Baby Shower

On (North American) Mother's Day, my very lovely girly friends threw a baby shower for me at Caroline's house. It was an absolutely gorgeous day, filled with sunshine and lots and lots of chocolate! The theme was chocolate and mint (for Junior Mint - get it? No? Oh come on!) and all the guests were asked to bring food containing one or both ingredients. Most people went the sweet route and my god...I was in sugar heaven! Chocolate mint cake, mint Bailey's cheesecake, minty-iced cupcakes, brownies, and more minty chocolates than you could shake a stick at. YUM. We also had kebabs with minty sauce, minty pasta salads, and a chickpea and mint salad just to balance out all the sugar. We had chocolate-scented candles, chocolate face masks, peppermint foot spray, and minty green nail polish.

I was so surprised and touched to receive gifts - they just aren't the "done thing" here before baby arrives. I know how weird it must have been for people to buy things for the baby (and how difficult because we're not finding out the sex this time until the birth.) The girls bought a load of adorable clothes, little toys, and a custom made Junior Mint sleepsuit (see photo)!

Caroline got a friend of hers to do Indian head massages and Hopi ear candle therapy (don't ask - I'm still not sure what this involves, but I have images of my friends with birthday candles melting away in their ears.) The massage was heavenly! It was a chilled, fun, sunshiney day. I cannot thank my friends enough.

The day before, Paul and I went up to Peterborough for a 3D scan. It was AMAZING! I was worried that we'd see an accidental willy/hooha shot, but because the baby was quite big at that point (32 weeks), the sonographer just had to stay focussed on the face to avoid giving the gender away. For the first few minutes, Junior Mint hid his/her face hidden behind the arms completely. The stinker. I had to roll over onto my side and jiggle my belly around (not pretty) to coax the arms away. Finally, we saw the little button nose and chubby cheeks and got some amazing shots:






We're still thinking boy, although the smiley photo really reminds me of Mia.