One of my best friends is having a baby next month and I got to throw her a baby shower. I say “I” but really it was a committee planned event. Way back in August our sci-fi/fantasy group from college got together and had a “family” reunion. We were sitting around chatting about the forthcoming baby and the subject of a shower came up. “Oh, my friend S is throwing one” said the baby mama. A group of us looked at her in horror. “WHO?!” “My friend that I eat lunch with once a week.” None of us knew her, and no offense to her, if WE didn’t know her, then she would not be throwing OUR shower. And so the committee was formed. I was asked to wrangle the group, as we live all over the place and we all have loads of obligations, but I at least don’t have a paying daytime gig, so I got to be the wrangler. Whee!
So what do we sci-fi/fantasy/horror people do for fun? We go to Cons (conventions for you Mundanes). We decided that nothing would do better for our former Art Show Director than a mini-con baby shower. We spent days and weeks discussing what our con would have and this, my friends, is what we ended up with.
Our con had an Art Show, Dealers Room (the room with the giant gift table), Panels (about babies & child raising), Name Badges (random silliness), & Con Suite. I made themed signs to show guests what each room was for (what’s a con without room signs?).
Panels included: Naming Your Geek Baby, Steampunk Your Baby, and Name that Celebrity Baby.
We listed our favorite weird names (best name “Awesome Danger”) aloud during the Naming Your Geek Baby game. The people that got the most laughs from the GoH won. Winners of both that game and the Celebrity Baby game got to take home the frames from the celebrity game. We also spent quite a bit of time just talking about our baby & kid raising experiences. The Steampunk game was mostly just something to do while the other panels were going on. I’m going to make a little activity book out of the pieces of the steampunk game for the baby once he arrives.
Art Show had both an Amateur Track (art by me and my kids) and a Professional Track (art by our incredibly talented friend Kay). We were going to have a silent auction and even put out bid sheets, but ended up doing a live auction with Monopoly money. One of the kids that was there was really stiff competition. He got most of my art. He’s three. *sigh*
Con Suite had PB&J sushi rolls, several kinds of candy, cheese, crackers, Yoda Soda, and a giant Delta Psi Phi onesie cake & Converse booties.
Later, of course, there was time for gifts. Some of the favorites were ones I made: Baby’s First CosPlay Villain Mustache Pacifiers (idea from here)
and Baby’s First Con Shirt:
The Guest of Honor and her U.F.O. had a great time. “Thank you, everyone! I was not expecting a complete, elaborate con. That was amazing and SUCH fun!” 🙂
Lisa Holcomb 