A Non-Gender Neutral Registry When You're Team Green!

One question we got a lot when we announced that we were going Team Green this pregnancy was, "What about a registry?" Luckily for us, a registry isn't necessary. We have more than enough to welcome another bundle of joy. However, having a few new items for this baby is a fun idea. But how do you register for fun items when you don't know what you're having?

I was SURE there had to be something out there for parents who weren't finding out their baby's gender until birth. Were parents doomed to have only gender neutral items once on Team Green? There had to be a better way. I was on a mission!

Using the amazing research skills God gave us mamas, I went to the internet in search of an option for gender-clueless parents! And to my delighted surprise, I hit the jackpot!!

Not Finding Out, www.notfindingout.com, is an online registry where parents who aren't finding out can register for gender specific items while not knowing. Each item has a version for a baby girl as well as a baby boy. Your friends and family get the joy of shopping your registry without knowing baby's gender either. They simply select an item to purchase and once the sweet baby is born, Not Finding Out sends the parents all the wonderful gender specific items purchased!

As a registrant and expecting parent, we get the fun part of selecting all the fun items we need and would like for our sweet baby. Once set up with a login and registry on Not Finding Out, a welcome package is sent to the parent that includes a "Shhh, Card". The parents bring the "Shhh, Card" to their care provider to have the gender discretely written and sent back to Not Finding Out in a pre-addressed, pre-stamped envelope! NO ONE has to know baby's gender but the care provider and Not Finding Out. It's fantastic!

Registry items range from clothing, blankets, and bedding to furniture, strollers, and car seats. All the items available on a traditional registry are offered at Not Finding Out. Even fun items such as gift sets, highchair covers and lovies are featured on Not Finding Out's product list. Most items include a boy and girl option unless both aren't available.

When someone purchases an item from your registry, they are given two options: to select the option THEY want or to select the "NFO Option", which means the gender specific item will be sent to the parents after the baby is born. Once an item has been purchased, a beautifully wrapped Gift Preview Card is sent to the parent or the guest to bring to the baby shower to give to the mother. The Gift Preview Card shows both the boy and girl option of the item as to not give away the surprise. At checkout, guests are given one last option to have the Gift Preview Card and the pruchased item sent to them to deliver or directly to the parents. If they chose the "NFO Option", the items will be sent directly to the parents after delivery!

For parents who are choosing to leave baby's gender a surprise until the delivery room, Not Finding Out is an excellent registry option! What a fun way to select gender specific items without knowing and without spoiling the surprise for family and friends. I am SO excited to select a couple of fun items for Baby #5!!

To Know or Not To Know

By now it is no surprise we are pregnant with our fifth child. Shocking? You have no idea! Typically well-planned and tried for, our babies have been an expected addition. But this baby? Sweet baby #5? He or she has had a mind of their own... from conception. This baby has been unplanned... yet never for a second unloved. Danny and I are over the MOON excited about this new addition.

That being said, it seems only fitting that we follow this surprise baby's lead... and leave him or her as a surprise as well! Yes - you read that right. Danny and I have decided to leave baby #5's gender up to the imagination until the wonderful day he or she is born.

You might be screaming in your head, "Why? What are you thinking? I HAVE to know!!" Some feedback I've gotten so far has ranged from not being able to set up a proper nursery to not being able to connect with the child. All well-meaning comments by friends and family and yet... it hasn't changed our decision to leave baby's gender as a surprise.

Let me try to explain myself...

1. We have 4 beautiful munchkins already and at least one of each gender. We have more than enough gender specific items to go around. I plan to wash 2-3 weeks worth of clothes for both genders to have them ready to go, and of course I will bring a gender specific outfit for each to the hospital to come home in.

2. This is our last. For sure. Although I am sure some will take bets that we will end up having another, this really is our last baby. And we've always wanted to wait to find out - so what better time than now? Rather - no other time than now?

3. I want to make this pregnancy special, just how all the others had a special element to them. Our first pregnancy was magical all in itself, our second was our first boy, our third was our rainbow baby (baby after a loss), and our fourth we did fun things we'd never done before, like a gender reveal and a sip and see. I feel like we've done it all... except this.

4. As if a baby at the end of it all isn't enough, waiting to hear the doctor announce, "It's a BOY!" or "It's a GIRL!" will make pushing all the more exciting! The wait throughout the pregnancy will be fun - filled with old wives' tales, fun gender prediction tests, and tons of pools! (I hope you win some money!)

5. The biggest reason I have chosen to wait to find out the gender of this sweet little bambino is to avoid gender disappointment. When I found Griffin was a boy, I cried in denial for a week. I was so sure he was a girl - that the ultrasound was done too early and the tech was seeing the umbilical cord. I read article after article about women who had been told they were having a boy to find out weeks or months later they indeed were having a girl. It was awful... spending a week mourning the loss of a child that never existed. and I refuse... REFUSE... to do that again. Gender disappointment is REAL, even if people don't want to talk about it. People always said to me, "Why are you upset? A healthy baby is all that matters!" And OF COURSE they were right. That doesn't mean I wasn't still upset. Waiting until the birth of our sweet baby will leave no room for gender disappointment. When I see his or her chubby cherub cheeks and big blue eyes, there will be room for no other feeling than LOVE.

Waiting to find out the gender of our baby seems to be rare today. Please don't misunderstand - this doesn't make us any better or stronger of a parent than anyone else. This is simply our decision... and we couldn't be happier!

Let the speculation BEGIN!

Tiny Dancer

It may be June, but memories of my daughter's 7th birthday party still make me grin. Even if the party was in February. I am obsessed with the ballet theme we used! It mixed the perfect amount of sweet pink and delicate designs to make way for the sweetest displays.

 

I set the tone of the party with a sweet ballet invitation from BeeAndDaisy on Etsy! You can find the invitation here: BeeAndDaisy

I then searched Etsy for the perfect printable package to decorate the party. I wanted something that would give me a lot of options for a good price. I found the perfect package from AmandasPartiesToGo on Etsy. Check out her shop here! AmandasPartiesToGo

The buffet was dressed with a simple plastic pink table cloth I bought at Walmart. I used the Kiss sticker printable from the package to make fun little bags of candy. I printed bunting from the package as well as a Make A Crown sign to display with the crown favors.

The food table was my absolute favorite. I used it to display delicious cupcakes, heart shaped marshmallows, candy covered Oreos, and Rice Krispy treat lollipops. The cupcakes are topped with a printable from the package. The cupcake tower was purchased last minute from Party City because the only display I had was black. I decorated the silverware with fun rhinestones and displayed a few pretty sparkly tiaras I had. Food included a cheese ball and crackers, a Chinese chicken salad, croissant sandwiches, and fruit. Above the table I hung pink and white pom poms and printables from the package!

The favors were made by my loving mama, affectionately known as Nana. She decorated simple pink gift bags with tulle and a bow. She then adorned them with the favor tag from the printable package. Inside, guests were gifted with a pink tulle tutu, a pink wand, heart sunglasses, and a pink polka dot bow!

For activities, we had a ballerina craft! I cut the top half of a leotard from pink scrapbook paper and glued them to a piece of white cardstock. Each guest then used their hands and pink paint to make the tulle ballet skirt!

We also had a fun guest - an actual dance teacher! She taught the girls a fun, quick routine to At Last I See The Light from Tangled. The girls also got to have fun free dance to the music of Frozen!

This was the first party for Mikayla that was No Boys Allowed and although we missed her brothers and boy friends, it was a great time to just relish in being a GIRL! Thank you again to everyone that made it!

Under The Sea

It's hard to believe my middle son is 2! Although I can't remember life without him, I'm not sure how we got here. We celebrated Ronan's birthday in style with an Under The Sea themed extravaganza! The party was originally scheduled to take place at Mimi and Papa's in the pool, but a few minor set-backs had us moving the party to our place last minute. NO BIG DEAL! We got this!

I started my party planning MONTHS ago - really, 364 days before the party when every thing I worked my ass off on for his first birthday melted away in the blistering Las Vegas sun. So we planned to have the party at my in-law's because they have a pool and we could use the dining room for the goodies and prevent everything from melting away again. I originally wanted an 'Oh - Two - dle's' party because Ronan is a HUGE Mickey Mouse Clubhouse fan. But I didn't feel it really went with the pool so we started looking for something nautical/ocean.

I am a HUGE FAN of Lauren McKinsey and all her amazing printables. I had recently joined her Cute Club which gave me access to all of her awesome downloads and sure enough, she had an Under The Sea party!! It was all perfect! You can check out her fun stuff and joint he cute club here: Lauren McKinsey

I started with the outside. I purchased a Styrofoam wreath from Hobby Lobby and wrapped it in green crepe paper.  I then used orange scrapbooking paper and my Cricut to cut out his name. I used the "Life Is A Beach" Cricut cartridge. I also used one of the clip art fish from Lauren's Under The Sea package. I hung it with fishing line! I also made garland with tissue paper I purchased from The Dollar Tree and hung that with fishing line as well.

Once family and friends entered the party, they were able to view his fun beach themed smash cake. Nana made fun candy-dipped Oreo's with a fondant number two and blue polka-dotted straws. The chalkboard was purchased on clearance from Hobby Lobby because of a silly mark on it. Uh - what mark?

The centerpiece of the party with the food table! I simply covered in a plastic blue table cloth and a fun fishing net that can be found at Hobby Lobby (I happened to borrow mine from a friend). The framed menu and Bait Stop sign were printed from my Lauren McKinsey package. We had hamburgers and hot dogs, homemade potato and macaroni salad (not pictured because Mimi and Papa brought those), fresh watermelon, Fish N' Chips, and the most amazing cupcakes! These are by far my favorite part of the party! My mom, affectionately known as Nana, followed the tutorial in my dear friend Lynlee's book, Sweet & Unique Cupcake Toppers. You can get more information about her cupcake topper tutorials and information about where to purchase her book here: Lynlee's Petite Cakes

Hanging from the ceiling were fun sea creatures I had made! Using the same tissue paper from the Dollar Tree, I make pom-pom's. Then I made fun eyes and glued them onto the pom-pom. We had a turtle, a crab, and a whale (although my whale didn't come out quite like I wanted it to.) They were hung with fishing line. We then blew up pearl white balloons from Hobby Lobby and tied them to fishing line and hung them from the ceiling to act as bubbles. Green crepe paper was used to make seaweed behind the table and I used the same Cricut cartridge to make bunting with his name to hang on the wall.

In the kitchen, I had each child's favor ready for them to enjoy! The items inside were purchased from two locations: Target and Party City. I used the Anything Labels from my printable package, typed each child's name on it, and printed them on shipping label paper so they would easily stick to the buckets. From Target, we purchased the buckets, which came with a shovel, a plastic fishing game that included a fishing pole and four plastic fish, and water guns. The Fun Pad, ocean stickers, and pin ball game and bubbles (wrapped in the Under The Sea push-pop wrappers from the printable package) were purchased at Party City. Lastly, I printed the Under The Sea Snacks fold-over label from my printable package and filled favor bags with Goldfish snacks!

In the kitchen we also had a Reef-Fill station with Hawaiian Punch for the kiddos to enjoy! We also had coolers with water bottles, soda cans, and beer for the adults!

Outside, we had seating available for the adults while their kiddos played in the inflatable pool (A.K.A. the bath tub). We also had a pop-up set up to add a little extra shade for the parents. We had toys purchased from the Dollar tree as well as the toys in the favors to play with. One of Ronan's gifts from Mommy and Daddy was the Waterpillar, which is a sprinkler toy we had planned to use but didn't end up needing. The bath tub was enough.

We had a fantastic time with family and friends. I've been asked several times why we spend so much time, effort, and money on birthday parties in the Clyne family, and to be honest, I kinda can't stand that question. Birthday's are so important. This is when your child came into the world, became a part of your family, and changed your life forever. Each child is special and unique, and they deserve to have a day to just celebrate them. Birthdays are a very big deal in the Clyne family and will be until I'm in the ground!!

Thank you to everyone who was able to celebrate with us!