Alia's Baby Shower

The backdrop went up in lilac and grey, two columns of balloons running floor to ceiling with a garland strung across the top and gold paper butterflies pinned all the way through it. Alia spent a good part of the afternoon in front of it in sage green while people took turns getting a hand on the bump.

Then the games, which is where any shower either works or does not. Four guests sat in a row in plastic ponchos while four more had blue bandanas tied over their eyes behind them. It photographs considerably better than it sounds.

The rest of it belonged to the dance floor, lit pale blue from underneath with the chandeliers going overhead. It stayed busy all evening on the same pattern: a circle opens, somebody steps into the middle of it, everyone claps them through, and then the next one goes.