The Shower Diva: Where Fun Reigns!

Goosie Cards® Creator Jennifer Marchetti

Surprise a mother-to-be with Goosie Cards® games at her baby shower. It's an easy, fun way to build baby's personalized flash card collection. After the shower, give the flash cards to the guest of honor.

Goosie Cards® games can be used at any shower, or go all out and host a “Little Genius Shower.”

Little Genius Shower Theme

• Send invitations with an educational toy theme. Baby Blocks invitations work very well for this theme. Or, you could use something with ABCs or 123s in bright, primary colors. Have guests bring educational gifts for baby.
• Decorating the party space with educational toys. Baby blocks are especially fun to use because you can spell out words like "food" for the buffet table and "gifts" for the gift table.
• Put some Mozart on the stereo.
• Play educational themed games. In addition to the Goosie Cards® games listed below, hold a spelling bee of pregnancy and childbirth related words. (Quick! Can you spell postpartum?), and play Baby Trivia. Give the winners plastic baby blocks filled with candies, bath salts, or other small goodies.
• For favors, use baby shower themed pencils. Personalize pretty labels with the name of the mother-to-be and date of the shower. Tie the labels to the pencils with ribbon. If you like, you can even add a baby block charm for extra pizazz!

Personalized Goosie Cards® Table Mixer

Guests frequently arrive with someone they know and sit with someone they know. But parties are more fun when people are mixing and mingling. Stir up some fun by the seating with this Goosie Cards® ice breaker:

1. Collect photos of family members and make one Goosie Cards® flash card for each member, i.e. Mommy, Daddy, Grandma, Aunt Rene, etc.
2. Make slips of paper that correspond to the names on your Goosie Cards® and the number of seats at each table. For instance, if there are six seats at each table, make six slips of paper that say Mommy, six that say Daddy, and so on. Fold the slips of paper in half and place them in a basket or bowl.
3. Place one Goosie Cards® flash card in the middle of each table, perhaps by integrating the flash card into your centerpiece.
4. When guests arrive, have them draw a slip of paper to find out where to sit. If the guest's slip of paper says "Grandma," they will sit at the table with the flash card that says Grandma. The flash cards make great conversation starts for guests.

During the shower, continue this family-centered theme by decorating with family snapshots and other memorabilia. Play Getting to Know the Mom (and Dad) - which is especially funny if paired with Don't Say Mommy's Name, where you avoid saying the name of the mother-to-be. Have guests join in the photo fun by bringing their own baby pictures for a game of Guess Who? Everyone enjoys seeing each other's baby pictures and trying to guess who is who.

Goosie® Stock Flash Cards Table Mixer

This works exactly the same way as the personalized table mixer, but uses stock Goosie® flash cards. You don't have to collect pictures for this one, just use ours! Choose from:

• Head to Toe, which feature little body parts. Send baby footprint invitations, play Itty Bitty Baby Parts and Mommy's Big Belly. Send everyone home with - what else? - hand lotion favors decorated with tiny baby feet!
• Animal Kingdom is great for animal theme parties. Feature Noah's Ark or farm animal invitations and coordinating decorations and favors. Play animal theme games like Special Delivery, Baby's Birthday, and Baby Animals.
• ABCs is great for BIG families that need lots of tables to match the 26 letters in the alphabet! Play ABC Baby Word Game or A to Z Baby and Baby Bingo.
• 123s lend themselves to counting games like Count the Pacifiers in the Bottle and Baby Price is Right.
• Trucks & Tractors is perfect for a baby boy shower! Guests will be sitting at backhoe and dump truck tables, so go with blue invitations and decor, and play boy-themed games like Vintage Boys' Toys and Name our Baby Boy.
• Favorite Foods is a colorful addition to any food-themed shower. Great for pairing with games like Sweet Pregnancy and Baby Food. Edible prizes and favors will tie in with your theme scrumptiously.
• Busy Bugs is a fantastic addition to Holly Brix's "Dragonfly Fun" baby shower theme.
• What to Wear, which has pictures of clothes, is perfect for the popular "baby clothes" shower. Play Bun in the Oven Dress game and design personalized snap-t's for the new arrival.

Goosie Cards® in the Memory Basket

Have two or three friends pitch in to buy multiple sets of Goosie Cards®. They can be personalized or stock cards, or some of both. Pick out 15 - 20 cards with a mix of subjects. You might have 3 cards from the Animal Kingdom set, 5 personalized cards, 2 Head to Toe cards, 3 Busy Bugs cards, and 2 What to Wear cards, for instance. Show your guests all the cards for 30 - 60 seconds. Then put the cards away and give each guest a Memory Basket game sheet. Have guests write down as many flash card images as they can remember. The person who remembers the most flash card images gets a prize. The mother-to-be gets the flash cards!

Create Your Own Game

Use your creativity to integrate Goosie Cards® into other shower games and activities. Once you get started, you'll probably think of lots more ways to have fun with flash cards before your give them to the mother-to-be.

About Jennifer Marchetti

Mompreneur Jennifer Marchetti is the creator of Goosie Cards® - the first and only personalized photo flash cards for children - and founder/CEO of GoosieCards.com. When Goosie Cards® were introduced in 2006, the response from parents, teachers and medical professionals was overwhelmingly positive. Children love personalized flash cards and they are a powerful teaching tool, especially for children with special needs and autism. Since then, Jennifer has been working closely with parents and schools to develop a wide range of Goosie® brand products designed to help parents and teachers inspire learning in their children. Jennifer lives in New Jersey with her husband, Jeff, and their two young sons, Luke and Zach (whose nickname is “Goosie”).