Nurse Gift for when Having a Baby



My baby just turned a year old about a week ago, so I thought I would make a quick post about the gifts I made for the nurses when I had her. This was my second baby, and after having my first I had learned all the great and wonderful things the amazing nurses do for you AND for your baby while you're in the hospital. So I wanted something nice to thank them with.

 

These were very simple. I bought a bunch of things that I felt I would enjoy if I were working a 12-hour shift in a hospital. Almonds, candy, gum, granola bars, chap stick, mints, etc. I put it all in a clear bag, added a cute card that was from my baby saying "Thanks for taking such good care of my Mommy and Me! Love, Baby Nielsen". I cut the letters for 'Thanks' out of cute paper on my Cricut and I added some cute ribbon too!

 

 

 

My best friend's mom was a labor and delivery nurse for 30+ years and I asked her how many nurses I would have/gifts would I need. She told me they work 12-hour shifts, and that Mom has a nurse and baby has a nurse in the nursery. So that's 4 nurses a day, a normal stay is two full days, and then plan on showing up mid-shift. If I remember right, I made 10 gifts.

 

 

 

I made them about 8 weeks in advance. Before I was too exhausted from being pregnant and huge in general and it kept me busy and distracted me from other pregnancy anxieties and stresses. I then packed in my hospital so they were ready to go when baby came.

 

I got the best care while I was in the hospital! I like to think that the first nurses spread the word about how great I was and that the following the nurses took extra good care of me. I did have one overnight nurse that I didn't care for too much, so I did not give her a Thank You Gift, but overall, I think my nice gesture made my experience that much better.

The Very Hungry Caterpillar Party Decorations- Part II

 

 

Like I said in my last post, I normally post party pictures AFTER the party happens. However, for my party I'm working on right now, I'm posting things as I make them. I'm working on a Very Hungry Caterpillar (book by Eric Carle) theme party for my daughter's first birthday. Keep following along, I'm excited to see how everything comes together at the actual party.

In this post, I'm going to show how I made my Caterpillar Candy Lei's and my Hungry Caterpillar Plate Centerpiece.

Caterpillar Candy Lei's

 

Hungry Caterpillar Plate Centerpiece

 

Caterpillar Candy Lei's

I'm excited about the candy lei's. I'm going to be using them on my tables as décor and they will also double as a favor for the kids (and in my family, the adults like party favors too). I found the green cellophane wrap from Hobby Lobby. It was the only place I could find green and it was only $2.99. I cut it down and placed 5 pieces of candy on top.

 

 Then just roll the wrap around the candy. Keep it flat.

 Don't twist it between the candy sections, keep it flat. If you twist it between the candy pieces, the candy moves around and the caterpillar won't lay nicely.

 I used red and yellow ribbon to tie off the sections. I used the red around the 'head', I felt it was easier then making a red face somehow. And I used yellow on the rest of him to add some color and contrast to the caterpillar.

 I cut off the ends and curled the ribbon. I also glued on some googly eyes, but you can't seem really see them here (sorry for the poor quality photos!)

 

 

 

I'm going to set these up on my tables around my centerpieces like this:

(And remember, this should look way better all set up at the actual party)

Check out how I  made the centerpieces here:

http://berriesofwisdom.blogspot.com/2014/06/the-very-hungry-caterpillar-party.html

 

 

The Very Hungry Caterpillar Plate Centerpiece

Now the easiest thing that I have made so far for this party has been the caterpillar plate centerpiece. I used red and green party paper plates that I actually bought from Walmart for $.48 a pack! And that's for 20 plates each, so that's a great party deal whether you're eating off them or decorating with them. I used an old wrapping paper roll and clear packaging tape too.

 

 I taped the bottom of the plates to the wrapping paper roll and the tops of the plates to each other.

 I made the faces with my Cricut and scrapbook paper. But I'm sure this would be very easy to cut out without a Cricut machine or anything special.

This cute guy is double-sided and I will be putting it on a countertop or table somewhere at the party.

 

 

 

 

 

The Very Hungry Caterpillar Party Centerpieces

 

 

 

 

Now normally I post about my parties after the party (and by after, its usually months to years after the party). But right now I am planning my youngest daughter's 1st birthday party and I am making everything for it myself, so I thought it would be easier (and more fun) to post as I go. And this way I can give you detailed directions so that you can duplicate this stuff yourself for your own parties (and so I can remember how I did stuff in case I want to do something similar again in the future too.)

My theme for this party is going to be The Very Hungry Caterpillar, a classic children's book by Eric Carle. I am so excited about it and so far everything has been super easy ( I am a crafting novice) and has turned out really cute. I can't wait to see how everything comes together for the actual party!

Right now I am finishing up my table centerpieces. Here are some examples so far:

 

In the book the caterpillar pops out of his egg and is very hungry, Each day of the week he eats a different fruit and a different quantity. Monday he eats through one apple, Tuesday he eats two pears, Wednesday he eats three plums, etc.... And on Saturday he eats tons of things; a pickle, Swiss cheese, ice cream cone, chocolate cake, and more. My favorite thing about my centerpieces is that they each have a picture of my daughter eating the particular food item. It was so fun to take all these pictures and I learned about some new favorite foods she has now, like plums.

 

In addition to the picture of her eating the food, I made Cricut (Preserves and Sweet Treats cartridges) cut-outs of each item too. I made four strawberries for Thursday (because the caterpillar eats through 4 strawberries) and only two pears for Tuesday, and so on. And I have a calendar background with the day of the week circled. The dot border I used is straight from the book, it is an Eric Carle bulletin board border that I cut down. You can buy the border on Amazon.com or at any teacher/classroom store. And of course I needed a caterpillar on each centerpiece, so I added a caterpillar sticker to each side of my centerpieces (they are double-sided). I got the stickers from my local dollar store, but they are also available on Amazon.com too.

 

They were really easy to make, here is my breakdown:

 

 

I glued a printable calendar to a manila file folder. I got these from the dollar store, $1.00 for a pack of 10. I circled the appropriate day of the week.

 

I added the Eric Carle border along the outside.

 

If a little manila is still showing, its okay. I covered up anything weird with the picture of my daughter or the food cut-outs.

 

I added a caterpillar sticker. Sometimes it was placed randomly or sometimes I used the stickers to cover up mistakes.

 

 

I cut down some of the manila file folder and put it on the bottom so that the centerpiece could stand up. They are all doubled-sided, so that the guests on all sides of the table see cuteness.

 

 

My plan is to display the centerpiece in the center (well, obviously) of the table. I will have green tablecloths with a dotted runner or napkin square under this centerpiece. In front I will have caterpillar candy lei's (like the one above). Here is my post for a how-to for making the caterpillar candy lei's http://berriesofwisdom.blogspot.com/2014/07/the-very-hungry-caterpillar-party.html . I did eight round tables and all the centerpieces were different; Monday-1 apple, Tuesday-2 pears, Wednesday-3 plums, Thursday-4 strawberries, Friday-5 oranges, and then I picked a few of the food items from Saturday (based on Cricut cartridges I had readily available and/or food I felt like giving my kid for her centerpiece photo-shoots) -watermelon, lollipop, and cupcake.

 

 

 

And I did have some mess-ups and/or made some extra fruit and food cut-outs that couldn't be used on my centerpieces, so I strung them together into this super cute decorative food banner

You can see how I made all my banners here:

http://berriesofwisdom.blogspot.com/2014/08/the-very-hungry-caterpillar-party.html

 

 

 

 

Old, New, Borrowed, and Blue Bridal Shower Brunch

Last month my cousin Shawn married his longtime girlfriend, and high school sweetheart, Megan. They have been together for so long and Megan is just so wonderful, that's I feel like she's always been a part of our family. I threw her a small bridal shower with just the women from my family to help her celebrate that special time. I am so very excited that she is officially part of the family now!

I did a spring/floral theme (the shower was in April and the wedding n May). I planned it at noon and that helped dictate a fun brunch menu. And of course a brunch menu needs mimosas!

 

I set up this cute mimosa bar. It had a couple different kinds of champagne and lots of different juices! Orange, orange-pineapple, cranberry (which I believe is actually called a hibiscus, not a mimosa), and pomegranate juice. I also included some fun sliced fruit for garnishes on the glasses. We had some non-drinkers there too and they thought it was fun to have a variety of juices and garnishes to choose from too.

 

Trying to have some more 'brunchy' food, I started with a parfait bar. I had vanilla yogurt, blueberries, strawberries, raspberries, granola, chocolate chips, pecans, almonds, grapes, and bananas. I do have some vegan family so I also had soy yogurt, dark chocolate chips, and I made sure my granola was vegan (Bare Naked Granola). I love 'bars' because it looks nice and is fun for guests to make their own food, and its less work as the hostess since you don't have to put together 30 individual parfaits, or whatever item you set up as a bar.

 

Also, here's a fun Waffle Bar that I did awhile back for another party ( I feel like it kinda fits in here....)

Butter, Strawberry jam, Nutella, Peanut Butter, Whipped Cream, Apples, Strawberries, Blueberries, Chocolate and Carmel Sauce, Bananas, Macadamia Nuts, Powdered Sugar, Coconut Syrup, Maple Syrup, and fresh fruit

 

(Sorry for the Waffle Bar sidetrack, back to the bridal shower brunch.) I also had croissants and meat and cheeses (vegan English muffins with avocado and tomato for the vegans). And I made cute little mini-omelets in a muffin tin. I call them Ham Cup Omelets.

 

The recipe for these is here http://berriesofwisdom.blogspot.com/2015/04/mini-ham-cup-omelets.html

The possibilities for these little omelets are endless and they are just so cute and individual!

 

 

I did a little bit of an Old, New, Borrowed, and Blue theme for the shower too.

 

 

I hung up a bunch of OLD pictures of the couple, which is always fun to see.

 

NEW was obviously all the nice, new wedding gifts.

 

BORROWED was a journal/notebook. We passed it around and everyone wrote their marriage advice for the happy couple ( borrowed advice....Get it?)

 

And did my dessert table all in BLUE. Luckily this party was around Easter time so it was very easy to find candy with  blue wrappers or even blue donuts.

 

 

We also did a "Panty Raffle" for the bride. Very similar to the "Diaper Raffle" for baby showers, but with panties for the honeymoon. For every pair of panties brought for the new bride-to-be, you'd get a raffle ticket. The winner of the raffle won this fun prize (bottle of wine here, but I will use Martinelli's or one of those plastic tumblers with lid/straw for parties for non-drinkers, and measuring spoons, candle, hair ties, chocolate, sometimes a gift card)! And did specify ahead of time that the panties do need to be new and clean :)

 

 

This party was fun and I will definitely use an Old, New, Borrowed, and Blue theme in the future for more Bridal Showers. I really liked it and it was fun to have old pictures and share our marriage advice. I will also be doing a lot more parties at brunch in the future. Brunch food is fun and I was very impressed with myself for coming up with some vegan and vegetarian options. AND Congrats to Shawn and Megan! I love you guys and wish you the happiest life together!!