{Ready To Pop at The Big Top} Circus-Themed Baby Shower Invites

For my circus/carnival themed baby shower, I really wanted my invites to be festive and playful.  The key element was the balloon, which guests had to inflate to read all the details of the party.  I designed the file in Illustrator and sent them to fastballoons.com to have them printed.

I designed a simple graphic for the envelope using elements from the invitation itself, and printed that on my home printer.  One thing I learned while designing my wedding invites is that you can have as much fun as you want with the exterior of the envelope.

I found these super-cute envelopes with striped lining at envelopes.com so I picked those up (bonus- I didn't have to lick the glue to close them all, they are self-adhesive!  No pregnant lady wants to lick 35 envelopes).

I wanted to ask shower guests to write their message to me or the baby on the inside of a children's book, rather than a store-bought card.  We want to start building baby Diehl's library now, and we are all about recycling well-loved books.

Welcome!

You know The Ritzy Rose for our handmade wedding designs.  We formed the company shortly after our own wedding in 2010.  Now stick around to watch husband and wife team Jen and Jason as we set out on our next great adventure: parenthood.

Follow us through our pregnancy as we design the nursery, plan for a little one, and tackle endless creative projects.  You’ll find tips, tricks and all sorts of DIY goodies.  And the fun is just beginning- this November, our little bundle of joy will arrive!

I am 24 weeks pregnant. We don't know what we're having. I have a lot of ideas and 16 weeks to implement them before our lives are turned upside down in the best way possible!

Currently, the room that will become our nursery is being used for storage.  Since our 1915 house doubles as our place of business for The Ritzy Rose, it just made sense to do things that way when we moved in a year ago. In order to feel like we were settled fairly settled, all extra boxes were placed in that room, to be sorted out later.

Later has arrived! This week we will be enlisting our brother-in-law and construction pro Brad in installing drop-down stairs to the attic so we can clear out the room and start designing.

As soon as this happens, I will begin a process that I've been excited about for quite some time: designing our vintage circus nursery!

I will be posting all of my DIY designs here! Wish me luck ; )
-Jen
The Ritzy Rosebud