Storybook Baby Shower

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My sister-in-law Rachel is pregnant with her fourth girl in less than six years!
I am of the opinion that all babies deserve a baby shower, but when you have four in a row of the same gender, you need a baby shower! Everything is trashed after three kids!!

When I was planning Rachel's shower, I kept thinking about how snug and cozy it is to sit by the fire with a stack of books and a mug of hot cocoa around Christmas. I wanted to incorporate that sense of comfort and coziness into Rachel's shower and have a great "girls' night in" enjoying yummy treats and good company.

A storybook shower was the perfect theme!

Along with incorporating different storybook/fairy tale elements throughout the shower, I decided to serve cookies and cocoa--because can you think of a better girls' night in during the holidays than a cookies and cocoa party??
I set the treat table with "storybook" things that I gathered from around the house: a stuffed dragon, wooden sword, and shield; Little Red Riding Hood's basket; and a few copies of Grimm's Fairy Tales and an old storybook from DI. All the cookies that I served were in cookie jars. I found the mushroom one and the pumpkin one at DI and my mother-in-law let me borrow her gingerbread man and old-woman-who-lived-in-a-shoe cookie jars.

We had "Three Bears Porridge Cookies" (oatmeal craisin) and "Peter Peter Pumpkin Eater Cookies" (pumpkin)...
... along with "Rumplestiltskin's Golden Haystacks" (butterscotch and chow mein noodles) and Gingerbread Men.

Along with cookies, I had a hot cocoa bar. I made my famous crockpot hot cocoa and set out three different kinds of marshmallows (gingerbread, chocolate, and normal), whipped cream, sprinkles, chocolate syrup, and caramel syrup, and let people go crazy.

As a party favor, I made "Milk Mustaches". I just bought a mustache mold at Michael's and used vanilla bark. They're on sticks so you can hold them up to your face--pretty cute! I also used more storybook elements to decorate the hot cocoa bar--Rapunzel's braid, the frog prince and the princess's golden ball, a stack of Mother Goose books, and one of the three bears.

And there are the milk mustaches!
We just played one short party game. I had Rachel pick a slip of paper out of a basket that had a storybook or fairy tale character written on it and then she answered yes or no questions for us to guess who she was. Simple and fun!

We had a great shower and we are so excited to welcome Rachel's baby in a few weeks!

Remember to check out Duncan Hines' website www.duncanhines.com to find some great recipes for your holiday get-together! I was selected for this sponsorship by the Clever Girls Collective.