Baby showers are a prenatal necessity… once, maybe twice. But perinatal support is necessary with every pregnancy. Every time a mother is pregnant, her body, mind, and spirit require a recovery period, and one way to lend a hand in that arena is to embrace alternative baby showers and throw a nesting party! The idea is simple: you gather as mom’s friends and family and help her nest. Here are a few ideas to get you started:
House Cleaning
Divide and conquer. Deep clean mom’s house to prepare her family for baby’s arrival. Each guest (or group of guests) tackles a specific area of the home (e.g., bathroom, bedrooms, all the vacuuming) divvied up by the host. You can even make fun cards for each area with information on how this area is cleaned. KEEP THE CARDS. When someone visits mom postpartum, they can easily lend a hand and do a quick cleaning of the same area they had for the nesting party. Huzzah! Continued support for mom!
Freezer Meals
Guests are asked prepare their favorite freezer meals and bring the extras needed like canned goods and chicken stock to fill mom’s freezer with hearty meals to be enjoyed postpartum. This takes the meal prep burden off the family without compromising the nutritional components essential to postpartum recovery.
Slow Cooker Meal Prep
Nesting Party Guests gather to chop veggies and prep ingredients for freezer bags to be used for easy and nourishing postpartum slow cooker meals. After the baby is born, mom, or whomever is supporting her, can throw the contents of a bag into the crockpot for an easy family meal.
Kid Activity Kits
If mom has older children, her fellow mom friends can help her prepare activity kits to help keep them entertained when postpartum mama needs a break. Self-contained kits can be designed or found online and can be designed to meet the interests of any age of older brother or sister: Painting, Lego fun, or clay sculptures.
Pantry Prep
Grocery shopping can get cumbersome with the addition of children and one way to reduce the in-store burden for later is to stock up on non-perishables beforehand. Mom can make a wish list and your nesting party guests can bring pantry staples to stock. It’s like a baby registry for her kitchen!
Baked Goods Haul
Nesting party guests can participate in a day of baking hearty baked snacks (e.g., muffins, granola bars, lactation cookies). Guests can make a day of baking in the kitchen, maybe with a little wine on the side. Healthy snacking is happy snacking, and we all know how big a nursing mom’s appetite can be!
If you throw any of these alternative baby showers, let us know! Email photos and a description of what you did as a group to carrie.gaynor@marabouservices.com. If we share your party, we’ll send you a free Marabou gift as our thanks for doing your part to encourage the spread of nesting parties to help moms prepare for postpartum and unite her community!
How does Marabou support women?
We live in culture where “bouncing back” is more valued than proper rest. As admirable as it may be for a sports star to get back on the field, the same rules don’t apply to postpartum recovery. The traditional resting period has been stolen from women through pressure to get back to their job or simply through lack of presence.
Grandmas, sisters and best friends who otherwise would have been there to help a woman transition into motherhood often live too far away to be of any help. Household chores and caring for older children inevitably fall on the mom. But she just delivered a new life! She needs rest.
Marabou Services is a unique gift registry which provides services instead of stuff. Most mom’s get too many onesies, too many baby blankets and not enough helping hands. Break out of a destructive cultural norm and start a Marabou registry today.
With a Marabou registry you can sing up for any service which will benefit you or someone you know during the postpartum recovery period.
Postpartum doulas for a first time mom
House cleanings for moms of multiples
Childcare for moms with older children!
Once your registry is created, add it to any other registry or post it to your Facebook and ask friends and family contribute to your postpartum service, rather than buying you more stuff.
More and more moms find they have to figure out postpartum alone. Is it any wonder why PMDs are on the rise? Or women are embittered by the journey of motherhood? We can change that by giving the gift of peace.
