budget bridal shower?

[Grumpy's Gal]

I need to plan a shower for someone who has nothing at all -- a kitchen shower is what it will be.

I'll send a recipe card in the invitation and ask everyone to bring a recipe written out for the bride to be.

I haven't thrown a shower in years and years.

Suggestions? thoughts? fun ideas? I know some of you have been to showers. What tips do you have? The shower will be afternoon -- no meal, just dessert.

Thanks for any help you can provide.

 

[princessnoelly]

I did a Pampered Chef bridal shower several years ago. We did it as a brunch and it was great. People were able to order things from her "wish list" and then she got to pick additional items based on the total dollars earned from her friends purchases. She ended up with a lot of great stuff.

I attended an "around the clock" shower and everyone was assigned a time. Some of the stuff people brought gave was really funny- 6am shower gel and a coffee maker....10pm was sheets, etc. It was fun to watch everyones expressions as the bride opened the different hours.

I've never played games at a bridal shower...so I'm no help there.

You're a wonderful friend to host such an important event!

 

[jen22984]

For my bridal shower, all of the guests were asked to bring a small kitchen item that started with the same letter as their first name. It was used in the first ice breaker, everyone had to introduce themselves and say which kitchen item they brought.

 

[Nissi]

I love Jen's idea! Must have been pretty funny for some people!

Two games I had my guests play at my daughter's shower.

1. I pre-purchased about 12 small priced kitchen items and placed them on a decorative tray. I had my daughter slowly walk the tray around the room and while doing so, I kept saying, OK, pay very close attention, there will be a test! As she walked, you should have seen them trying to memorize, count, and study the tray of items. Then I told her to go into the bedroom with the tray and stay there til I called her out. I then told everyone to number their papers from 1 to 15 and began to ask them question.....about my daughter! Ex: What color are her tights? How many rings is she wearing? Does she have any hair clips in? Are there any zippers on her? Etc. So funny! Then she got to keep the tray of kitchen items. (Corn cob holders, can opener, bamboo skewers, etc) She didn't know til the end.

2. Have a pre-madelist of things and assign a point value to these things. Then ask people to keep score for themselves based on what is in their purse. This was another very fun activity Both games take a while too, so fills up some time.

3. Also, another game was to fill a glass measuring cup with jelly beans or hearts, or whatever candy is appropriate and have everyone place a guess as to how many are in the cup. The winner gets the cup and the candy.

HTH

 

[chris31997]

Something else you can do, is have everyone bring something from the pantry. One it will help stock her pantry, and two it is fun to see what people have in their pantry. Another thing you can do is have everyone bring in their recipes.

Sorry don't know any games.

 

[3boymthr]

My aunt had everyone bring a cleaning supply for the house one with a fun descriptive name such as - fantastik, kaboom, etc. the items were pre-assigned, but certainly easy to get. She didn't tell everyone what they were for but we found out at the shower that she had written a little poem. She asked everyone to bring up their item when she said the name in the poem. Each item was placed in a basket. It was a sweet poem about how they had met and adding the cleaning supplies to the poem was funny. She had written things like "They spent their afternoon watching the Tide." And "On their wedding night lets hope the bedsprings are Bounce-y and the fireworks go Kaboom and all their days there after are Fantastik". My cousin loved it.

 

[Grumpy's Gal]

you guys are great! Thanks so much for your ideas.

This young lady is a friend of our family and this is, as far as I know, the only shower she's having so I want it to be special. She (they) have nothing so they need everything. I just want it to be special but I'm on a really tight budget.

if you think of anymore ideas, please PLEASE post them.

Thanks!

 

[DisneyCaliCouple]

My sister-in-law just threw my Bridal Shower this past weekend. We are coming from our parents' houses, so just starting out. One fun thing she included in the invitation was for guests to bring their "favorite pantry item." Such as a spice, flour, ect. Things you don't think to buy when you're first moving in but you usually need. For every item they brought, they entered their name for a drawing of a prize. It's just like when you go to a baby shower, and people do the diaper thing, where you get a ticket for every pack of diapers you bring.

We actually filled four boxes of pantry foods...a LOT more then I expected! It ranged from spices, cake mix, flour and sugars, and even a 9.5 pound bottle of BBQ sauce. Everyone really liked the idea too!

She also passed out recipe cards with pre-addressed envelopes to the guests as they left if they wanted to send their favorite recipe to us.

As far as games...One she did was the Toilet Paper wedding dress game. She got the TP at the 99cent store and everyone had fun with that one.

 

[Mickeyflower]

I personally HATE bridal shower games, BUT.......I am planning one for my niece and the only "game" we will have is called 20 Questions. You video tape the groom to be and ask him questions about their relationship (you can google 20 Questions Bridal Shower game and you get a ton of hits that have the questions already made up for you). Then what you do is ask the bride first, and then play the grooms response. Sort of like the Newly Wed Game, home version. We are also doing favors, so I think prizes will be a bit much. It's about the bride after all.

 

[ozziejen2000]

Some other games are bridal bingo. You can print free cards at
www dot dltk-cards dot com/bingo/bingo1 dot asp
You can use anything for the markers, candy pieces etc.

Another idea for a game is the word scramble
www dot abbee com/wedding_word_scramble/quiz dot .html

I personally love the idea of the pantry purge, sounds great for spring cleaning.

 

[LilAnn]

Funny coincidence, I just threw a bridal shower for my BFF this past weekend at my house. I had a bunch of different foods to munch on and tons of cupcakes (she loves cupcakes). I personally think a bridal shower is more fun if you have bridal shower games, otherwise you are basiclly just watching the bride open up gifts.

Here are games I have either played at showers or did this weekend:

I played the tray game that a previous poster mentioned. Only when I had the bride walk our of the room, I just had everyone write down a description of what she was wearing, the more details, the better. After that, I then had people write down what was on the tray.

I also used the pads of paper later and had everyone place the pad on their head and try to draw a picture of what they thought the bride would look like ont he wedding day. Hilarious picture to get of everyone drawing with paper pads on their heads and concentrating.

I have played the toilet paper wedding dress game before. I did a variation and had teams make a wedding veil out of tissue paper ( I happened to have a ton of tissue paper at home).

I had my BFF's fiance pack a bag secretly and bring it to me before the shower of random clothes of his and hers. At the shower, I blindfolded the bride and told everyone that the lights had gone out the night of the wedding, so the bride has to get dressed in the dark the next morning. it's hilarious to watch and it's fun to have the bride be the one doing the game for a change.

I have had someone write down the bride's responses as she is opening her gifts and then we reread them outloud later and explain that this is what she is saying on the wedding night.

Oh, I could go on and on with the games. Have fun planning! Good luck!