chase them the hell off your lawn....haha...

And, the sealed letter from the Ob/Gyn to the baker is offered for a fee.

Another dumb distraction from the world we live in.

I'm still waiting to wake up in bed next to Suzanne Pleshette.

One of ours had his when he was 20.

It didn't really surprise me any, which was kind of a letdown for him.

since gender and reproductive organs are not always aligned. And I don't know if I want to go to a party involving genitals.

But I do recall some of that going on. Some of my recall is a bit hazy in spots.

...point.

and ruin the surprise?

Was in the delivery room.

play parlor games (some of which involve chocolate "baby poop" ), and, of course, bring gifts.

Instead of in a dolphin pool in an Indian sweat lodge while being anointed with gluten free fair trade cruelty free lotions made from organic ingredients by identical twin reiki practitioners.

they have roommates (the mom's sister and husband) and live in an apartment in New York, and the kid was born at like 3 am. All around horrible sounding idea in my opinion. But the kid seems to be okay.

I'm in my 60s and grew up the oldest of 9 kids. Our parish (Catholic of course) had so many large families that if you had 4 kids, people said "Such a small family, only 4 kids?"

Yes we baby boomers have a completely different reference point. So by the time my younger brothers and sisters came along my mom wasn't even organizing christening parties any more. Baby showers were unnecessary, she already had every baby item in hand-me-down condition.

These millennials only have one kid, or that's the plan anyway. I guess they have to milk their families and friends for all the gifts while they can. To each his own.

It's a second baby shower where you drink and visit the baby and of course you bring a gift.

The genital reveal party, a traditional baby shower, and then the sip-and-see party. Maybe there could also be a mom's water breaks party; then later on, baby's first solid poop party and so forth. I guess we are expected to be delighted and fascinated with a family's reproductive accomplishments. And bring gifts.

One. We weren't able to attend but both hubby and I thought it was way over the top and we had already gotten 3 gifts for them. I don't understand the need to have a party about everything either. Who knows what they'll come up with next, perhaps one of your suggestions will go mainstream.

"witness the conception" party, that I'm into.

It turned out later that the mother to be had not been pregnant. That is extremely proactive.

come one, come all. just bring gifts.

Yea, chase them off your lawn, it's our right!

I think a first marriage or first child is okay after that skip the parties

I detest party games of any kind. There always seems to be some element of humiiation involved.

they theme it as retro.

We were astonished. HUGE party. It was fun, it was nice but we had never heard of it before.

It was something we had to look up. Apparently it is the deal now.

Yes to the first question.

and the sex typed "games" are juvenile, outdated, and utterly repugnant. One wonders if they'll serve cake carved into the appropriate genetalia with anatomically correct colored icing.

My RSVP would be "Are you out of your minds? No, I won't be attending."

Some depict the actual birth, complete with a mom, baby emerging from the birth canal, blood and umbilical cord. All made of cake and icing. 😳

She did the big box of (blue) balloons. I already knew and was sworn to secrecy. No gifts expected, just a fun afternoon with lots of food and alcohol (son-in-law's family are big drinkers) except for Mom of course.

I don't mean until birth, I mean at least a year after they were born. They would tell people they aren't announcing it (and both kids have unusual names that don't have associated genders) and people really didn't get it.

I work in radiology and I'd say a good fifty percent of couples having twenty-week ultrasounds ask the sonographer to conceal the gender identity in an envelope for the big baby shower reveal. Whatever. I always wanted to know ASAP when I was preggers. Why, back in MY day...

And yes, get off my lawn. I worked hard for it.

Oh, good grief, the gender reveals rate right up there with the "We're Pregnant" proclamations in my view. There ain't no "we're" when the time comes.

of every damn thing people do, which then turns into various ridiculous celebrations of every damn thing they do. I don't think it's entirely for the gifts, although that might be part of it. I think it's because social media - Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat and so forth, along with obnoxiously ubiquitous selfies, have made it socially acceptable, if not actually mandatory, for people to tell the whole world in detail about all of their personal events, especially, it seems, the reproductive ones. HEY, WORLD, WE HAD SEX AND MADE A BABY AND AREN'T WE WONDERFUL! Wonderful, like billions of people throughout eons of history.

I'm happy for people who have babies. When the baby is born they can let me know and maybe I'll send a stuffed toy or a fuzzy blanket. In the meantime I do not want to be invited to ovulation parties, gender reveal parties, baby showers, water-breaking parties, episiotomy parties, sip-and-see parties, first poop parties or anything else having to do with somebody else's biological processes.

And I very definitely do not want them on my lawn.