My Family Baby Shower

I spent this past weekend in Raleigh with a handful of women who mean so much to me. My aunt and grandmother planned a family baby shower to celebrate our little man and all of the women from my mom’s side of the family gathered together for three days filled with so much love, lots of reminiscing, plenty of hilarious story-telling and unconditional support.

I wish I could relive the entire weekend and left Raleigh last night with a very full heart. I feel so grateful to have such kind and thoughtful family members who wanted to celebrate this special time in our lives.

Most of us arrived in town on Friday but my shower didn’t kick off until lunchtime on Saturday. I was told I had to spend Saturday morning away from my aunt’s house and after I picked up my grandmother and great aunt around 11:30 a.m., the three of us headed back to my Aunt Laurie’s place and arrived to a house that had been transformed with adorable light blue and baby boy-themed décor.

To my incredible family: Thank you all so much for the time and effort you poured into my shower. There were so many little details that came together to make my shower so special. I think I spent the first 30 minutes pointing out creative decorations and crafty projects that popped out at me from around the house!

There was plenty of wine, sangria and “spa water” made with freshly sliced lemons and limes to drink and we sipped out of stemless wine glasses decorated with our initials that my aunt had made for everyone as party favors.

(HUGE thank you to my sister and my cousin Katie for taking almost all of the pictures you see in this post. I did not snap a single photo this weekend and they both captured everything perfectly!)

We didn’t waste too much time chatting and catching up before it was time to sit down for lunch.

We had plenty of chopped salad, fresh fruit and mini sandwiches to eat, all of which were so delicious! The chopped salad was packed with fresh fruit, almonds and avocado and I’ll try to get the recipe to share with you guys soon because everyone absolutely raved about it. Such a great summertime dish!

After lunch, we all moved into the living room to open gifts. I was completely overwhelmed by the gifts everyone brought for our baby boy and their incredible generosity. I said it felt like Christmas morning!

I’m pretty sure our little boy is already spoiled and he hasn’t even arrived yet!

I opened some of the most thoughtful gifts including hand-knit sweaters, homemade artwork for the nursery and much-needed items from our registry.

My mom made me cry with a bassinette filled with the most touching gifts. She gave us a handmade baby toy and blanket, scrapbook (already filled with lots of pictures from my pregnancy that she took from the blog!), a first-edition copy of The Bobbsey Twins book (a book from one of my favorite childhood series), clothes, diapers and more.

I have the best mother in the whole world and I only hope to one day be half the mother she is to our little boy. I’ve had one heck of a good teacher, that’s for sure!

One of the gifts Ryan was particularly excited about when I showed him everything after I arrived home yesterday was a snazzy red car toy from my grandma!

With help from my aunt, they changed out the license plate on the front to say “Fagan’s First” which was way too cute!

The rest of my shower included a series of three fun games, including one where we used toothpicks to take tiny tastes of baby food.

We had to guess what kind of baby food was in which jar and it was harder than expected… and also quite hilarious!

This was everyone’s reaction to jar number two, which ended up being green beans:

Ick!

Once we were done with games, my shower was officially over, but since everyone was staying for the weekend, the fun didn’t stop! We headed out onto the deck for happy hour (more spa water for me!) and spent several hours chatting until we moved back inside to watch American Pharoah win the first Triple Crown in 37 years.

And then it was time for dinner! We dug into a delicious homemade meal before surprising my grandma with a celebration for birthday!

She turned 86 at the end of May and it was such a treat to be able to celebrate together. Happy birthday, Mimi!

I think she’s going to make an absolutely amazing great grandmother!

Thank you again to my aunt and grandma for hosting such a beautiful shower for me and our little boy. And to my entire family for all of the love and effort you poured into making Saturday so special. I know I am so lucky to be able to call all of you my family. I love you!