[mcanvasback]

On of Isabella's preschool teachers is adopting (domestic, brothers 3 and 4) and one of the other moms and I are planning a shower. It will probably be a Saturday afternoon tea with approx 15 people, moms and kids.(3 year olds) The brothers will not be there.

Any ideas on how to make it special and fun? We want to keep it simple but obviously I don't want it to be awkward or chaotic. This is a group of people who don't know each other well, but we all love Cindy.

I am not sure how to organize it, or how organized it should be - any suggestions? Thanks!

[kretzklan]

In the traditional shower realm - you could play some 'get to know you games' that even the kids could take part in. Maybe write her advice about toddlers and make the funny twist to write things that you have each learned from her about toddlers/preschoolers. It sounds like fun - my adoption shower was awesome!

[Ebadge90]

Is this the first child, or children for this family? If so, make it like any other shower.

[crick]

Do you know the theme of the boys's rooms they are doing? Are they registered? A lot of times I look at the registry list to kind of gauge a theme for the shower.

One item I received was a "recipes for kids" book where everyone brought their kids' favorite recipe and they compiled it into a binder for me. I really liked that.

Both of my showers were pretty "traditional" in the sense of a brunch/lunch, gift opening, and just chatting with everyone. We didn't play any games like you would with a baby shower, but they all passed around a book of wisdom like Kretz suggested for people to write in.

Another thing we had was I was asked to put together a small photo album with pictures of the kids so that everyone could see what they looked like and get an idea of their personalities etc. People seemed to enjoy passing that around and it helped spark conversations.

[MichiAmy]

A great theme for boys via adoption is "SuperMan was Adopted"!!!

[votemom]

something they did at my adoption shower was to have a slide show running on the TV during the festivities. it just cycled thru continually and everyone got to see all of our pics. if she's got pictures, that might be nice.