Design Dearly: Dive Bar inspired Couples Baby Shower

last weekend I hosted a baby shower for my dear friend Ann. Since this is her second baby, when I offered to host her baby shower she requested something simple, casual and where her husband would be included. So we decided to go for a BBQ for the couples shower.

I promised Ann to keep it simple and just decorate one table as opposed to the 3 tables I did for her previous shower ;-) Since this time the boys were included we decided to follow a burgers beer and baby talk theme as well as incorporating decor items inspired by a dive bar.

At first I wanted to create an actual bar but that was out of my budget and time frame. So, I thought to create a bar wall using chalkboard paper I found at michaels. Then I created a bar table by raising my folding table with bed raisers so it would be at bar height, added two bar stools and voila the Meredith's dive bar was ready.

I personally think baby showers are for the adults not for kids so I like to keep the baby items to a minimum and just use them to add a hint here and there like I did with the baby bottles toppers on the mini cakes. I thought it was cute to display baby size food, like mini burgers, shooters, mini cupcakes, mini fruit cups, small sandwiches and mini coronitas. To continue the bar theme I used beer bottles as flower vases and a beer bottle holder as an utensil and favor holder.

For the color scheme, I didn't want to be too much pink in order to make the boys feel more welcome. I decided use red as the main color and have hints of pinks and other random colors here and there.

for the favors, we ordered beer mug chocolate lollipops from our favorite local All things chocolate store and I made these small BBQ sauce bottles from favor bottles I found at hobby lobby party section. I used white avery labels and printed on my computer. The labels read: thanks for joining us to celebrate the Meredith's and their growing family!