For some people, picking out baby shower gifts for their friends who are expecting is exciting. Sometimes it is so exciting they end up forgetting that they ought to be more practical when it comes to buying the gift. Cute gifts are very nice to look at, but after all the trimmings have been removed and everyone is done admiring the presentation and the kitschiest of the gifts, do you think the recipient might make full use of it? In times of the economic recession such as this, we ought to become more practical about our gift-giving ideas to ensure that we are truly doing the best we can to help out a friend who is expecting.

However, your baby shower gift, as practical and sensible as it may seem, need not to look dull when it is opened by the recipient. There are many great ideas on how to make really cool-looking baby shower gifts for your friends. Here are some cool and practical ideas that are not only delightful to look at but also very easy and practical to use.

Bib and Pacifier Party Pack

You can make a baby bib and nipple pack by buying a couple of bibs for the baby as baby gifts and several replacement nipples for the baby’s bottles. Always get the general sized kind of nipples to ensure that it will fit whatever brand of bottle the mother will choose to purchase for her infant. You can begin by rolling the bibs into colorful little sausages and stick a nipple on one end of each baby bib roll. This will now resemble a makeshift baby bottle (albeit a colorful one at that). Next, design a paper wrapping label on the computer and print it out. You can come up with a personalized baby’s bottle sticker, such as “Baby Laurie’s Milk”. Print out as many labels as bib bottles you have and stick it around each bib bottle to resemble a label. Place all the bib bottles in a narrow box all in a row, and cover the top with some cheap plastic instead of a box cover to make it look attractive.

The Cloth Cake

The cloth cake is a great gift for baby that is slowly rising in popularity. Rather than buying a real cake for the mom (who is probably trying to lose the pounds, anyway), buy several different sized towels and other cloth baby essentials in monochromatic colors. Fold each one to look like a cake slice or if you cannot seem to do it, you can wrap each cloth around a 3D triangular-shaped cardboard instead. Put all the cake pieces together to make like a beautiful cake and decorate the top with “fake icing” by choosing your thinnest and longest cloth gift and folding it into a flower shape and putting it right onto the center part.

You might want to wrap the gift with a bit of ribbon on the side not only to make it look glamorous but also to “bind” the whole thing together. A cardboard cake center might actually be used to hold the cloth cake and become its base if you think the mother is also the baking kind, for she will be able to use this also later on after she gives birth. Wrap the whole thing in saran wrap if need be, and tell your hostess that she need not put this masterful creation in the refrigerator to chill!

Flower Pot Accessories

One grand gift of baby products will not need to be ostentatious – just get to the presentation right away. The Flower Pot Accessories of baby products will require you to purchase a practical tin or tumbler (or even a baby waste can) as the “pot”. Put a block of Styrofoam in the middle, and wrap a couple of barbecue sticks in green Japanese paper to resemble stems of flowers. On the pokey part of the stem, you can hang the different baby accessories you want to become gifts. These could be the following: extra nipples for bottles, a pacifier, a baby Sippy cup that does not spill, a vitamin drinking cup for when baby is older, a suction device for baby’s clogged nose (you can carefully slide the hole in the center into the barbecue stick, just make sure to tape it right before the end part so it does not puncture later on when it is moved) and many more. Decorate the entire thing with tiny sprinkles of glitter and cover it with clear cellophane to resemble a bouquet in a pot.

There are many great ideas that will not cost you an arm and a leg just so you can impress your friend. With a little ingenuity and a desire to gift someone with something she can use, you will surely make a great gift.