Mexican Fiesta Baby Shower

Here are some highlights from the latest baby shower I worked on for the past few weeks.  

The mommy-to-be is R's sister and we're super excited to meet the new baby who is due sometime next month.  Wanna know a great way to give my parent's a simultaneous aneurism? Excitedly announce at the dinner table that R and I are going to be aunt and uncle. Deep silence ensued while my parents worked that one out in their heads.  For that long, agonizing moment, they forgot that R had a sister.

The theme was a Mexican Fiesta and I volunteered to take care of the favours and decorations for the party. No way was I going to be responsible for poisoning a guest list of 60 people. I work much better with glue and paper.   

Originally, we were going to do a jungle theme because the momma wants to decorate the baby room as such. However, I stupidly thought that I would find more stuff going with a fiesta theme.  Newp.  Michael's had jungle wall decals with parachuting monkeys, safari felt shapes, animal wood shapes, plastic animal figures - you name it. Monkeys everywhere. Do you think I could find a sombrero or chili pepper lights in London? Ha!  I bitched to everybody who would listen how much I missed having easy lunchtime access to Kensington Market and Chinatown. At times like these, I even miss IKEA.  As it turns out, a good friend of mine called a dozen places in Toronto trying to source out these tacky things only to find out that they no longer stock chili pepper lights because these are not CSA approved.  It was difficult, but I had to let go of the obsession. 

My first brainstorm was to buy a bunch of mini cactuses as favours. Unfortunately, they're not really in season and they cost at least $2.50 to $2.99 each. Totally not in my budget for the number of people coming. Then I thought of doing up packages of salsa/hot sauce, mojito mix or spicy popcorn mix... but I didn't want to go to all the trouble and expense if people were going to just let it sit in their cupboards.  I decided to go to a local nursery to check out their selection of cacti and succulents anyways and I ended up having the epiphany that I'd been waiting for. I love when I have these!

I knew that I wanted to make mini pinatas weeks ago, hence all the balloons that got blown up. So I spent (you really don't want to know how many) hours making tissue paper pinata bases.

 [Tip:: I used 2 parts glue to 1 part water. The thicker it was, the faster it dried. If it was too watery, it just ripped the tissue paper. Believe me, you don't have time for the tissue paper to rip and get stuck to everything except the balloon.]

Here's the packaged product. After 45 balloon pinatas, I realized I left the opening way too big to close up with tissue paper alone. But I needed it that big in order to get everything inside. You better believe that at three in the morning, I was not happy when I realized this. After a significant amount of stewing, I let go of my initial ideas and improvised. I'm really happy with the finished display.

I varied the colours based on the tissue paper I had on hand. There really wasn't a specific colour theme again. I've discovered that I can't pick one or three colours and go with it. At least, this time around I just wanted everything to be colourfull and it worked well with the theme of a fiesta.


Wanna see the goods inside? I know you do.

At the nursery, I picked up a few packages of seeds for tomato, jalapeno and sweet pepper plants. I used a ceramic baby foot mold I picked up at Michael's to create plantable seed papers. You can also find them :: here ::  I blended some paper in our blender with water, strained it and plopped the mess on top of the mold. I layered on about 7 or 8 seeds. Then plopped another layer of paper mess on top.  (Plopping is a very key technique. I'm not even kidding - if you don't plop it on the mold in one lump, it won't bind when it dries.) Then, I pressed the water out with a sponge and dried it with my embossing gun. Ideally, I should have just let it sit and dry before taking it out of the mold but I didn't have the time. I have no idea if the seeds will germinate now that they've been blasted with concentrated heat for two minutes. Oh well. I never said I had a green thumb.  

Lastly, I packaged up some potting soil and placed it in one of those biodegradable pots that can be planted when you're ready to transfer the plant outside. I included planting & harvesting instructions and a recipe for either a tomato salsa, jalapeno salsa or greek salad. While I was gluing the recipes to the card stock, I realized I should have typed up a recipe for some sort of sweet pepper mexican dish. Too late. Aish. Greek Salad...seriously, what was I thinking?

Other side projects included :  

Mexican Mustaches as an ice breaker for the party guests. I LOVE these.

*R and my dad indulging my whimsy*

Turning a Curious George pinata into Jorge the Curious Mexican.

Felt garland. 

Succulents wrapped in tissue paper for room accents.

A baby name banner.

Fake flowers on colourful tea towels for a more festive feel.

And I finished the blanket...

I can't wait to do another fiesta themed shower. Pinatas are awesome. They're especially awesome when you crush them with your hands and the glue-y paper crackles while it crunches. It's better than popping bubble wrap.