an LSU baby shower

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just the fact that i used the letters “LSU” in the title of a blog post, therefore permanently adding it to internets history forever and ever tied to this blog, will tell you how much i love my friend alina.

because i hate lsu.

today, however, that is neither here nor there. today is a story about how four girls on a plane survived what can only be labeled as “the longest, most interesting, scariest, and loveliest day ever.”

left to right: sarah, alina, beth, me!

this is at the end of the long day i am about to tell you about so that would explain why we all look as wonderful as we do. because everyone looks great after a day of air sickness, crazy shower preparation, delayed flights and late night arrivals, right?

i’m getting ahead of myself.

alina is the guest of honor at the baby shower that i will eventually tell you about. sarah and beth are her sisters-in-law. and for the purpose of the story – beth is also pregnant although not as far along as alina. i am (according to her awesome mom) alina’s “dearest friend” which is quite an honor in and of itself.

it involves things like talking about gassy dogs, taking weird pictures on the computer and putting up with husbands who stay up playing video games until 4:45 in the morning. very important job folks. not for the feint of heart.

so chris and i drove down to baton rouge last friday to meet up with our dearest friends and hang out for an evening before the gals took off to dallas. i know it probably seems weird that we drove to baton rouge to get to dallas but the four of us got screaming good deals on tickets so we just hopped on a plane (thinking that would make the trip easier and more enjoyable for the bean-growing-ladies).

wrong.

first of all we were on a pretty small plane. second of all we flew through a storm the entire way. third of all, two of the girls were pregnant. so to put a really long and not all that pretty story short and squeaky clean – the bathroom was pretty much occupied the entire flight. even i, who has never had one bout with motion sickness, got a little woozy. but i didn’t get sick thank God. i’m pretty sure he had me there to help take care of the others. also, thank heavens for sarah who had an unending supply of anti-nausea medicine.

do you know how long an hour and fifteen minutes feels when you are nauseated on a plane for the entire trip? it is about eight hours of someone shaking your head around and punching you in the stomach. super fun.

anyways – we did actually make it to dallas and alina’s mom picked us up at the airport and drove us to her house where we all rested for a bit before the shower and had a very light lunch. we were all honestly afraid to eat because we knew we would have to fly home again later and we weren’t sure what the weather would be like. people started showing up around 12 to start setting up for the shower.

aside from the fact that it was all yellow + purple, it was a beautiful shower and SO much fun! just kidding about the yellow + purple thing alina! kind of. 😉

purple + yellow flowers in the centerpiece

mike the tiger watching over the table

delicious baby carriage cookies

a sweet dotted cake and even sweeter lsu baby booties!

ribbon adorned water glasses

daddy’s diaper bag

the ladies in charge of games did an excellent job! we had three games for guests to play, none of which required group participation which worked out well.

guess the candy bar

for the first game we put different candy in paper bags and put a baby-related clue on the outside. you could shake the bags and feel the candy bars inside to make a guess as to what it was. any ideas on what the candy in this bag is? {hit – it rattles when you shake it and comes in a box}

baby bottle bowling

if you’ve known alina and jared for more than a hot second, it is blatantly obvious they are huge bowlers. even after their lovely wedding they put their bowling shoes on and hit the lanes. (don’t believe me? click here) in fact – she is 7 weeks away from delivering a baby and is still bowling every friday. pretty impressive if you ask me. anyways – we had to incorporate bowling of some sort so we put some rice in ten baby bottles and gave everyone three chances at knocking over as many “pins” as possible. i think the highest score out of a possible thirty was fourteen!

diaper notes

probably the most fun little game was the diaper notes “game”. i use the term “game” loosely because it is really more of an activity that people can do. we unloaded a box of newborn diapers and left a bowl of markers for everyone to write a sweet, funny (and hey, some were probably inappropriate!) note to jared and alina to make them smile during the two a.m. feed & change sessions. once they were all done we stuffed them back in the box and taped it back up.

a few of the notes:

incoming!just keep swimming, just keep swimmingthat’s what she said#1 of a million

and of course these are my favorites

clearly i did not write those two totally offensive letters on the left diaper, but did clear up why they were there on the right! 😉

if my mom had been there, this is definitely what she would have written. (click here to see why) and since alina and my mom had a special bond i just had to include it! i know it will make alina laugh when she gets to it.

alina and margaret

this is alina and her brother’s wife margaret. they are somewhere between seven and fourteen days apart in their pregnancy which i think is so cool. if i ever decide to have a baby i really hope and pray i have someone close to me who is also with child so i don’t have to go through it alone!

i ended up taking a lot more pictures with alina’s camera than i did mine so she has most of them. i’m sure they will be on her blog before long though (hint, hint alina…) so i will direct you guys over there when she posts them so you can see some more pictures!

despite the crazy start to the day, the rest of the evening was very nice. due to the weather and some mechanical problems, our return flight was delayed long enough for us to have a wonderful dinner with her family at a swanky restaurant in dallas called rathbun’s blue blate kitchen.

as you probably guessed they have a daily blue plate special but instead of typical diner food they serve things like duck and calamari and other stuff i don’t eat.

so here was my dinner.

fried green tomatoes + grits

dude – could i be more southern?? these tomatoes were ah-mazing. probably some of the freshest green tomatoes i have ever had, coated with a perfectly crunchy parmesan breading and topped with some kind of goat cheese spread and a ancho chili honey sauce. the grits were full of roasted poblano peppers and cheese – smoky, spicy, cheesy, creamy and rich. all the food groups in one sweet little cast iron pot!

oh and the random glob on the corner of my plate was a sample of alina’s creamy garlic mashed potatoes.

i die.

and lucky for all of us the flight back was heaven-like and totally uneventful. we actually enjoyed ourselves in the non bouncy airplane, with bellies full of yummy food (and zofran.), cameras full of pictures and hearts full of love. we can’t wait to meet little spare and snuggle the new baby!!