The Best Shower Ever!!

Ingredients to a great baby shower:

1.) Great Family and Friends
2.) The "Baby Maker" Cocktail (One part fruit punch, two parts Bacardi Rum)
3.) Pin the Sperm on the Egg (the Game)
4.) Fried Chicken, Macaroni, and plenty of other alcohol absorbing food


In retrospect, the weeks leading up to my baby shower weren't very eventful. As my sister drove around town collecting blue onesie picture frames which would act as my favors, and my parents spent days replacing the everything from the carpet in the basement to the yard set, Patrick and I tried not to think too much about it because the truth is that neither of us really wanted to assume that anyone would come.

I know that sounds pessimistic but I think a better way to look at it is that we went into the shower with a pragmatic outlook. 1) It's still a recession - no matter what MSNBC reports, 2) We just got married a year ago and people may be upset that we just sent our thank you cards out a month ago, and 3) In general, neither of us like to bank on others doing stuff for us, so we just thought it would be best to prepare to buy everything that we needed, from the bibs to the bottles to the Baby Einstein play-yard ourselves.

Nevertheless, the one thing that I knew for sure was that the shower would be anything but conventional. There would be no mini tuna sandwiches with the crust cut off here. Instead of ice tea one would likely find liquor, in place of "Baby Jeopardy" or "Don't Say Baby" there would plenty of politically incorrect games, and as an alternative to bruschetta and crab cakes there would be fried chicken, macaroni, and lasagna.

Around 3pm (the time the shower began), no one had arrived. Pat sat on the couch looking at football and around 3:30, he looked at me with a look that obviously said, "Is anyone gonna come?"  I just gave him a quick shrug and went to refill my plate with three more chicken wings as I continued to talk to my sister and godsister. Knowing my family and friends, I wasn't too worried because I know that everyone runs on CP TIME + 2 hours -- but I did hope that people would come moreso for my parents, sister, and husband than for myself.

Sure enough, by 4pm the house began to fill with my mother's friends and as Patrick predicted, by the time my mother came downstairs to make her "Grand(mother) Entrance" around 4:30, the house was filling up fast.

Once 6pm arrived, Patrick and I looked around my parents house and were truly humbled. There we saw family, extended family, pseudo-family, old friends, new friends, co-workers, neighbors, and other loved ones from various times in our life. After three rounds of "Pin the Sperm on the Egg" and a few rounds of "Change the Dirty Diaper", it took us another hour and a half just to go through all of the gifts. Needless to say, we were truly overwhelmed and grateful.

So Teddy is coming into this world very loved and very well-dressed. Yet, after it was all said and done, I truly believe that I would have been just as grateful if people couldn't have brought anything but their love and support. Venturing into parenthood for the first time is scary enough, so to know that you have the love, support, and prayers of people who truly care for you is worth its weight in gold...(But don't get me wrong, the gifts are appreciated as well.)