A welcome celebration! WARNING - Picture overload!

I'm very lucky that my closest family & friends agree with me; that each baby - whether your first, your second, your fifth, your final - and each pregnant mama needs a celebration party. Call it a shower, a sprinkle, a get-together... its important to me to be celebrated and pampered as I approach my baby's arrival. So, my sister arranged a small party, in my honor, and invited my closest friends and family. The theme was books - in honor of my love of reading (to myself and to my kiddos), each guest was asked to bring a book for the baby. I have to chuckle at the number of turtle books that my baby received!

My sister did the decorating and made the invitations. Mom supplied the food. And my friends supplied the entertainment (who knew that my husband could accurately draw a nursing bra/nursing pads for a close game of Pictionary?! or that our former nanny didn't know many nursery rhymes?!). We had an amazing time and it was so wonderful to celebrate baby's impending arrival.

I tried to take a lot of pictures, so here are some of my favorites... THANK YOU to those who came, and of course, those who planned the shindig.

The food! YUM!!



Flowers from my mother-in-law. Beautiful!


Diapers...part of a game. Y'know...the one where you closely examine the contents and identify which candy bar "filled" the diaper?! Fun stuff!

The cake pops that my sister made. YUMMMMY!!! (they were made to look like rattles with our last initial on them, since baby doesn't have a first name yet!)


The baby swing almost collapsed under the weight of the prizes for the games we played.

The favors my sister made... flowers from mom & sister in the background.

The favors & flowers...

My sister's first crack at a diaper cake! Not too shabby, huh?! Topped with baby's first doll...which my two older girls also have. I just wonder if this one will match the hair color of her doll - the other two have not!

Our game of Pictionary was quite entertaining... even for those who didn't think they could draw well enough. I saved all the pictures because they were so comical!!! (or surprising!!)

My guests examining the contents of the afore-mentioned diapers... don't they look enthralled?!