Baby B Shower (Part I)

Welcome to my first series on planning a baby shower!  I'm going to walk you through may planning process during the next few posts.

Step One:  Determine if you will have a theme. This shower will have a "Bee" theme.  I love Bee themes because they can range from being cutesy to vintage...and this shower will be a mix of the two.

Step Two:  Find your invitation.  The invitation is the first thing your guests will see, and will set the tone for the event.  As you get to know me, you'll learn that I buy most things (that I don't make myself) from Etsy sellers.  When it comes to invitations, I buy almost exclusively from Etsy.  I narrowed the pool of great options to these three:

PapierSanctum offers a couple bee-themed options.  This one caught my eye because of its vintage feel:

LilSproutGreetings offers a couple invitations featuring the letter B.  I really like this one, but because we had settled on a bee theme, this one made the final three: 

PrintSmitten also offers some great options. I was really drawn to the crispness of this particular bee themed invitation against the natural backdrop.

Which one did I choose?  Not so fast...I can't make that decision yet.  My next step is to look for other coordinating items.  Note that I said coordinating - I didn't say matching.  Matchy matchy is no bueno in my book.  I think it spells disaster - if you look like you were trying to match colors/shapes, and you don't quite pull it off, it looks bad.  But, if you coordinate items, your event looks like a million dollars - even if you only spend pennies.

So, what specifically am I looking for?  For a shower I need food, decorations and gifts/favors, at a minimum.  Because of the bee theme, anything honey-flavored or made from beeswax is a possibility. But, what I really do at this point is pull from each invitation to create the overall look and feel of the shower. I'm inspired by the vintage hive, the sweet simplicity of the "b," and the honeycomb shapes.  I know I'll find something!  Once I have found some items to pull the shower together, I'll make a final decision on the invitation.

Stay tuned!

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Option #1: Vintage beehive via Etsy seller PapierSanctum  

Option #2: B/Bee for Baby via Etsy seller LilSproutGreetings

Option #3: Honeycomb Pattern via Etsy seller PrintSmitten