Grandbaby Poppy is due to arrive soon.  And because I love party planning and I just so happen to have the most amazing women in my life who come alongside me and make it all happen, I just HAD to throw a shower for my daughter.

She chose red and turquoise as her theme colors and chose to carry them through to her nursery as well.  This worked out beautifully because all the things made for the shower had longer-lasting purpose as they would help decorate Poppy’s room.

The menu was fun to plan as it was a fall shower and therefore, soup season.  Everyone who reads my blogs know soups are my favorite.  They serve a lot of people and most people like them.  Plus, at a shower, I knew we would be serving women only so that flung the doors open a bit to include more than meat and potato type offerings.

My daughter, Kyrsten has loved decorating cakes since she was tiny.  I don’t usually make cakes or cupcakes because I don’t usually like to eat them, but we started practicing and made some pretty yummy and adorable creations, if I do say so myself.

So, here are some pictures of the big party as well as a sampling of the amazing games we played and some recipes, too.

This…THIS is the gorgeous food table.

We served chicken salad with pecans and red grapes on croissants (recipe to be posted on the food blog soon),

Apple skewers with toffee dip,

Crudités with either roasted red pepper hummus or homemade ranch dip right in the cup under the veggies so it didn’t spill all over plates,

Fruit and cheese,

And, of course, soups.  I made a Cheese with Roasted Cauliflower Soup with bacon for garnish, and Butternut Squash Bisque with toasted pecans for garnish.  We served them in glass mugs that I purchased online (having a handle helped manage soup AND a plate), and we served the soup from red enamel cast iron pots.

We had three varieties of cupcakes that we had made ahead from scratch, frozen, and then thawed in time to frost the day of the big event.  I will post these eventually on the food blog as well.

We made brownie cupcakes with toasted marshmallow frosting.

Lemony, Vanilla Cupcakes with raspberry filling and Cream Cheese Buttercream frosting (with a secret ingredient),

And Red Velvet with Cream Cheese Buttercream frosting.

The decorations were beyond beautiful and all hand-crafted for Addie to bring home.

This was our amazing candy bar where guests could fill a bagful of candy to bring home as a party favor.

Then came the games where our good sports put frozen plastic babies in ice cubes to see whose melted first.  The winner was the one whose ‘WATER BROKE’ first.

They dressed each other in toilet paper diapers,

Had a bottle drinking competition,

And mothers and daughters fed each other in a baby food eating race.

All in all, there were lots of laughs and lots of beautiful women doing what we do best, coming together to share and build up and work together to welcome a precious new life into our world.

The Amazing Team: