This is how they did it.  Shannon went to her 20-week ultrasound, and rather than asking the baby’s sex, she asked the ultrasound tech to write the sex on a piece of paper and put it in an envelope.  Then Shannon and Nate gave the envelope to their baker,  Camille at Cubby Cakes, who had already prepared the cupcakes the night before.  Once Camille got the envelope she inserted  either blue or pink candy in the middle to correspond with the sex of the baby, then she frosted the cupcake in a gender-neutral color to hide the color of the inserted candy.  All of us family members were waiting at their house wearing pink or blue to show what we thought the baby was going to be. I wore blue, even though I was secretly hoping for a girl, I just thought the way Shannon is carrying the baby it was a boy.

Since I was going to do some decorations, I asked Shannon to come up with a theme, (that always makes it so much easier to decorate right?) Shannon liked the theme “what’s it gonna bee?”.  We can’t take credit for this cute saying, we saw the concept on the internet and we just thought it was too cute and had to use it.

I know how I am, and if I would of started making stuff for this party ahead of time I would of probably gone to the extreme.  So I intentionally waited until the day of the party to pull it all together. It was just the right amount of decorations, but not over done, but got you in the mood for what was to come. The first thing I did when I got up in the morning was make this banner

I got some yellow canvas fabric from Joanns and attached vinyl letters that I made with my expression machine

Since I don’t have a Silhouette machine I had to get creative for the artwork.  I added the bee graphic by finding an image on Google and printing it on a sheet of clear label paper.  I then cut around the shape and tore off  the paper backing and stuck it on the fabric.  My daughter Tiffany free handed the dotted lines with a sharpie connecting the bees at the bottom.  I finished it off with ribbon on the bottom and ties for the top.   A couple of weeks back I had picked up these baskets that  reminded me of a bee hive and sprayed them yellow. I glued a $2 black Wal-mart plate to the top to make them into cupcake stands.  Adding a couple of bees to tie in the theme

I picked up the best smelling white hyacinths at the nursery and put them into inexpensive felt baskets from Michaels and added some pre-made fabric flowers also purchased from Michaels.  I took 4 plates from their cupboard and set the flowers on them as a centerpiece for their kitchen island. Simple and cute.

I added some more potted plants with the coordinating ribbon and the extra bees I had leftover.  The cupcake table was looking a little bland, so I used the extra ribbon to drape underneath the stands and a sunflower pomander I had in my Etsy store stash.

Now it was a waiting game for the cupcakes and the soon to be parents to arrive.  Here are some our  family members dressed in their pink or blue attire

Nate wore blue, and little Layla wore pink cause she loves pink!

My daughter Tara was on the pink team, but Lucas, Layla’s little brother was on the blue team.  Even Daisy, Shannon and Nate’s dog, got to get into the spirit of things and wore a pink vest.

My other daughter Tiffany and my nephew Connor were on opposing teams

Shannon decided to go with both colors, but there was a little more pink than blue if you ask me!

Camille did a beautiful job on the cupcakes.  The bees were so cute on top!  I wish I would of gotten a better picture of them close up, but at this time the anticipation was getting to us all and so the cupcakes weren’t sitting very long for me to capture a lot of pictures.

On the count of 3, all of us family members with cupcake in hand, frantically bit into the cupcake.  Here are the parents to be biting into their cupcakes

Looks like Nate is pretty happy..

Shannon, well she was taking a second look, I don’t think she believed what she was seeing

Nate was beyond ecstatic.  His dream come true.  Shannon, well it took her a little while to adjust, because she thought secretly all along that is was a girl, but now she couldn’t be happier. 

Don’t you just love that bubble sign?  I was so honored that Gail from MyRepurposedLife had her daughter Jamie send that to me.  I had mentioned it to Gail how fun it would be to use it at Shannon and Nate’s gender party and the next thing I know it arrived in the mail!  Wow, I was speechless, thank you Gail and Jamie! Gail made a bunch of these for Jamie’s upcoming wedding, you can see how she did it here. She is one talented lady with a Dremel tool!

Now that we have the answer to “what’s it gonna bee”,  it’s time to start planning. I have raised 3 girls, so this is going to be so new to me to have a grandson!  Shannon and I didn’t waste anytime and have already gone out shopping for an inspiration piece for the nursery.

A blue and white striped Avery rug from Pottery Barn Outlet, let the decorating begin!

Going to share this over at Amanda’s

What’s It Gonna Bee? is a post from: Cre8tive Designs Inc.