How to handle gift situation for two showers with overlapping guestlists?
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So, early in my pregnancy, my mom hinted that my sister wanted to host a baby shower for me. My sister never mentioned it, and so neither did I...cut to two months ago when my best friend offered to throw a shower for me. I told her that my sister might be planning something, but if not, I would love for her to host. The next day I got an email from my sister asking me to start on a guest list. Which was fine. I told my best friend that my sister was planning one after all, but she still really wanted to throw us a shower. So I suggested that I keep the guest list for my sister's shower to ladies only, and more relative friendly, and let my best friend host a more casual co-ed party for our friends. My best friend was happier to be hosting "the more fun shower" anyway, so it worked out.
The thing is, I don't have enough family to segregate the guest lists, so all of my female friends who are invited to the shower my sister is throwing will also be invited to the co-ed shower, along with their SOs and kids, our male friends, and my husband's friends and some of his co-workers.
My sister asked for our registry information for her invitations, but I don't know what to do about the co-ed shower. I don't want to discourage our friends who will only invited to the co-ed shower from bringing a gift from our registry, but I'm weirded out by the idea that 20 or so of my female friends will be getting two shower invitations, both of which mention that we have a registry. My friends are all pretty laid-back, so can I just mention to them "by the way, we'd love to see you at both showers, but please don't think you should bring two gifts."
Is that weird?
Re: How to handle gift situation for two showers with overlapping guestlists?
~Benjamin Franklin
DS dx with celiac disease 5/28/10
Ditto on the pp. There's no such thing as "too small for a shower". Only invite your family to the one your sister is hosting and then your friends to the one your best friend is hosting.
I am fortunate enough to have two showers as well and the only people invited to both are my mother and mother in law.
Without my female friends, my sister's shower would be five people, including me. If I were my sister, I would probably feel upset that I'd offered to throw a shower and the guest of honor decided not to invite anyone. And regardless, those invitations have already gone out.
My group of friends is very tight-knit, so there's no way I'm excluding my female friends, all of whom are friends with my husband, and I'm friends with their husbands and boyfriends, from a co-ed party thrown by a woman they all know and are friends with. That would be very weird.
Maybe I should have just told my best friend that my sister was throwing me a shower and leave it at that. However, a lot of my friends are men. And my mother and my dad's wife are rather traditional, and would feel more comfortable at a traditional baby shower.
I guess the solution I feel most comfortable with is to ask my best friend not to include our registry information on her invitations. If someone who isn't coming to my sister's shower wants the information, they will ask.
I think there's a general rule that you don't invite the same people to 2 showers. I made that mistake and I was a little embarrassed about it. I had two really good friends at work who I had invited to my baby shower. That was before I knew that there was going to be a shower at work. I should've known there would be a work shower, because they do one for everyone else. But when no one has said anything about one for me and I was 36 weeks along, I figured it wasn't going to happen and I invited my 2 work friends to my other one. Eventually, I think 2 weeks before my due date, the work people threw together a shower for me. So it kind of was my fault but kind of not too.
Can your sister and your friend team up and just throw you one fun shower?
Oscar born October 2011
Miscarriage at 8 weeks (August 2013)
DD due September 1, 2014
If you were to count potentially 5 family members at the sister shower, seems like the best way to deal with this is to combine a shower with two hosts, if there's a lot of overlap in your family/friends circle this will be a way to include all in one celebration if time and space permits.
Two showers with the same group of people is overkill and looks gift grabby. I don't think showers are THAT enjoyable for the guests as they are for the MTB.
If your sister's invites are already out - you can't really do anything about that.
How many women are overlapping with the other shower?
If you're friend's invties aren't out yet - I would change the wording so that it does NOT say shower. If I got an invite to one "shower" and on "BBQ/picnic/party" then I would be OK with that, since I wouldn't think I needed to bring gifts to both.
Now, this means that most of your men friends might not get you a gift - since they might not recognize the co-ed party as a gift-giving shower. But I think ?t's just going to have to be that way. It's worse if the overlapping women think that you expect 2 gifts from them.
I hope this helps. This is a tricky situation.
That's what I was thinking...I'd rather people didn't bring gifts than some of them get the impression they were expected to buy two.
What about having the co-ed shower be a diaper shower? I wouldn't be offended if I was invited to a shower and a diaper shower. I'll bring a pack of diapers for some booze and snacks