One of my best friends from college is pregnant and that meant I got to help throw her a baby shower!! It was such an honor and so much fun to put together. So many of you on Instagram loved seeing the photos, so I wanted to write up a full blog post on some of my favorite decor pieces and how we went about planning it in case you’re planning one soon too!

1. Pick a theme

Once you’ve got a date, time and an invite list (we asked the mom to be to send over a list to make it easy!) – picking a theme is your next task. This will help guide you on decor, invites, food and the general feel of the party. We picked Born To Be Wild to go off the nursery decor – I loved the options for decor and the baby animal aspect of it just felt perfect.

2. Pick a Location

Your location needs to be big enough for all your guests and should obviously be in a convenient location. We wanted to keep it at a neutral space that was also affordable, so we went with a local place in Ocean City- The Buzzed Word.

Wherever you choose, you’ll want to confirm with the place their stance on things like decorations, food, alcohol, and time for set-up and break down.

3. Decide Food + Drink

Depending on the time of the party, you’ll likely need to plan out food options. Of course, you could do a full meal, but we chose to do a brunch spread since it was in the morning! We had it catered by Sweet Bites Charcuterie and they made the most awesome boards for everyone to snack off of. Not only was it beautiful but it was so delicious.

Of course, mocktails were for the mom-to-be, but we also put together a MOM-osa bar for guests. It was a fun activity for people to put together their own drink, plus it made it easy to make a mocktail for the mom-to-be!

4. Decor

Note: we decided to hire out help with the decor Palm Picnics OCMD did an amazing job on helping us organize everything and set up the cutest decorations!

This was the fun part for us! Palm Picnics did an amazing job at providing some great eye-catching decor pieces. They handled Balloons, a display shelf, the peacock chair, and a big sign which made it so easy. Of course, you could find a lot of different options to do this yourself on Etsy and Amazon so I’ve linked some stuff here in case you want to go that route. I used a lot of these Etsy items to add little touches that fit the theme.

Here are some of my favorite items:

• Jungle themed garland

• Giant stuffed giraffe + lion

• Plastic jungle animals

• Baby succulents + party favor signs

• Decorative Boxes

• Decorative signs

• Decorative baskets

• Balloons (we used our event planner, but you could definitely use these kits!)

5. Party Favors

Decorative cookies are always such a cute touch to any party. If you’re local, Laney Bakes did ours and they were so yummy and perfectly on theme. We also had a table with baby succulents for guests to take home to “watch them grow”. A small but super cute touch that helped add to the theme.

6. Outfit

You guys know I had to make sure that my outfit was also on theme! Baby Showers during spring are the perfect time to bring out some cute dresses. I picked out some pieces from Rent The Runway to try on and went with an animal print maxi dress + a knitted sweater. If you’re looking for a special outfit, but dont want to buy, make sure to check out Rent The Runway and use my code RTRFAM5994439 for 40% off first two months of the 8 or 16 item memberships.

Most of all, it is so important to have fun and think about the mom-to-be as you plan it out. You want to make sure that whatever you’re doing is something that they’re comfortable with and that they’ll love. If they love being the center of attention, find ways to put her in the spotlight, but if she’s more of an introvert, maybe skip the games that put her front and center. Hosting the baby shower is such a special honor and I’m so grateful that I got to be a part of this milestone in a friend’s life. If you have any questions about any specifics, ask them below!