Three Pixie Lane: April 2013

My sister-in-law is having a baby girl, and we are so excited for the soon-to-be parents! This past weekend we drove to Richmond, Virginia to help host a baby shower.

The new (almost) parents have travelled the world. A travel themed baby shower was perfect to help celebrate the 'new delivery' soon to come!

The travel theme took a more vintage-style, so that I could incorporate muted colors of pink.
For the decorations, I used some of the gifts for the baby to use as displays. Michael's has these great travel themed, cardboard suitcases. I packed her gift in one of them and added the pennant (paper from Funky.time here) banner.

Gifts included in the suitcase were a little bunny from Pottery Barn; baby shoes from Italy; a vintage-style bib; a monogrammed baby blanket; frilly socks and shirt from Janie & Jack; and books with travel themes. The 'passport' came from Michael's.

Dr. Seuss' book, Oh, the Places You'll Go! was a great choice for this theme. Olivia goes to Venice is another great travel book for a little one.

And who doesn't love the Madeline in Paris or in London books? I tied the books with ribbon and ephemera tags from different scrapbooks (Hobby Lobby.)

My minivan was loaded for the trip, but I forgot vases! I separated a large bouquet and tied each with ribbon to place around the room. This little frame says, "Home is wherever you are."

The globe came from Books-a-Million, and I chose it, because it has soft hues with green, blue and pink. I asked the parents-to-be for a list of the places they have travelled, which included places in Europe, Asia, Russia, Canada, and America. This was a great lesson in geography for my children and me. I had to research several city locations!

These great flags and little airplane came from Mr. Printables. I purchased the Populaire Font (here) from Myfonts. It is a great font and is on sale at their site until April 29th! There are some great free handwritten fonts out there, but I wanted all the flags to match the designer's pre-printed flags from Mr. Printables. Check out my Pinterest board (here) for some great free fonts.

FYI if you want to make your own globe: I had to use a magnifying glass to find the cities, and with a hammer, I lightly tapped the pins into place.
printable map of usa jigsaw puzzle

This is the map and flags available at Mr. Printables. It is a great one to make, too! Thank you, Mr. Printables for sharing this for free!

I saw these cute, candy airplanes on Pinterest, and had to make them for the shower. A vintage 'room key sat on the quirky elephant.

Mints were used for the wheels, Smarties for the fuselage, and gum for the wings. The travel journal is by SMASH.

I found the pink baby beret at Janie & Jack to give to baby girl. This prompted a hat display of baby hats from different places. The Sarah Louise smocked bonnet was also a gift and represented America.

Both my girls wore this little hat. It has a 'Burberry' look, so it represented Great Britain.

I found the vintage wire hat stands at an antique shop years ago. The flags were printed from Mr. Printables (here.)

(flags from around the world)

The frames are from Michael's. I found several great travel quotes from Pinterest for the displays.

One of the hostesses sent me a picture of a wreath made from maps. I had made these before from sheet music, so this task was pretty simple. The Wright brothers-style airplane came from Hobby Lobby and was sprayed pink.

I wanted the wreath to be mostly pink, so I found vintage maps in the public domain online (here) and printed the paper on both sides.

Teresa's best friend designed the cake. It was so cute! At the top it read, "In Transit: Baby Thomas."

Chapter 1: the beginning...what an exciting time in their lives! This suitcase was for 'Mini Bottles;' water mini bottles.

Strips from travel scrapbook paper wrapped the 'mini' bottles.

More suitcases were displayed in the foyer. I decoupaged vintage travel tags and hotel labels to a few suitcases. The vintage labels were intended to remind Teresa of her travels as a young girl. Aren't the old baggage tags so much prettier than the ol' white tape strips used today? I had some of my own and printed others from the web. Vintage tags and labels can be found at Etsy, Pinterest, and Paper Source.

Do you remember when airlines gave pretzels or peanuts for the in-flight snack? I used to love these! I filled small glassine bags with pretzels and peanuts for a remembrance of childhood travels.

Different sandwiches and fresh salads, with fruit, homemade potato chips and mimosas were served.

Two lovely hydrangeas were placed at the front door. These 'maps' are actually wrapping paper from Paper Source and hid the green plastic containers.

Hat boxes from Michael's were stacked for an additional display and to hold the clip boards for 'Travel with Baby' Advice.

These advice sheets were passed around, while Teresa opened her gifts. One mom wrote, "Book a coach seat for dad and baby and a first-class seat for you." Too bad I didn't think of that when my kids were babies!

I found the different airline symbols from a free font, called 'airline logos.'

To hold the 'advice' sheets, I found small clipboards and decoupaged them with different travel- themed paper.

This suitcase held party favors for the guests. Small travel candles were bagged and sealed with travel related labels.

When I added the vintage labels, I also added French pages from an old book to the inside of this case. My grandmother's luggage was lined with paper; I suppose to keep the lining clean. In her day, people paid high dollar for good leather luggage, which would last a lifetime. I am not sure if it was common for people to line their luggage with paper. This same grandmother also covered her couches with plastic, when we came to visit!

Another best friend of mom-to-be had these adorable (Tiny Prints) invitations made.

Isn't mom-to-be radiant and beautiful! I had so much fun making decorations for this shower, but even more fun at the shower!

Here are a few more ideas that would be cute for a travel themed party: