"Ericka Kammerer" wrote
Because a shower is the only type of adult party where
guests are required to bring gifts, it confers special obligations
on the guests of honor and on the people who plan the shower
to avoid looking like a greedy gift-grub. That's why people are
not allowed to throw themselves or close relatives showers, shower
guests are supposed to be very close friends, and the gifts are
supposed to be small, almost token gifts. You've stretched
things by having a shower this big, but you still have to act as
if this the gathering of intimate friends it ought to be.
One possibility for the shower is that you plan a set
of activities for the guests so that they're enjoying themselves,
and you gather small groups of guests together throughout the
party and open their gifts. You will be kept busy with the
gift opening, but at least your guests won't be tied down to
it and you'll be able to provide some of that more personal
attention to each guest and the gift they chose for you.


I agree. I wish more people used some etiquette and manners in the execution
of their baby showers. The ONLY way I know of to have a "no wrap" shower is
for the *people who are throwing it and totally not related to the parents
to be* to throw it as that type of shower, and I've never heard of that. But
I suppose it's possible if it's thrown as a No Wrap Shower, similar to other
themed showers people have like Lingerie Showers for weddings.

Personally, I think it's tacky even if it's friends who do all the throwing,
for someone to have extremely huge showers OR mulitple showers. I mean, it's
one thing to have a shower in each "circle" such as shower thrown by
coworkers and then another thrown by friends which family will attend.

But let me introduce you to my sister in law. She had 5, count them, 5
showers for her FIRST baby and some people were invited to 3 or 4 of those
showers. SOOOO tacky to invite the same person to several showers to where
they feel obligated to bring gift after gift after gift! My SIL planned her
showers and put friends up to throwing them for her. Not only that but she
dictated themes and this is how people got invited to 3-4 showers- she
decided to have a "Baby Gear Shower", then a separate "Clothing Shower" and
then a "DIaper Shower" and a "Toy Shower"! She might as well just have sent
cards to everyone and said "Hey, you have to buy me an outfit, a toy, a baby
gear item, and a bag of diapers- not just one gift, but one of each". SOme
people grudgingly attended one or two but a lot of people did not. In
addition, she had someone throw her a shower at a large church where she
didn't know half the people but they were invited due to her being a
member's friend. She received all-themed gifts at this shower and I remember
her counting her outfits and she had something like 80 baby outfits from
just this one shower. The whole family talked about her, like "Oink oink!!"
Because she had shower, after shower, after shower until she reached
everyone she knew- not friends, jyst acquaintances. It was the tackiest
thing I have ever seen. To this day. And she DID put little stipulations on
the guests, no No Wrap specifically, but she did do a lot of dictating as to
exactly what she wanted. Oink indeed.

This isn't the same thing at all, but a girl I used to work with is pregnant
with twins, a boy and a girl, through in vitro. Her sister is throwing her a
shower at work. She has already had one shower and the work one is going to
be just as huge. She went to a store to register, and she filled up the
memory card on the scanner- she had to go back to the service desk and get
an additional scanner because she registered for so much stuff, the scanner
wouldn't take any more. People think this is sort of tacky, too. Her
registry is unbelievable. Everything on the shelf it seems. I know she's
having twins but her sister has kids and has given her a lot of hand me
downs too. Also, when you have twins, you don't need to register for 2 of
everything but she seems to think (well this was SAID) "Why not, since
others are buying it??" So she registered for 2 high chairs ($120 each), 2
bouncy seats, 2 cribs, 2 swings. I told my husband you'd need 2 car seats.
and maybe 2 high chairs would be handy. But you can surely do with one
bouncer and one swing- but one baby in the swing and one in the bouncer,
then swap them later. Etc. I don't know, it just seems like people get tacky
with the showers and this is IMHO. I know it causes a lot of people to avoid
attending more than one showr and I know some people who didn't attend one,
they thought it was "safer" just to send a gift. Sad..

On the shower note...the girl w/ twins' sister had 2 babies a couple of
years apart and had showers at work. Some people at work thought it was
tacky for her to have a shower for a second kid when it had only been 1-2
years since they went in and bought the stroller, carseat, high chair, etc-
she got almost everything she needed from the work shower. People felt like
they had just bought all that stuff, she could have used it again. But I
noticed that she didn't register for the big baby gear, she registered for
diapers, baby wash, wipes, and things like that.Now that I am pregnant with
#2, someone wants to throw me a shower. With #1 I only had ONE shower, and
it was small. I received a lot of helpful things but we also bought a lot of
what we needed ourselves. I saved **everything**- clothes, swing, bouncer,
crib, car seat, stroller. Toys etc. This person really wants to throw me a
little shower again, it would be the same people as last time. It's been
just over 4 years. I am debating if it's rude to "turn down" a shower, and I
am debating if it's rude to let her throw the shower but have her somehow
let people know that we saved everything and will only need some basics and
mostly diapers and wipes. I don't want to dictate my shower, you know? I
thought maybe it's better etiquette to put up a small registry that she can
enclose on the invitations and if people go look, they'll SEE that it's
small, and contains mostly necessities such as diapers.?? Or just let her
throw the shower and say nothing at all and maybe people will get things
like that anyway? My husband still works with these people and he doesn't
want to have another shower thrown for us, he doesn't want for anyone to be
able to comment that it's our 2nd shower. Are 2nd baby showers (meaning
showers for Baby #2) tacky in general? Money is a LOT tighter this time so
if someone did throw us a diaper shower that would help out tons. But I just
don't want to seem like I am trying to GET people to. I don't care if they
don't, so I have also just felt like we can just let people get us gifts if
they want to without them feeling like they have to because of a shower.