Lynlees

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Ahoy, Baby!

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The offi­cial start of Sum­mer is June 20th, but it sure does feel like the sea­son has arrived ear­ly here in Vegas! For expec­tant moth­ers due in the next few months, there’s no bet­ter way to wel­come their new first mate than with a nau­ti­cal-themed baby show­er! I adore the Mod Nau­ti­cal Anchor col­lec­tion by the WH Host­ess, pair­ing sev­er­al shades of blue with a bright and refresh­ing pop of yel­low, which I uti­lized to style this bright and cheery lun­cheon for The Par­ty Dress Mag­a­zine’s Sum­mer 2012 issue. I decid­ed to focus on a mature feel to hon­or the moth­er-to-be, with the infu­sion of play­ful and sweet details. The beau­ti­ful invi­ta­tion set the mood, invit­ing guests to join the cel­e­bra­tion seaside.
The dessert table was set-up along the water­front, pro­vid­ing a gor­geous view and anchor­ing the par­ty. It was not easy find­ing water in the desert! To avoid obstruct­ing the scenery, I cre­at­ed a back­drop inspired by a win­dow at Anthro­polo­gie that not only resem­bled a sail from afar, but at clos­er look, also sim­u­lat­ed coral from the ocean. With the use of chick­en wire, I con­struct­ed the shape and then insert­ed white fold­ed cof­fee fil­ters to devel­op coral designs. As a jux­ta­po­si­tion, I propped up a rat­tan anchor that, with the burlap table­cloth, added a nat­ur­al, sandy feel to the crisp and vivid col­ors. I also cre­at­ed small­er ver­sions (again with chick­en wire) and made coral to use as table decor, with the addi­tion­al of col­ored cup­cake lin­ers. An “AHOY” pen­nant ban­ner hung in front of the table.
The sweets cen­tered around the nau­ti­cal theme and coor­di­nat­ing col­ors. Due to the Sum­mer sea­son and out­door loca­tion, I thought it would be refresh­ing to uti­lize sev­er­al lemon and fruit treats, along with some tra­di­tion­al desserts. I hol­lowed out lemons, added lemon cus­tard topped with blue­ber­ries and dis­played them in a sea­side lantern. I also insert­ed the col­lec­tion’s cup­cake top­pers to add height and decor to the over­sized con­tain­er. The col­ors of the fruit matched per­fect­ly! Small mason jars were filled with milk and life­saver donuts sat perched on the rims with the help of fish drink stirrers.I dipped Ore­os to make cook­ie pops and dec­o­rat­ed them with fon­dant to resem­ble port­holes. I love using dif­fer­ent types of con­tain­ers and props to dis­play the food that add to the theme and decor, rather than tra­di­tion­al plates and serv­ing dishes.

Lemon cup­cakes were embell­ished with fon­dant sailor one­sies, bibs and baby bot­tles, nes­tled in sug­ar sand, along with choco­late sea shells in a nau­ti­cal steer­ing wheel tray I found at Home Goods. I also dipped marsh­mal­lows in choco­late and added fon­dant strips and num­bers to make buoys.

I made lay­ered jel­lo light­house push pops in con­tain­ers from Cup­kate’s Event Design, as well as mini fruit tarts to com­plete the table. Buf­fet cards were dis­played with the cor­re­lat­ing desserts and cen­ter­piece sticks adorned glass jars filled with sug­ar sand. Sea urchin meringue cook­ies were scat­tered through­out. I also recy­cled the bas­kets and crate, which were orig­i­nal­ly uti­lized in the East­er Egg Hunt par­ty styled for the Spring issue, and sub­sti­tut­ed the grass with sug­ar sand!
The lun­cheon table was set with a burlap cov­er­ing and a striped blue run­ner. A lantern served as the cen­ter­piece and inside, anoth­er coral dec­o­ra­tion sculpt­ed with chick­en wire, white cof­fee fil­ters and yel­low cup­cake lin­ers. You can also uti­lize flower arrange­ments or can­dles to fill such lanterns to add inter­est. Small vas­es with flo­ral decor were enhanced with nat­ur­al string and cup­cake top­pers through­out the table. Each set­ting con­sist­ed of blue fish plates and coor­di­nat­ing small plates to car­ry lemons for the seafood meal that I had pur­chased at Pot­tery Barn a few years back. Addi­tion­al lemons were served in small, plas­tic con­tain­ers resem­bling boat hous­es. I used these lit­tle con­tain­ers in our Moth­er Hen par­ty as chick­en coops and keep try­ing to find new uses for them! You can dress up sim­ple sil­ver­ware by sim­ply tying a col­or­ful rib­bon around and plac­ing it direct­ly on the nap­kins. The water bot­tle labels can also be used to adorn sim­ple glass­es and were filled with cool and fresh-squeezed lemonade.
Last­ly, I set up an area to urge guests to leave a “Mes­sage in a Baby Bot­tle” for the par­ents-to-be on a framed note­card from the col­lec­tion. And as a final send off, I wished guests a bon voy­age with life­saver can­dies pack­aged in cel­lo bags with top­pers and wrapped with string for an added touch!
The gor­geous weath­er, pic­ture-per­fect set­ting and the assis­tance of my trusty helpers made this shoot smooth sailin’!

Merci Beaucoup!



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Comments

  7. Anoth­er stun­ning par­ty! Where did you get your burlap table­cloth? I like how ver­sa­tile it is. Thanks!

  8. Thank you SO, SO much!!! Oh my good­ness… I don’t know what I would do with­out burlap! It tru­ly is so ver­sa­tile (as you’ve seen in so many of my par­ties!) and even bet­ter, it’s fair­ly inex­pen­sive! I actu­al­ly pur­chase the fab­ric at Joann craft stores. ♥

  12. Thank you for the inspi­ra­tion every­thing looks amaz­ing! I am hav­ing my nau­ti­cal theme baby show­er and absolute­ly love this idea of a sail­boat for the back­drop, how were you able to make the sail­boat stand in place along with the anchor? How did you attach the anchor?

    • Thank you so very much, Diana! The back­drop made of chick­en wire is attached to the table legs at both ends with rope. As far as the anchor goes, I had to add a wood­en stand to hold it up behind the table. If you are set­ting up your table in front of a wall of sort, it would be much eas­i­er to hang up the anchor! 🙂

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