where Ash had to have a C-section. But all is well. Baby and mama did well and grandma (I LOVE this new title) was able to fly in immediately to be with our kidlets :)
Connor is such a precious little baby! We are all so in love with him; as such the shower I had planned for Ash had to be postponed but alas at a month old he was the star of the show. Thank you dear family and friends for helping to create and/or attend the festivities! Ash was delighted with the party and Connor was as good as gold. Of course I could not help but spoil him rotten!! I have been finding all sorts of unique, fun gifts for him for months! Everything from theme gifts such as a teddy bear, book and clothes, to camo outfits (layette) and even entire Army fatigues when he is 4 years old, to zany Spider Man shoes, to a cute little Onsie with a fabric tie and vest sown on the front to wear to church! Our special aunts and cousins showered him with such thoughtful gifts as well, as did all of Ashley's friends and neighbors :) One extra special gift was a darling pastel colored flannel baby blanket with matching burp cloth with crocheted edges by his great grandmother Maybelle (my mom) who has since passed away but created two works precious blankets one for each of our kids. I added a cuddly stuffed lamb to go along with it in remembrance of a childhood song my mother used to sing to me and I to our kids and now to Connor ... "Rockabye don't you cry we'll come home to grammies. By the hill, beside the mill we'll see a little lamby."
Ashley's friend Aimee designed and constructed our banners "Connor", "Mustache Bar" and all of the spectacles and mustaches on sticks for photo ops. Her friend Jen helped her design the cute invitations and little gift bags filled with blue taffy; from the embossing to the embellishments all whale themed. Ash and Jen also helped me create a darling scrapbook style grandma brag booklet of photos of Connor! Another friend Tiffany created the most adorable fondant whale cookies; even the little bags, bows and dangling cards were adorable! Loraine helped with our lovely chicken salad croissants, Ash also made her delicious pasta salad and Paul helped me load, transport, unload, set up and take down of our cute display and food tables, etc. A great shower tip was to have all guests address their own thank you card envelopes so that Ash could more easily mail out sincere thanks. I placed a little paper whale in three of the cards and whomever discovered the whale won a prize! It was such a fun shower! PS I ordered an entire huge Crayola Crayon box filled with Ashley's favorite colored sirilian blue crayons for one of my special activities/stories - ask me about it some time! (wink)
