Our Baby Shower

   Last Friday I was able to drive up to Gainesville so my mom and I could run errands and get the last bit of decorations and food items needed for the baby shower.  Originally I was planning on having two baby showers (a second one was semi-planned for May 20th at our house in Orlando), but after Michael said baby showers are more of a girl thing and he didn't want to invite any of his friends, I only had three people to invite, and none of those friends know each other.. So I cancelled it, which it makes it extra special that my mom worked really hard to make this one so great!! ♡ I was also really thankful for being able to drive up on Friday since Michael's car had been at the dealership getting worked on and we had been carpooling the past two days. I really enjoyed having his company to and from work, but that meant he had to get up an hour early so I could be at work by 6:20am (normally he leaves for work around 6:35am). But we were able to pick up his car last Thursday night.
   Between running errands, my mom and I met Zach and Jacquie at Peyton's daycare for "International Day", since they aren't allowed to celebrate Easter. Each classroom was set up as a different country and each parent brought an assigned dish. Zach made Australian Parmesan puffs. Italy was my favorite - I love my carbs! We stayed up late cutting cards and wrapping the popcorn and by 10:30pm, Mommy said we could just put out a plate of Milano cookies instead of decorating them with icing to look like babies. Yet the next morning when I came back from breakfast with Grandpa and Daddy, what was she working on? The Milano babies! Luckily I think she had a little bit of time to rest, and this week my parents have been on vacation visiting Grandma Belva. I'm hoping Michael and I will get a chance to take Emma to meet her while I'm on maternity leave, but we might have to plan for sooner than later.

  I know Mommy was glad she made time to decorate the Milano baby cookies because they were such a hit! Everyone mentioned how cute they were and not a single one was left uneaten!  I forgot to take a picture of the matching plates, cups, and napkins, but they were a light green with a baby carriage on them.

   The first hour consisted of everyone eating, greeting, and talking together, then we began playing games. The first one was an old wives tale quiz and everyone had to write down if they thought that comment was supposed to mean a person would have a boy or a girl. I wrote my answers down by what changes I had noticed or not in the past seven months, but still got four wrong. Mia's mom won that game. The second game was everyone had to cut a piece of string in the circumference of what they thought my belly was, then Mommy measured me: 37 inches. Lindsey won since her string was the shortest at 39 inches, while a lot of other people's string measured in the high 40's or low 50's, ha!  The third game is what I called "the pee game". We wore balloons under our shirts or dresses to simulate pregnancy, and then had to hold a quarter between our knees to simulate holding our bladder, and walk the 30 feet to the patio where we would attempt to drop the quarter into a cup.

 Tonia's younger sister Kendall got her quarter in the cup in the first try, so we upped it to "two quarters to win". Kendall got her second quarter in too! Mommy passed out pre-wrapped prizes to the three game winners. We also had a word scramble game to play, but skipped it since we still had to do cake and presents! I didn't get a picture of the inside of the cake, but it was from Publix - vanilla with fresh strawberries in the middle. It was very good and Michael definitely devoured the leftovers we took home! ;)  Alana was super helpful and took pictures on our Canon of us cutting the cake and opening all of the presents.

 ^^ Oh my GOSH, he is such a cutie!!  I was really surprised with how many presents there were, and that each person gave us about five things. Everyone followed my request of bringing a book instead of a greeting card since books will get much more use. Alana and Robin both got us huge boxes of diapers (around 200 count each). That should last us about a month or two, right? Haha. I definitely want to use this bunny as a prop when I document Emma's growth each month and see how long it takes her to get bigger than the bunny.

 Although Mia also got us a baby book, she couldn't resist getting a card and writing a lot of great things inside. I keep these cards from her forever because they are so fun to read years later. Of course I wish Mia could have been there, but I knew it was impossible with her living in Colorado.  Her mom sent her lots of pictures and videos of the party, and I called her on my drive home.

 ^^ My mom filled this box with a lot of my own baby clothes, including the outfits I came home from the hospital in almost 30 years ago! I don't look anywhere near almost 30, right? ;)  Michael got this picture of me with Mia's mom before everyone left. The party was scheduled from 1-3pm, but with extra time to open all of the presents, lasted until 4pm! But it was so sweet of everyone to stay the whole time and not rush us through any of the party. It was a very enjoyable time.