Posts Tagged: "baby shower"

Baby & Child 6-Piece Flatware Progress Set

- - Baby Shower, Kids

baby-child-flatware-progress-set-giftBabies outgrow baby items so quickly. But this baby shower gift grows with a child, getting years of use!

A silver baby spoon? Nah. No one has time to polish silver.

Kids Size Flatware

Go with a Baby & Child 6-Piece Flatware Progress Set instead! Progress sets come with a baby set of fork and two spoons of different shapes, and a child set of spoon, fork and knife.

The baby set is perfect for feeding baby food and the child set is perfect when children learn to feed themselves.

Oneida makes Baby & Child 6-Piece Flatware Progress Sets in adorable styles, including ones with hearts, teddy bears or ducks, that are stainless steel and dishwasher safe. They’re even packaged in a beautiful presentation box.

They’re so durable they can be passed down from generation to generation!

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Hershey’s Candy Bar Baby Birth Announcement

After 14 years, we have a new baby born in the family July 4, 2018. Announcing my great-nephew, Rogan Charles!

hershey's-candy-bar-baby-birth-announcement-thoughtful-gift-ideaAnd… GREAT it is!

It’s been so long since we’ve had a newborn in our family that when he was born on Independence Day, we definitely felt the parades, fireworks, and the whole nation celebrating was appropriate!

I wanted to take a celebratory gift to the hospital when we visited the new Mom, Dad and baby.

Easy Peasy DIY Baby Birth Announcement

I purchased 24 Hershey candy bars (12 plain and 12 almonds). Then I took a blue permanent magic marker and colored in the HE in HERSHEY.

It’s easy peasy! All you have to do is color within the lines!  Continue Reading

Personalized Toy Basket

- - $20 or Less, Kids

Toy baskets are a parent’s best friend…

Because they spend so much of their time picking up toys off the floor. Again and again and again.

personalized-toy-basket-bin-gift Someone has to pick up those 50 Hot Wheels cars and those 150 pieces of Mega Bloks. Yes, I make my kids help me a lot of the time but sometimes it’s just faster and easier to do it myself.

Toy baskets make it easy for parents (and kids) to clean up from room to room and the pretty baskets make cute storage space.

Their open top makes it simple to take things in and out, and they’re light enough even the kids can move them around. They can be filled with anything from large wooden toys to soft stuffed animals. They are just so convenient!

Life with children is a beautiful mess and toy baskets make it cleaner and more organized.

DIY Personalized Toy Basket

A gift I like to give for baby showers and kids’ birthdays is a Personalized Toy Basket with a child’s name on it. I make them myself and you can too!

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Funny Books for Parents With a Sense of Humor

I’m a parent with a twisted sense of humor, and I’m not the only one.

I think it’s actually healthy because I’m able to laugh at things that normally would drive someone crazy!

A sense of humor (twisted or not) will get you through the highlights and pitfalls of parenthood. For example, I have a child in diapers so every day is full of shits and giggles. Literally.

My friend Beth and I bond over our twisted sense of humor. I’m so excited she’s pregnant with her first baby!

When it came time to pick out her baby shower gifts, I knew what book I just had to give her!

Hilarious Books for Parents

It’s called Go the F**k to Sleep by Adam Mansbach and Ricardo Cortés.

Sleep deprivation was one of the hardest things I dealt with as a new mom. When your baby just won’t go to bed, you do start to think, “For the love of God, go the f**k to sleep!”

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My First Library | Baby Shower Gift

- - Baby Shower

We all have our favorite childhood books or the ones we enjoyed reading aloud to our own children.

my-first-library-baby-shower-gift

If you’re like me, you love certain titles so much you want other children to read them and fall in love with them too!

When thinking about what to give my best friend for her baby shower gift, I wanted it to be meaningful and special. I reflected on what things my two boys really liked when they were babies and also what things I really enjoyed as a new parent… Definitely books!

Certain books I’ve read to my boys more than 100 times so I decided to give her copies of the children’s books that were favorites in my own family.

I picked out a cute wooden crate and glued painted wooden letters that spelled MY FIRST LIBRARY.

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Pay It Forward Baby Shower

- - Baby Shower

With your first baby, you feel like you need every baby gear that exists. You’ll register for anything that could make your life and baby’s life easier. Baby wipe warmer. Check!

pay-it-forward-baby-shower-gift

As you prepare for your second baby’s arrival, you may realize you don’t need many baby items, especially if you’re having your second boy or second girl. You may not even need diapers if you cloth diapered your first child.

You may opt for a baby sprinkle, a smaller version of a baby shower, or decide you don’t need even that.

But what if a friend, family or co-worker insists on throwing you a baby shower to celebrate your second (or third or fourth) baby’s arrival and you’re not in need of baby items?

The answer is a Pay It Forward Baby Shower.

This type of baby shower honors you and your baby but the gifts people bring benefit an expectant mother in need.

The baby gifts could be donated to a low-income mom, a single mom, a teen mom, or a local non-profit organization dedicated to providing babies with life’s basic necessities.

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Pregnancy Survival Kit for the Expecting Momma

- - Baby Shower

I’m three weeks away from my due date with my second baby. Looking down at my basketball-sized belly and swollen feet, I feel like each and every woman deserves a medal for surviving pregnancy.

pregnancy-survival-kit-thoughtful-giftA pregnant woman’s body goes through a million changes leading up to baby’s arrival so provide her with lots of support and TLC. If you know a momma-to-be, you can give her a Pregnancy Survival Kit containing some or all of these essential items at the beginning of her pregnancy.

Belly Cream.

The dreaded stretch marks. Prevention is key so she’ll want to start using anti-stretch mark creams starting in the first trimester on her belly, breasts, and butt. This specific cream did wonders for me during both of my pregnancies. I put it on after every shower.

Pregnancy Books.

There are several good ones out there but my go-to pregnancy book is What to Expect When You’re Expecting. It doles out tons of practical advice in bite-sized chunks of information using a Q&A format. There’s a reason why it’s a New York Times bestseller and one of USA Today‘s 25 most influential books of the past 25 years.

Prenatal Vitamins. 

They’re vital for fetal and maternal health, and it’s something she’ll have to take every day.

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Aden & Anais Swaddle Blankets

- - Baby Shower

Besides our cloth diapers, the baby items we used the most for our son were our Aden & Anais Swaddle Blankets.

swaddle-blankets-baby-shower-giftWe received other types of swaddle blankets, but these worked so much better that we used them all of the time. I really liked that they were soft, stretchy, lightweight and breathable.

They’re made of 100% cotton muslin so they get even softer each time you wash them.

Besides using them for swaddling, I used them cover his car seat or to cover me up when I was nursing. In a pinch we used them as burping cloths. My son continued to use them as a sleeping blanket until the age of three!

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Celebrate With Sparkling Juice & Mocktails

There are many opportunities for celebrating at work. Just because you can’t consume alcohol or champagne at the office shouldn’t prevent you from toasting someone’s good news.

celebrate-sparkling-juice-mocktails-giftMy co-worker, RaShonda, recently received a job promotion and became a grandmother for the first time. Two big reasons to celebrate!

To congratulate her on her two brand-new titles, Personnel Assistant and Gigi (her nickname for grandma), I decided to bring some treats to the office.

I brought a bottle of sparkling white grape juice cocktail, a bottle of sparkling Mango Bellini mocktail, and some white chocolate covered pretzels.

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Baby Growth Calendar Photos

- - $20 or Less, Baby Shower

Parents love to capture precious moments of their baby’s first year, especially how fast they grow every month. I have a unique, cute and easy photo idea for every month – a baby growth calendar!

st-year-baby-growth-calendar-thoughtful-gift-idea

7 month, 8 month, 9 month, 10 month, 11 month, 12 month click to enlarge

My cousin took pictures of her baby girl with a large calendar desk pad. The photos consist of her baby lying on top of the calendar every month of her first year.

I’m sure it was easy at first but took several takes to get the photos just right when she started rolling or crawling. It’s all about creating memories, right?

She would write on the calendar 1st month, 2nd month and so on. This made for the most adorable baby pictures. Continue Reading