Baby Shower

Baby showers are an American thing recently adopted by us English folk, although suitably toned down, thankfully. No-one could compete with the Tiffany gifts given at Miranda’s baby shower as seen on Sex and the City. Lets not be silly.

A friend of mine is 8 months pregnant and as I love to bake and feed people I suggested we organise a small tea party/baby shower for her and some friends. One last get together before the baby arrives and life is never the same again.

After being told not to ‘make a fuss’ I decided to ignore the boss and secretly ordered some decorations from babyshowerhost.com. Who knew these websites existed? There must be some keen baby shower hosts out there. I was also directed, by the gorgeous Nigella, to a fab online specialist cake company where I found the rather cute cookie cutters, as pictured above.

Then I set about planning my menu. We decided against alcohol from the off, if the star of the show couldn't drink I didn't think it was fair to let everyone else get giggly on the wine (plenty of time for that after the stork drops off the new arrival). As afternoon tea was the theme I decided upon smoked salmon sandwiches and cute cup cakes plus one show stopping cake to grace my Nigella cake stand. Any excuse to show it off.

Saturday was spent tied to a hot oven wishing outdoor kitchens existed. Then Sunday arrived and we whizzed through homemade lemonade, chocolate and Guinness cup cakes, a stunning red velvet cake with American frosting, rocking horse shaped double choc chip cookies (the Flamingos were sadly made redundant – their skinny legs and necks made transporting the pre-cooked cookie from work top to baking tray near impossible), sandwiches and orange jellies with jelly babies hidden inside. What a mission but 2.30pm arrived and we were ready. There was a slight last minute rush but my friend’s husband helped out by getting the ladders out and putting up our bunting!

We had a great afternoon, two of the girls bought their children, one being just a year old and the other only 7 weeks! Gifts were given, photos were taken and it was a really lovely occasion.