Baby Shower

Does having a party at your house rev you up more than co-hosting at someone else’s home? Perhaps you don’t bat an eye at either? You’re the consummate party planner and thrower?

Savanna’s baby shower was a blessing. The event took place in a fairy-tale setting. Ariel, Belle, and Jasmine (Sav’s faves) would have approved. The shower was in a house patterned after a European castle.

The facade was stone with a huge tower serving as the front entrance. The driveway was long and peaceful, set back in woods on a flat plain. The landscape was natural, pleasantly groomed, not fake or artificial-looking.

A stroll over light gravel and crunchy foliage led you to a 14-foot high beveled-glass front door that opened into the castle tower. There were more beveled glass windows throughout the tower. Sun shining through the many windows spread rainbows around the tower. I kept thinking how a rainbow maker would add yet more rainbow beauty.

Have you heard of rainbow makers? They’re small crystals that circulate with solar energy. A rainbow maker certainly wasn’t needed in this beautiful tower but if there was one, guaranteed, it’d produce bookoodles of rainbows. Here’s a link to rainbow makers: and a snippet of what the area looked like.

Most of you know I like to take photographs. This party was different. I took a single photograph. One! Here it is:

The cake

The tower photo above was taken as the last people there were leaving the party. The picture wasn’t my idea and I obviously didn’t take it but I sure am happy to have it. (A friend who wasn’t able to attend was shocked there were no photos for her to vicariously chew on, after-the-fact.)

Here’s the thing, taking photos is a relaxing pass-time for moi. Sav and I were wound tight for this party… Therefore: throwing a party in [my] house definitely revs my engines more than co-hosting in someone else’s home. Thus, no photo collage. But, no way am I a consummate party thrower.

The girls and I (Jeff too) were so honored that our friends offered to host a baby shower in their lovely home. The beauty of it all is part of what churned us up. And the fact that it wasn’t our turf. Not being on our own turf was so odd because every invitee was a friend of Savanna, Diana or me. Guests who attended came from very different circles (family, church, business, high school, college, work). Seeing all the faces of people I/we love and care so much about walking into a home that I’d never been in before, at one point, caused light-headedness.

I was standing with Diana while she delivered a toast of a funny anecdote about Savanna being a stellar babysitter. The story was about Sav sitting for two neighborhood boys, Brian and Stuart. The job was Savanna’s but on one occasion Diana filled in for her. The boys were disappointed that D didn’t live up to S’s standards of imaginary story-telling. Diana came home that night saying she “kids don't like her, never wanted to babysit again, didn’t care how much it paid.”

The humor was welcome, a lot of people got a kick out of it. But all of a sudden I felt dizzy, wondering if dehydration was the cause. Now, thinking back, the cause was more likely that my/our stress-engines were internally overheated.

The party was a week ago, Savanna and I continue to say we’re exhausted every time we speak and though she is pregnant and I am old, we both attribute our tiredness to the baby shower. That’s how magnificent it was!

Thank you for reading!

Love, Shelley

In all things give thanks ~ Thessalonians 5:18