Gender Reveal Party

I'm skipping around a bit here on the order of posting...I haven't posted about Christmas with my parents, my in-laws, or Santa yet but I am excited to write about the party today so I'm going to do it while it's all fresh in my mind.

A year or two ago, a friend told me how her friend had a "reveal party" to tell everyone the gender of their baby.  I had never heard of this and instantly thought it was BRILLIANT! How fun to find out in front of those closest to you if you will be having a boy or a girl! I put this idea in the back of my mind and today I finally got to use it!

So, I had been giving Kent a hard time about being a Scrooge about this party, but it turns out he was totally right.  We included only our immediate families and having a nice, small group made it more special.  I did a bit of searching to find some ideas of what all to do at such a party and threw it all together a couple days before Christmas. Thankfully my mom and mother-in-law provided lots of food (Christmas leftovers!) so I didn't have to do much to prepare for the party.



I had seen a cute idea to serve "Mom's Cravings" for food at the party! I also served pink lemonade with blueberries floating in it. Get it? :)



My sister helped me make poffertjes (baby-sized Dutch pancakes).  Maybe you remember my obsession with them when I posted about Tulip Time? I had just gotten this poffertje pan for Christmas and was so anxious to use it.


I sent an e-mail to everyone asking them to wear something either pink or blue to "cast their vote" as to which gender they thought the baby would be.  I was so happy that everyone got really into this! My mom even showed up in a pink feather boa and a pink clip in her hair! Even the brother-in-laws all complied and wore their colors proudly, some even added a pink or blue lei to their ensembles.  You guys all rock for participating in this crazy pregnant lady's wishes!! Earlier in the day I had even let Kylee "dye" her hair pink with some hair stuff she had gotten for Christmas. We ended up washing it out because it was just really sticky and at the last minute she changed her vote anyways and wanted to wear blue to the party. I wore both pink and blue because I had a pretty strong feeling if it was a boy or a girl and I didn't want to give it away by the outfit. We took pictures of Team Pink and Team Blue.



6 pinks

 

7 blues

 When everyone got here I asked they make 2 nametags- one with a girl name suggestion and one with a boy name suggestion.  Girls name went on their backs and boys name went on the front...then everyone mingled, checked out everyone's suggestions, and cast a vote for the Best Name Suggestion of the day.  I tallied up the votes and made sure there was a prize for whoever's name suggestion got the most votes. You will never guess whose suggestions won!! There was a tie with the names Karina (suggested by Kylee) and Luley (suggested by Kael).  How perfect. :)




Prizes and and name suggestions



I am going to love having these for the baby book!





I had a bunch of "baby"-sized prizes.  Mini Oreos, Mini Chips Ahoy, little Diet Pepsis, a Baby Ruth, Babybel cheese and Baby Teddy Grahams to go with our baby theme.

Lastly we played an Old Wives Tale game that I found here. It was really fun to see how the questions panned out and going into the last question we were tied 6-6 between boy/girl.  The last question indicated girl!

So, up to this point, we had more "votes" from family that it would be a boy, but the Old Wives Tales seemed to say we would be having a girl.

It was time to find out! You might remember that Kent couldn't make it to the ultrasound. Well, I had the ultrasound tech put the gender in an envelope, then I delivered that envelope to CJ's (a bagel shop in town). I talked with the owner and she said she would make some bagel bites for me and frost them either pink or blue.  I stood there in front of her to make sure she could clearly see what was in the envelope, and she verified that yes, she knew which color to use. :) I picked them up at noon today and I can honestly say the box stayed shut with NO PEEKING!

Once all the votes had been cast and games had been played, we gathered all our family in the kitchen and opened the box...




Blue frosting on the bagel bites!


There was such excitement around here when we opened the box! My father-in-law couldn't be here today so he was on the phone while this all happened and I think all he heard for awhile was screams. :)

We are so happy to be adding to our family and are anxious to begin the name hunt! You guys, this party was so much fun.  I was begging my sisters to let me throw them a gender reveal party for them whenever they have a baby.  Feel free to share any K name suggestions for a boy that you have!