enJOY it

This past weekend, my high school girlfriends got together to shower our friend Erin with love before her baby girl Lucy is born in April. There were just six of us and it was much more about being together and chatting than anything else. We've been friends for nearly two decades and it's unreal that we are now on to the second generation of little girl friends.

The "theme" of the shower was "earthtones" because Erin was "feeling earthtones" for the baby room. In general, I think picking a color scheme is the best way ever to host a party because "decorating" involves gathering everything you own in those colors, buying some flowers and calling it done.

At least that was my plan. Until I realized that the oversized photos of my baby are not ideal decorations for someone else's shower (DUH, Elise. That's on par with talking about your own wedding when someone tells you they're engaged.) and decided to switch out the frames and ampersand in our dining area for a yarn garland.

Yarn garlands might be my new favorite thing. You get to use up the remainder of your current yarn stash and you have an excuse to buy some pretty new stuff. (All of this came from Joann's.) I just used a length of yarn for the main piece and then wrapped various lengths in various colors around it (using this method).

I decided to make a simple "LUCY" banner to cover the random intercom box that is usually in our kitchen too. Oviously I could have given it a pass with the iron…

Other than that – candles, candles and more candles plus some Trader Joe's flowers were the extent of the decor. I pulled all the earthtone colored vessels in our house (many came from my thrifting adventures) and stuck in them tapers from Trader Joe's and small pillars from Ikea.

Paul BBQed burgers (because that's what Erin's been craving), we ate dinner, painted onesies, tossed Ellerie back and forth and played games (all by candlelight). And then we chatted late into the evening about husbands, babies, jobs and life because that's the point of all this anyway. I failed to get great group or many people photos but sometimes that's how it goes.

Such a good evening and Erin, we love you. You're going to be an awesome mama to Lucy. Ellerie and I cannot wait to meet her.

ps. see the watercolor invitations here and the shower my girlfriends threw me last April here.