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Baby Shower Planning: How to Host a Great Celebration
Plan a baby shower that guests actually enjoy. Covers timing, guest lists, themes, and coordination tools for stress-free hosting.
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Planning guide
Quick Answer: Funny baby shower games work because they put normally composed adults in slightly ridiculous situations — chugging apple juice from a bottle, smelling melted chocolate out of a diaper, or drawing a baby while the paper balances on their head. Keep the humor clean, make sure no one feels singled out, and pair one big spectator game with two or three quick laugh-out-loud fillers. This guide covers 17 games that consistently land as the funniest moments of a shower. Each one tells you the group size, the time needed, the materials, and any setup tips so you can run them without a hitch. Whether you are hosting grandparents, coworkers, or college friends, these games generate the stories guests will reference at the first birthday party.
Hosts and co-hosts who want a baby shower that leans into laughs instead of sentiment, with games that work for mixed-age groups and feel memorable.
Melt 6 different chocolate bars (Snickers, Baby Ruth, Milky Way, Almond Joy, 100 Grand, Mounds) inside 6 numbered diapers in the microwave. Guests pass the diapers around, smelling and inspecting each one, and write down which candy bar they think is in each. Most correct wins. It is deeply silly, everyone plays, and it is the most-photographed game of every shower. Works for 5 to 30 guests and runs 10 to 15 minutes. You need: 6 chocolate bars, 6 newborn diapers, numbered stickers, paper, and pens.
Tip: Microwave each bar for 15 seconds at a time and stop the second it starts looking convincingly disgusting. Over-melted chocolate smells like chocolate instead of like the joke.
Fill baby bottles with apple juice or water. Contestants race to drain the entire bottle through the nipple as fast as they can. Most people last 20 seconds before their jaw cramps, which is exactly the joke. Works for 3 to 8 active contestants with everyone else watching and cheering. Runs 5 minutes. You need: one baby bottle per contestant (dollar store, $1 each), juice or water. This is a reliable crowd-favorite if you recruit a couple of competitive volunteers.
Tip: Poke the nipple hole slightly wider with a safety pin before the game so contestants can actually finish — otherwise the game dies when the bottle refuses to flow.
Three volunteers are blindfolded and race to diaper a baby doll correctly in 60 seconds while the audience shouts conflicting directions. Often two of the three diapers end up somewhere around the doll's ankle. Works for 3 to 6 contestants and runs 10 minutes including setup and reveal. You need: blindfolds, baby dolls, newborn diapers. Keep a neutral judge to adjudicate which diaper is actually on correctly.
Each guest balances a paper plate on their head and draws the baby-to-be using only the marker against the back of the plate — no peeking. At the end, everyone flips their plates for a reveal that is consistently the funniest 10 seconds of any shower. The parent-to-be picks their favorite. Works for any group size and runs 5 to 8 minutes. You need: paper plates, markers, and a prize for the winning masterpiece.
A shower riff on Pin the Tail on the Donkey. Print a silhouette of a pregnant person on a large poster. Give each guest a printed baby cutout with sticky tack. Blindfold them, spin them twice, and have them try to stick the baby on the belly. Closest placement wins. Works for 5 to 30 guests and runs 10 to 15 minutes. You need: a printed poster, baby cutouts with sticky tack, and a blindfold.
Instead of reading nursery rhymes aloud, guests have to sing them — solo, on the spot, when their name is drawn from a hat. The reluctance alone generates the laughs, and half the guests realize mid-song that they never knew the second verse. Works for 8 to 20 guests and runs 10 minutes. You need: a hat with names, a list of 15 nursery rhymes, and a very forgiving crowd. This is a grandparent-favorite.
Tip: Have a bailout option: guests can tag the next person in if they truly cannot remember a rhyme. This keeps the energy up instead of letting the game stall on one embarrassed guest.
Each guest tears off the length of toilet paper they think will wrap exactly around the expectant parent's belly. Everyone wraps simultaneously. Closest length without going over wins. Guests overestimate so wildly that the reveal gets laughs every time. Works for any group size and runs 5 minutes. You need: one roll of toilet paper.
Optional but memorable: a TENS unit on low settings simulates mild contractions. Volunteer dads and partners take turns experiencing a gentle version of what the parent-to-be has ahead. Keep it mild — the point is the reaction, not actual discomfort. Works for 3 to 6 volunteers and runs 10 minutes. You need: a $25 to $40 TENS unit from a drugstore and a brave volunteer group. Not for every crowd — skip if you are unsure.
Tip: Always let the volunteer control the intensity dial themselves. The laughs come from their reactions, not from cranking it up.
Blindfold 4 volunteers and feed them small spoonfuls of 5 different baby foods. They have to identify each flavor. Spinach-pea is the one that consistently breaks them. Works for 3 to 6 contestants with the rest watching. Runs 8 to 10 minutes. You need: 5 jars of baby food and blindfolds. Keep the foods mild — no one wants to fight a mouthful of peas on camera.
One guest leaves the room. A pacifier is placed under someone's plate or napkin. The guest returns and has 60 seconds to guess who has it by studying faces. Works like a reverse Mafia and reveals which of your friends have the worst poker faces. Works for 6 to 15 guests and runs 10 to 15 minutes. You need: one pacifier and a well-lit room.
The night before, freeze small plastic babies inside ice cubes. Each guest gets a cube in their drink. The first person whose baby is fully freed from the ice shouts 'my water broke!' and wins. Guests cheat (chewing the ice, shoving the cube under a hot plate) and that is where the laughs live. Works for any group size and runs 15 to 30 minutes in the background. You need: 30+ small plastic babies ($5 online) and an ice cube tray.
Tip: Use slightly larger cube trays so the ice takes at least 20 minutes to melt in a room-temperature drink — otherwise someone wins in the first 4 minutes.
Prepare 12 old wives' tales about pregnancy ('craving sweets means a girl,' 'heartburn means the baby has hair'). Guests vote true or false for each. At the end, the host reveals which are actually supported by evidence (almost none are). The generational reveal — Grandma defending every one of them — is the comedy. Works for any group size and runs 10 minutes. You need: a printed quiz and pens.
Teams of 2 race to swaddle a baby doll in a muslin blanket as tightly and correctly as possible. Most burritos end up half-wrapped or suspiciously loose. A neutral judge (ideally a nurse or mom-of-three in the crowd) picks the winner. Works for 6 to 16 guests in pairs and runs 10 to 12 minutes. You need: 4 to 6 muslin swaddles and 4 to 6 baby dolls. Dolls can be borrowed from friends with toddlers.
For co-ed showers. A bracket-style single-elimination diaper-change race between all dads and male partners. 8 contestants race in pairs; winners advance. The final is hyped like a boxing match. The spectacle — grown men sweating over a doll diaper — is consistently the funniest moment of a co-ed shower. Works for 8 to 16 contestants and runs 15 to 20 minutes. You need: bracket sheet, diapers, baby dolls, and a stopwatch.
Tip: Record the final on your phone vertically for easy sharing. The dads reliably do something ridiculous in the last 30 seconds and it becomes the video the family group chat replays for a year.
Pack a real diaper bag with 12 to 15 items — half practical (wipes, pacifier, burp cloth, nasal aspirator), half ridiculous (a TV remote, a spatula, a rubber chicken). One guest pulls each item out dramatically and the room votes on whether it actually belongs. The ridiculous items plus the occasional real-but-odd item (a nasal aspirator is always a contender) make this land. Works for any group size and runs 10 minutes. You need: a diaper bag and an eclectic pile of items.
Read 12 real celebrity baby names (Kulture, Apple, North, X AE A-XII, Pilot Inspektor, Moxie Crimefighter). Guests vote on which are real and which you made up. Most are real, which is the joke. Works for any group size and runs 8 minutes. You need: a printed list and pens. Zero other materials.
Give each guest an index card. They write the worst or most unhinged piece of parenting advice they can think of, anonymously. The host reads all cards aloud to the parent-to-be. Some are jokes ('let the baby drive the car'), some are genuinely weird things someone's aunt told them, and the blend is gold. Works for any group size and runs 10 to 15 minutes. You need: index cards and pens.
Funny games work when everyone is in on the joke, not when one person is the target. Avoid games that put a grandma on the spot, make a shy friend perform solo, or embarrass the parent-to-be. The comedy should come from shared absurdity — chocolate in a diaper is funny because everyone is smelling it at once.
Three physical or loud games back-to-back wears out the crowd. Mix one big spectator game (like The Dirty Diaper Game or the Dads-to-Be Tournament) with two or three quick paper-and-pen laughs (Toilet Paper Belly, Grandma Was Right, Celebrity Baby Names) so the energy rises and falls naturally.
Mixed-age showers include coworkers, grandparents, and the pastor's wife. Keep the humor PG. Games about bodily fluids, anything genuinely scatological, or pregnancy-horror-story contests will land badly with at least a third of the guests. The Dirty Diaper Game is the line — anything further is a mistake.
Funny games should make the parent-to-be laugh, not feel like a prop. Check in with them before the shower about which games they are excited about and which feel like too much. Some parents love the Belly Measurement; others find it mortifying. Never assume.
The Dads-to-Be Tournament, Baby Sketch Artist reveal, and Dirty Diaper reactions all make incredible keepsake videos. Ask your PartyPilot co-host to be the designated phone camera — they can upload footage to a shared album afterward.
If you are considering a TENS unit game, the Toilet Paper Belly, or anything involving the parent's body, run it past them privately first. Some love the silliness; some would rather die. Better to swap it out than crash the vibe on the day.
The Burrito Swaddle Race and Blindfolded Diaper Change both need multiple dolls. Use PartyPilot's real-time RSVP count to know how many pairs or contestants you will have, then borrow or buy exactly that many dolls instead of over-ordering.
A good 'announcer' voice makes funny games twice as funny. Recruit an outgoing friend or the designated co-host (via PartyPilot's co-host feature) to hype each game in the style of a game-show host. The tone they set is the single biggest factor in how hard people laugh.
The Dirty Diaper Game (melted chocolate in diapers) is consistently the single funniest moment at most baby showers. The Baby Sketch Artist game (drawing with a paper plate on your head) is a close second because the big reveal makes the whole room laugh simultaneously. Both are cheap, easy, and work for any group.
Avoid anything involving real bodily functions, crude language, or drinking games. Stick to games where the humor comes from innocent absurdity — racing to diaper a doll blindfolded, drawing a baby without looking, chugging apple juice from a bottle. If you would not want a grandmother to describe the game afterward, skip it.
Yes, and they tend to work even better with men in the crowd because guys often commit harder to silly physical games. The Dads-to-Be Diaper Tournament, Blindfolded Diaper Change, and Baby Bottle Chug Race are all co-ed favorites. Skip games that assume traditional gender roles or inside knowledge of pregnancy.
Lean into the humor: mini rubber duckies, a novelty pacifier necklace, adult candy bars, a small bottle of champagne, or a 'World's Greatest Diaper Changer' certificate. Keep them in the $3 to $8 range. Funny prizes do not need to be expensive — they need to fit the story of the game.
Pick games that star the guests, not the parent. The Dirty Diaper Game, Sketch Artist, Funny Advice Cards, and Burrito Swaddle Race are all guest-driven. Skip the Belly Measurement and Toilet Paper Belly games and instead give the parent the role of 'head judge' so they get to laugh along without performing.
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