Into the Woods Baby Shower

I love babies - who doesn't right?
I love that I get to share the joy with close friends as they expect their new dear sweet bundles of joy!

I love planning parties too!  

And I love being in the woods. 

So what could be better than to combine all of those things into one lovely baby shower?  

Yup, that's right.  A dear friend of mine is expecting her first little one here in a few more months, and I had the privileged of being able to host a baby shower for her at our church.  

The theme for their son's nursery is Woodland.  So I took that idea and after churning it around in my creative brain for a bit and scouring Pinterest for inspiration, I had a fantastic idea to do a woodland theme inspired baby shower! 

This was such a great theme to work with since so much of the decorations draw right from nature.  Thus a trip down to my parents and a visit to my basement yielded most of the supplies I would need for virtually free!   

Enjoy the photos of the end result!

For the Buffet Table, I used white table clothes, and I lined the back of the table with wood chunks, glass canning jars that held a tea candle, and pine cones scattered in between everything.  

I also added a few small sparrow figurines I had by placing them on top of some of the chunks of wood.  I hung a banner I had made for my friend to use later in her nursery on the wall being the table to add a little extra splash of color.

I found these darling birch pattern paper straw on Amazon.  I love how they add just a little something extra. 

Since we were expecting around 30 guests at this baby shower, I decided to create one long table for everyone to sit at so we could all enjoy each others company.  Plus, it was a lot of fun creating one large dramatic centerpiece. I covered the tables in white paper table clothes and down the center of the table I used some burlap fabric I got on sale at Walmart to create the base for a large dramatic runner.  On the burlap, I placed dried wood that I collected from my parent's woods and black river rocks I pulled from their creek.  Then I mixed throughout all of that, pine cones I'd picked up at the park and different sized glass canning jars that held tea candles (the canning jars were from my ridiculously large stash of canning jars I have in the basement).  I also added some green dried moss I picked up at JoAnn's (again on sale!), and I'm glad I added the moss because it added a lot of color to an otherwise neutral centerpiece. 

Finally, for the centerpiece, I added the four flowering plants that were going to be used as game prizes.  I love how the Red, Orange, Purple and Yellow flowers really popped in the centerpiece. 

Oh, and yes, I also added to the centerpiece some more little sparrow figurines that I had to give it all a little more character.  

Around the edge of the table at each place setting, I set out the napkins and utensils alongside the favors that I had put together for everyone as a thank you for being a part of this special day.

The favors were a lot of fun and so easy to do.  I had 3 dozen jars of grape jelly still down in the basement from the last time I went a little crazy canning.  In my defense I was 7 months pregnant at the time and not quite in my right mind - although do not tell my husband that. ;)  

But anyways, I digress.  For the favors, I took some grape Jelly, placed a red gingham cupcake liner under the canning ring, tied brown twine around the rim, and added a small tag that said "Thank you".  I then put those jars into a wooden quart basked with some brown paper filler and tada!  I just love how rustic these look and how much they added to the overall table layout.

Since some of the invited guests were under the age of 10, I set up a Kids table for them.  I had a little burlap left over from the main table and just set out something simple for their centerpiece. 

This was the activity table at which I asked people to write their names and addresses on envelopes to make it easier for the guest of honor to send out thank you notes.  And I also had a basket of new born diapers and asked that people write a cute little note on those to encourage the new parents at 2 in the morning in the not too distant future. 

And last but not least, is the amazing cake that was made for the shower.  

A dear, sweet mutual friend who is great at making caking, made this for the new parents.  

It captures the joy of having a little boy, it included the new daddy's love of sports, 

and of coarse their little pug "Lucy" had to make an appearance as well!  

Oh, I would also like to say a huge and heartfelt THANK YOU to Angela who without her help and effort, the decorations for this baby shower would have fallen far short, the baby shower wouldn't have been half as fun, nor the food nearly as delicious! 

Thank you!!