What fun we had Making Way for Baby Ocampo a few weeks ago! For those of you who are unfamiliar with the children’s book, Make Way for Ducklings, it shares an adorable story about a duckling family that builds a home in the Boston Common. It is local favorite around here.

Along with my fabulous hosts Ellen, Laura and my Mom, we thought it would be the perfect shower theme for Claire and Kendra (the two mommies to be), as Boston was their home for 7+ years and we were planning the festivities here in town. Here were some of our  highlights.

YELLOW is far from mellow

The first thing that came to mind when I thought of ducklings was the color yellow. The color yellow added fresh and bright touches to our baby girl decor.

DIY DECOR

I wanted to room to have a DIY country chic feel. Thanks to ABannerAffair  (an etsy store), I was able to display a  perfectly distressed”Its a Girl” banner on our fireplace above all the gifts.

I also decided that one of our gifts was too adorable to keep wrapped during the party. We took one of baby Ocampo’s new baby dresses and displayed it like a piece of art in one of my repurposed white frames.

Quiche, Orzo and Watermelon

We tried to keep the brunch menu light, colorful and fun, including a make your own yogurt parfait bar, veggies and dip and a fresh, orzo, pesto and tomato salad.  My mother added her famous watermelon and feta salad to the spread and I cooked 4 semi-homemade quiches. Click here for the recipes I used from pinterest for the chicken sausage and red pepper quiche  or the spinach, goat cheese and sun-dried tomato quiche . Both were yummy.

Champagne and Butter Cream Anyone? 

We served coffee, cucumber water, seltzer and my favorite, a customized Mimosa bar. One of my co-hosts, Laura, was sure to bring all the fruity fixings and plenty of champagne for those of us who weren’t expecting to enjoy.

Our dessert bar featured cream puffs and cake pops from our favorite local Italian bakery, Josephs. Ellen also ordered a show stopping butter cream vanilla cake from Party Favors, featuring the ducklings walking through the Boston Common (see photo above). It really did steal the show! And not just because Party Favors has the best butter cream frosting I have every tasted 🙂

Duckling Twists

As many of you know, one of my favorite shower or birthday ideas involves asking guests to sign a keepsake hardback book for the shower honorees. In this case it was a copy Make Way for Duckling of course.

In addition, guests were asked to bring a book to add to the baby Ocampo library and sign individual duckling book-plate stickers that could then be added to the front or back page of every book. You can find these adorable book-plates at Kreatives on etsy.

When it came to shower activities, Laura designed an interactive and ridiculously fun Duckling themed scattegories game that all of the guests enjoyed. And finally when it came to our favors, guests received a duckling soap upon their departure.

Hope these event planning highlights help encourage your own creative and DIY ideas for your next baby shower or birthday party!

With Celebration and Ducklings,

Rae