So, you’re planning a baby shower!  Here are some tips on getting organized for the party.

First you will need to consult with the mom-to-be to pick a date and time, get her input for possible themes, and choose a location. Find out what items she may have already purchased for her baby, and which things she still needs.  No one wants to end up with 3 strollers and no car seat! Consult with her on the guest list, and make sure you ask for everyone’s address and phone number.  If you are using a restaurant, party room or other venue, make your reservations well in advance.

Next step?  Customize and order your invitations.  You’ll want to mail out the invitations at least one month in advance.  Once the invitations are mailed, you can plan out your decorations, party favors and menu.  Showers can be as simple or elaborate as you choose – anything from a pot-luck luncheon with all of the guests pitching in, to a catered affair with rented table linens and centerpieces from a florist.  The main idea is to gather those close to the guest of honor who are excited about the new arrival. And of course, the gifts help prepare the expectant mom for her bundle of joy. There’s nothing quite as cute as those little, tiny sleepers and overalls, is there?

As the shower date approaches, think of little touches that will help make the party wonderful for the guest of honor.  Arrange for one of the guests to pick her up and bring her to the party.  Make sure you have a comfortable chair with a pillow for her to sit in, as she may be getting to the uncomfortable stage of her pregnancy.  A bassinet or baby carriage is a sweet place to hold all of the unopened gifts.  Assign someone to record all of the gifts as she receives them, and someone to re-pack the gifts.  Keep your guest of honor well-fed and comfortable throughout the party.  And of course, you can make life after the shower simple for the mom-to-be by giving her customized thank-you cards to send out to everyone!

The rehearsal dinner is a special part of your wedding.  It’s a chance for the wedding party and close family members to have a more intimate celebration and get to know each other before the big day.  Historically, the rehearsal dinner was hosted by the groom’s parents, but if you are a couple who is financing your own wedding, you may find yourselves hosting this event.

The rehearsal dinner doesn’t have to be elaborate.  It should be in a place that’s easy to get to from the rehearsal, and can be quite casual and relaxed.  Pick a venue that reflects your style as a couple, whether you love Chinese food or barbecue, and share it with your friends and family.  It doesn’t have to be expensive – stick to your budget and plan from the heart.

A customized rehearsal dinner invitation is a great way to include everyone in your pre-wedding dinner.  Let everyone know ahead of time what the plans are, and that you’d like them to be a part of this unique event.

The rehearsal dinner is also a way for you to thank the participants in your wedding and those who have supported you along the way. Wedding are a time of toasts and sharing, and this is a great opportunity to really give your thanks out loud as a part of the celebration.  If you are giving gifts to the wedding party, this is the time to present them.

If you have family or other guests who have arrived from out of town, you can also include them in the rehearsal dinner festivities.  Sometimes your wedding day passes in such a blur of activity that you don’t really get a chance to visit with everyone, so the rehearsal dinner could be an opportunity to relax and catch up with people you don’t see often enough.

So relax and take a deep breath – you’ve gathered your wedding party and family, you’ve made it through the rehearsal, and now you can celebrate over a casual dinner before your big day.

If you’ve just gotten engaged, you know that wedding planning can seem like a full time job that involves you, your fiancé and a lot of family members!  One of the first steps in wedding planning is to decide when the wedding will take place.  You’ll need to decide what type of wedding you want to have and think about location before choosing a date.  Are you planning a destination wedding that involves a seasonal resort?  Do you want an intimate evening wedding held at your favorite local restaurant?  Or have you always wanted to be a spring bride?

Unless you are planning an unusually short engagement, you’ll want to let wedding guests in on your plans in advance.  That means sending out save the date cards.  These customized cards can double as engagement announcements, as well.  They are a great way to just give your friends and family members a “heads up” that your special date is set and you want them to be a part of the celebration.

Photo save the date cards are especially nice, because they let everyone see that guy you’ve been talking about for months, and how darned cute he really is.  A photo of the happy couple is a wonderful way to tell everyone to put your wedding date on their calendar.  After all, they’re going to want to see how great you look in your wedding finery, too. Since most of us post important announcements like that on our fridge, another great idea is to send a save the date magnet customized with either a photo or a calendar with your special date circled as a reminder.

Once you start planning your wedding and working on creating your own special celebration, don’t take the chance that your guests will make other plans.  Save the date cards are the perfect way to let everyone in on your plans, and ensure that they have plenty of time to make arrangements so that they can be there to celebrate with you.

Here’s a good example of how you can use any of our templates and just change the text for your occasion. This client created a Thank You card from one of our Birth Announcement designs:

Twins and triplets, oh my! Their arrival is a blessing to any happy family, but how do you know what to expect when more than one bundle of joy shares a birth date?  There are many mysteries and myths floating around about twins and multiples, but what’s really true?

According to about.com, twins or multiples aren’t always twice or three times the work to raise.  Although you will have the hard work of raising children like any parent does, multiples can act as playmates and companions for each other – built in best friends to entertain each other.

You might think that twins would always be in competition as they grow, but they aren’t more prone to sibling rivalry than any other siblings are.  Each child develops their own individuality and twins don’t feel a greater need to compare themselves to each other.

Have you watched “The Parent Trap” lately?  Wondering if you’ll be able to tell your identical twins apart?  Even twins that look extremely similar will have subtle differences in their appearance.  Parents and others close to twins get to know them as individuals and don’t get them mixed up.

Science hasn’t proven that twins share any paranormal connection – like a special ESP. Twins do tend to be very close, share an extremely similar genetic makeup and have shared experiences, so if they do have eerie connections, it’s nothing that is unique to twins but could be experienced by close friends, husband and wife or other siblings.

Twins and triplets are certainly special in any case. And not just any birth announcement will do for the arrival of multiples.  Our customized photo birth announcements for twins and triplets celebrate the miracle of your special arrivals.  With multiple (no pun intended) formats to choose from and a variety of unique customizations, you can share twice or three times the good news with everyone.

These guys have their handful with 8 little kiddos, what blessed parents they are!

Wow, congratulations to our TWO photo contest winners with a record number of votes of 706 each!  The votes were rolling in neck-and-neck at the last minute and finally settled on two winners.

Looking at the website data, we have really seen a lot of traffic come from facebook.  Make sure you are posting your photo contest entries on your facebook page to get the most exposure!  We’ve even included a little toolbar on the photo contest page to help you create the link.

 Who can resist a cute little babe wrapped in warm fuzz?  This is a perfect example of why we say to keep the photographs simple with plain backgrounds and with lots of baby skin.  Then the focus stays on the baby…just like these cute pics!

One of the benefits of a professional custom design and 2 sided cardstock is that you can put a gallery of pictures on the back like this client did.  What a great large picture of Kendall showcased on the front and still many photos on the back of the design. 

We see a lot of our “little boy blue” and “under construction” birth announcements with the little boy in the Dump Truck.  This birth announcement is neat because they chose a John Deere dump truck to go along with our “little John Deere” announcement: