We were all excited to hear our friends Shelley and Chris were expecting a second child. So my friend, Lauren, in a very Lauren-esque style, came up with a plan. April and I, were skeptical of this plan, but that soon turned to giddy nervous excitement. We all love their first little guy so much we couldn’t wait for them to have another one! We wanted to do something special for Baby #2, so the idea for a Gender Reveal party was …ahem…born.
The idea was to have the doctor write down the gender of the baby and seal it in an envelope and not tell anyone. The envelope would then be taken to a bakery and they would “bake us a cake just as fast as they can…roll it… pat it….” ummm I mean, they would make the icing in the center of the cake either pink or blue depending on the contents of the envelope.
We debated back and forth. “Should one of us know?” “Should Shelley know?” “Can she peek and then act surprised?” I made it clear that if one of us 3 party planners knew the gender of the baby, I would slowly Smeagol/Gollum style start to loathe the person. And at the same time I knew, if I was the chosen secret keeper I would give a smug little smile at some inappropriate time and ruin the whole thing. We called Shelley to let her decide. She decided NO ONE SHOULD KNOW!!! We all cheered!! That was exactly what we wanted, tantalizing suspense.
Thus we begin planning. We started by writing a letter to the bakery….
“The person who just handed you this note is the future parent of a little boy or girl. They do not know the gender of the baby yet. This envelope contains information about the gender of our friends’ newest baby.
We would like to keep it a SECRET from them. At this moment no one knows the gender except for you and the doctor.
Please make the icing in the center of the cake either blue or pink to correspond to the baby’s gender in the envelope.
Thank you so much for being such an important part of this day!
Sincerely,
Party Hostesses
Lauren, April & Laura”
We invited all the guests to wear the color of shirt they thought corresponded to the baby’s gender. An overwhelming majority wore blue! We decorated everything with pink & blue or gender neutral. We got the cake that said “What will it Bee? on top. We asked the bakery to double check that no pink or blue was visible.
We used a couple of Old Wives Tales as games to predict the gender. The wedding ring on a string circling her belly indicated boy. The way Shelley was carrying her baby bump indicated girl. Everyone marked on a calendar in either blue or pink when they thought the baby would arrive. (The results will be in sometime in October.)
We also had everyone list as many gender neutral names as they could in 1 minute, always good for a few weird name ideas.
Finally it was time to cut the cake!
PINK, PINK OH YES PINK!!!! IT’S A GIRL! I’m pretty excited about it, despite the fact that I wore a blue shirt as my vote!
We pulled out both official envelopes from the doctor to check. They both said “Girl
”
Please note that Shelley is wearing a pink necklace with blue shirt. Shelley & Chris were ecstatic with either outcome, that’s pretty much the only way you can pull off a party like this! (Oh and if you are wondering how I knew to present them with a pink onsie, the answer is I bought a blue one too!)
You know who was the most convinced of the correct answer?! Her older brother Zach! Anytime someone asked his opinion, he would declare “Girl!”
Congratulations Chris, Shelley & Zach! We can’t wait to meet her!
no comments