Throwing a Zero-Waste Baby Shower
- Kendra Sumac
- Jul 2, 2018
- 2 min read
Alternative title: “I have awesome friends”. My friends recently threw me the most fantastic baby shower, zero-waste style.
We skipped plastic cups and cutlery entirely, recruiting people instead to bring extra glasses with them. I baked sugar cookies and there were homemade cupcakes and lemon loaf and other delicious goodies, along with a beautiful charcuterie board. We ended up having to break out the paper plates to supplement, but it was definitely lower waste than the average party table (and looked classy as heck).
Guests were asked to bring gifts unwrapped or in reusable gift bags, with baby books instead of cards. As a result, there was no pile of wrapping paper at all! And I have a collection of books with inscriptions that me and the baby can treasure for a long time. I had a note in my registry that I would love to receive hand-me-down or thrift items, and it was so fun to see the great finds that people had scoped out – gently used toys, blankies, books and clothes.
Decorations were adorable, handmade, and reusable. I’m kicking myself for not getting a picture of it, but there was a super cute “shower” cloud with little raindrops hanging up that was painted entirely on the back of a recycled diaper box. And as much as it feels like being a party pooper to request no balloons, I honestly don’t think anyone missed having balloons.
The games were perfectly low key. We played “Don’t say baby” (kudos to the winner, this is completely impossible at a baby shower) and “The Price is Right” and there was a craft station where guests could pick a letter of the alphabet and create a unique page to be bound into an alphabet book for the baby. Instead of trinkets, the prizes were bulk candy, produce bags, bamboo straws and LUSH bath bombs.
I am so grateful to all of my friends and family for being a part of the day, and for committing to the theme, whether it was their thing or not. I think it was a perfect example of how a party doesn’t need Pinterest-y frills to be beautiful and wonderful. And was it a bit more work? It can be more work to look for secondhand goods than to buy in a store, and it’s definitely more work to make decorations than to buy them, but I had a few people comment that they had a lot of fun searching the thrift shops for baby gear. I really hope that’s true. And people pitched in to take shifts washing dishes, so in the end that didn’t feel like a hassle either. It felt like going back to basics, in the best possible way.
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