Baby Shower

The other day, Partner-in-Crime suggested that I haven't written enough about my pregnancy on this blog. I suspect it seems that way to him because our Aussie-to-be is an omnipresent being in our lives these days; but as a matter for public discourse, I must admit that I don't find the topic of "expecting" all that compelling. There is a sentimental gene that I missed out on somewhere down the evolutionary line. 

But, his suggestion did remind me that one thing I could share is our baby shower from a couple of weeks ago.

We were invited (I believed) to a house warming party at our friend G's new apartment (G is one of the Yanks from my almost exclusively American book club contingent). Strangely, P-i-C had arranged to bring half a dozen bottles of wine to this party, which struck me as odd. But, we do love G, so I thought he was being quite helpful.

When we arrived, G opened the door and, lined up across the room were all people that I knew, including almost everyone from the book club, but also a few faces from completely different parts of my life ... our longest Aussie friend, the head of our church group, my old boss... baby decorations everywhere ... this was a shower, not a housewarming, and G and P-i-C had conspired to make it happen. I got teary looking at all those smiling faces. And, the wine made much more sense. 

G has a secret calling in life, which is to be an event planner and her secret talent was on display at this party. She'd prepared a massive spread of gorgeous food, including a cake covered with our announcement photo. Gender neutral baby decorations were carefully arranged. And, she had a whole afternoon of games planned.

I've never thought myself much of a baby shower game person, but with G's persuasion it was hard not to be entertained by an afternoon of Baby Pictionary and so forth. The wearing of the "ribbon hat" was a little too embarrassing for me, but otherwise, I found myself embracing the old fashioned American shower spirit.

Baby showers are not nearly as common in Australia as they are in the States, and from what I can infer, most of the ones here are more along the lines of the civilized high tea or luncheon variety. Our Aussie friends did a valiant job of trying to make sense of the whole thing, as did the menfolk, all of who found the proceedings to be a little puzzling, I think. I did love that men were invited, as I've always hated that dads don't get to be part of the showering of their babies, too. P-i-C was entirely in his element, though at one point he and the gents retired to the balcony to smoke cigars while the ladies stayed inside eating chocolate and drinking wine (non-alcoholic, in my case). 

We were treated to any number of insanely adorable gifts, including this feat of engineering from my friend Sydney Smiles and her partner.

This face means, "it is so cute and little that I can hardly stand it, and I made it for most of the gift opening session.

We still have some time before our little one arrives in early February, but the kid is far on its way to being well-dressed and well-entertained. Moreover, as was evident by our lovely shower, well-loved by our friends. 

On a not-entirely unrelated note, I want to wish my marvelous Mom a happy birthday. I've written about my Mom and how much I hate living so far away from her before. Recently, I found this photo (rather, it's been in my photo album all along, I just took particular note of it recently) of my mom and me in my babyhood. Seeing it with the new eyes of an expectant mother made me notice how absolutely delighted my mom looks, and this photo, more than almost anything, has made me fall gushy over the idea of a baby entering our family. I can't wait to look at her/him with that much joy, and hope that I can do half the job my mom did.

Maybe I did get a little of the sentimental gene, after all.