The Ottawa Baby Shower

Wow. What a day. Today was the long awaited SURPRISE baby shower for the wife. It didn't exactly go down as planned.

To be honest, I did not plan on having any involvement in it at all. It was suppose to be a regular, well though out, baby shower planned by two of her best friends. They got together a number of times and planned a number of thing in which I was not involved and it was going just great.

Then tragedy struck.

The wife's best friend and the host-to-be for the shower's father passed away in a car accident in Peru while there on business. This happened on the same night as her fiance's grandfather also passed.

As you can imagine, this was an absolutely tragic night for them and all their family and friends. I won't go into great details about the situation and instead will stick to the shower.

Due her loss, she needed to go back home to be with her family. She wanted the show to go on, so we needed to find an alternate venue. Naturally, the only other location that made sense was that it be at our place.... the problem with this is that I still needed to keep it a surprise and somehow prepare and clean the house so that it was ready to receive 20+ people. The other thing about our place is that it is very closed, as in it's not open concept so we would need to squeeze everyone into one room.

In the few days before, I sent a message to all those attending letting them know of the venue change as well as sneaking away with Tiff's cellphone as she slept to get numbers for the friends I didn't have to ensure they knew about the location change.

I suppose I still don't know if I missed anyone that went to the original location? I think we're good.

The day of the event was interesting. Luckily the wife wanted to go to work early so we were able to get a bit more time. As soon as I dropped her off, I went to the grocery store and got a few extra items. I went home to meet a friend who was nice enough to go pick up a few items for me from the friend's house, at the original location, the night before as I didn't think I would have enough time. I then went inside and started doing the final cleanup. I finished any dishes we had lying around, prepared some meatballs, made sure the bedroom was clean and moved the chairs into the living room.

I then looked around and though to myself "This doesn't look like a baby shower to me". I then messaged the friend that was the co-chair of the party that had the most knowledge of the situation who informed me that she had a few things. She arrived along with another set of helping hands about 20 minutes later with cake and deserts in tow.

This was when I was the happiest all day. I was no longer alone in this fight against time. The next hour went very quickly with the arrival of a number of guests and the completion of the decorations.

The final task was actually getting her to the house whilst still trying to keep it a secret. Well her boss took on that task. They were scheduled to do training that morning and she mentioned that she will make the wife believe that she had to go to another location to get something and on the way would like to see the nursery that we had just finished painting. Well, while on the way, she didn't even have to say anything as the wife decided to blurt out "Hey, can we stop by my house and I can show you the nursery?" Seriously..... you made it that easy...

So they came over right away.

As she walked in this is how our conversation went:
Wife: "Hello?"
Me: "Hello!"
Wife: "Oh, who's here?" (noticing the shes at the doorway)
Me: "Oh, I just have a few friends over"
Wife: "Cool, me too"
Me: "Who?"
Wife: "Angie!" (as she walks into the main area and turns to see a room full of her friends)
Everyone: "Surprise!"
Wife (surprised face): "What?" (turning to Angie) "Did you know about this?"
Angie: "Obviously!"

It was fun. A few tears. Then the next thing she said was:

Wife: "Where's Becca" (the friend who was suppose to host). It was sad.

She went and got changed out of work clothes then came to speak to the guests then a few minutes later *BAM* From afar, her sister, mother, and family friend walk in, and she cried again. Good times! We love to make her cry.

Then about 20 minutes later *BAM* again from afar my mom, sister and a few family members show up. No tears this time, I think she ran out.

She was so unbelievably appreciative of the support and planning that went into the day. Everything seemingly went off quite smoothly in the end but did have one glaring omission. Becca. She was greatly missed but her presence was felt all over as a lot of the planning and the items prepared were all from her.

So, I would like to send a big thank you to Ryan for picking stuff up for me when I needed you last minute,  Patti for being a helping hand in the final stages, Angie for getting her to shower, to all the guests for being there, especially those who traveled from far and Michelle for being awesome, being the baker, the planner, the decorator, the executor and my saving grace in those few days leading up to the event.

The final heartfelt thank you goes to Becca. You were in the heart of the party without actually being there. The love felt for you from us is unending. Thank you for everything you did for my wife and unborn child.