How many times have you been to a baby shower and watched the clock until the gifts were opened so you could make your getaway without feeling guilty?  How many times have you groaned because showers can be so expensive?  Here are 10 unique and frugal things that I think ease the pain!

1. Skip the centerpieces and make diaper cakes!  As common as diaper cakes are becoming they still aren’t very widespread so people are very intrigued by them.  As a frugal person I would rather spend money on things I would use and were practical versus flowers for centerpieces.  If you are interested in learning how to make one you can read my earlier post about the one I made for Shannon’s shower!  The best part about the cakes is that you can make them whatever theme you would like and however big or small you want!

2. Have the guests skip bringing a card and bring a book instead! I think this is a fantastic way to build up your future child’s book collection at the same time you are saving your guests the money that they would spend on the card that would just get tucked away after you send out the thank you cards.  When you open up the book to read to your child down the road you will always be remembered of the person who bought you the book because of their note written inside the book!

3. Have the hosts decorate the area with their gifts! I went to a shower and loved the gift of cute little outfits clothes pinned to a very long string so it looked like a clothes line.  Whomever is putting the shower together for the new Mommy to be could make that their gift.  To give the room a nice twist on decorations hang the clothes lines around the room.  Now your host isn’t having to buy any sort of baby decorations in addition to the gift they are giving themselves.

4. Get your guests involved by giving advice. We all know that everyone likes to give their opinion whether or not you are looking for it!  For my bridal shower we had each guest write down one piece of advice for our newly wed life and they all participated!  It was so nice looking back on all of the tidbits of advice after the shower.  This is always going to be a great reminder of advice from others who have been where we were about to go.  If you want to give the Mommy to be a beautiful gift purchase a nice frame and some scrapbooking supplies and offer to turn the advice into a nice piece of wall art for the nursery!

5. Create a baby poker theme for the shower! This would be a great way to have a co-ed shower because the men wouldn’t get bored if they are into poker.  Have the guests all bring their gift and that would act as their ‘buy in’ for the game and allot chip amounts based on the gift value.  Or you can have the guests bring diapers and each diaper would serve as a single poker chip to play with.  The winner of the poker game would go home with a fantastic prize basket!

6. Create a baby’s first ABC book at the shower! Have all of the guests draw and color a letter of the alphabet on a piece of paper for the Mommy to be.  At the end of the shower collect all of the pieces of papers and create an alphabet book that is personalized by all of the shower guests that the family can use when they start to teach their child the ABCs.  I personally would have a guest opt to get that as their gift and get it laminated and bound for the expecting family.  To me that would be a wonderful keepsake that is very practical at the same time!

7. On a tight budget?  Create baby coupons for the expecting parents!  Use you imagination and life experiences when creating these coupons.  The coupons could be for a few hours of baby sitting, bringing over a pre-cooked meal for the family, doing chores for them, etc.  I recommend putting an expiration date on those suckers so the parents don’t come knocking years down the road!  :)

8. Create a time capsule for the child! I don’t know one person who doesn’t like a time capsule.  Have the guests from the shower bring something that is popular or related to the year the child will be born in.  I would have the expecting parents write a letter to the unborn baby and include it in the capsule too.  When the child turns 18 or graduates highschool let them open up the capsule and see what trends were taking place and read letters from the family.

9. Make sure to take lots of pictures! It is so easy for the guest of honor to get caught up in the hustle and bustle of being the center of attention and forget about pictures.  Coordinate a person who could even be the soon to be Father who will make sure to capture this moment so the Mommy to be can look through them all when she gets home and has time to relax.  If there is one thing missing from my shower it was the pictures.

10. And the final tip to make a baby shower unique and fun is to have fun! Times are changing and you can make the shower whatever it needs to be to fit the expecting Mother’s personality and tastes.  Get the guests involved and get everyone laughing so they aren’t watching the clock.

Tiny Prints has some good shower invitations to choose from too and you can order matching thank you cards at the same time if you like it to all be uniformed.  My favorite is the timeline card that shows different things from 20 weeks to 32 weeks!

“I wrote this blog post while participating in the TwitterMoms and Tiny Prints blogging program, making me eligible to get a Tiny Prints gift code worth $50, plus 25 FREE Tiny Prints greeting cards—a total gift value of $149.75!  For more information on how you can participate, click here.”