Dear Dave:
What is the proper amout of baby showers one should be given? Is it just for the first baby? I do not want to impose on people since my daughter’s last baby was only two years ago.
Oh baby!
Sorry.
This question might as well be about String Theory. If there’s one thing I know less about than theoretical physics, it’s babies.
As I’ve been getting older I’ve noticed that my friends have started making these little copies of themselves, called babies. Apparently they grow up into actual people. Consider my surprise when my previously held belief that humans are spawned in little vats like in The Matrix was shattered. I actually said, “Woah.”
My complete novice-ness in this particular area may actually be of some help to you as it may translate into a bit of objectivity. Did you know that objectivity and babies are considered antonyms in the Oxford English Dictionary? Apparently, when you have a baby, or, if you’ve got a vagina, you lose all ability for rational objective thought when one is in proximity. So it’s either baby or objectivity. Fortunately for you, I’ve got a diaper full of the latter.
Now, according to my extensive research, the whole point of a baby shower is for the friends and family of a mother to be to “shower” her with gifts that will help her raise the child. I’ve got a pretty well documented stance on parties created solely for gift giving. In general they’re just exercises in equating emotion with monetary value.
However, in this case, I’m much more lenient as the gifts are intended to help raise the child. What more noble deed is there than picking up a Baby Einstein mobile for the expected son of two mildly stupid parents in hopes that it will be your gift that wrests him from a child of mediocrity. Surely he’ll call you after he gets his Laureate and thank you for instilling black and white patterns on him at such a young age.
To sum up, baby showers = good.
But, multiple baby showers?
This is usually where it gets a little tricky and it can definitely seem a little like you’re asking for baby tribute, “All hail our fertility. We demand plush toys!”
If you look at it logically, there really isn’t any need for a second child baby shower. The whole point of the first one was to help you get all the tools that you need to raise a child. Which you’ve already got, because the first baby is already being raised. Therefore, you really should not need anything else because you could probably just use that same genius making mobile for Kid #2.
Now don’t start crying about middle child syndrome or trying to create an equal atmosphere of love for all your children. I’m the second child in my family and I spent my first 18 years wearing my big brother’s clothes and using his toys. Did it mean I was less loved because my mom and dad didn’t have a tea party to shill for new baby stuff? Nope. It’s just stuff.
I’m not saying that you should absolutely not have one. You’ve also got to gauge your audience. Most likely if your daughters friends are other mothers with their own kids to worry about, they’ll probably see the multiple baby shower as being slightly self important.
But if she rolls with a big crowd of single, unwed ladies, or a gaggle of bridge playing grandmas, hop on that baby toy gravy train. The only thing that single girls and grandmas love more than babies, are babies that aren’t their responsibility. They’ll do anything to quell that thundering biological clock, or that pang of nostalgia. So why not make that anything equate directly into a dope set of DUPLO building blocks?
Cash in, I say.