What Might a Baby Shower in Space be like?

I asked this question of author, Cornelia Amiri and she had lots of ideas to share! I’ll let Cornelia take it from here!

One place to turn to for ideas about baby showers in space is Star Trek. On Voyager, in the Human Error episode, Torres, at her baby shower, gets a pleenok—a type of puzzle for teaching Vulcan babies primary logic, from Tuvok.  And Mr. Kim, gives her disposable diapers with the Starfleet logo on them—standard issue. 

To top off the joyous occasion, Seven of Nine shares her best wishes for the baby. “To the newest member of our crew. May all her desires be fulfilled except for one, so she’ll always have something to strive for.”

And on Star Trek’s Deep Space Nine, the Heart of Stone episode, Julien Brashir and Miles O’Brian planned a baby shower for Ensign Vilix’pran, who was budding, with twins. O’Brian was building the ensign a hatchling pond as a gift and Brashir ordered some baby clothes from Garak.

As far as baby showers in deep space go, the first thing is, whoever is throwing the baby shower will explain what a baby shower is to all their nonhuman crewmates.

 “It’s a party humans have when they are pregnant to celebrate that and receive gifts (diapers, cribs, strollers, rattles, pacifiers, and toys) to help prepare for the baby.”

Then, the crewmates may look at the human like their crazy. But they’ll accept that it’s another weird part of human culture, and not wanting to be rude, they’ll attend the baby shower and bring a gift.

Now, in the far future, when we are born in outer space, we will have food copiers, or, like in Star Trek, replicators. So, we won’t have to bake baby shower treats. We’ll just tell the copier to make cookies, and the type, like sugar and almond ones, and the shapes. So, instead of just round, since it’s a special occasion, you might tell it to make shuttle, moon, spacesuit, planet, and star shaped cookies. And you’d tell the replicator what color of icing to use for each shape. In a few minutes you’d have treats as tasty as if they came from a bakery. 

As for the cake, you’d want to welcome baby to their new home. So, you might have the food copier bake a white cake in the shape of the starship where the baby will soon be born, in medbay of course. 

When the guest arrive, the mother-to-be will open her presents. One gift could be a bright mobile to hang above the infant’s crib. It might be made of a new type of plastic molded into the shapes and colors of all the known planets in the galaxy the ship is now exploring.

I couldn’t think of any games for an outer space baby shower, but one idea came to mind. 

The mama to be might tell everyone, “Things change so fast now. There’s no way to keep up with technology, especially all the alien advances. Who knows what life will like by the time this baby turns 18. That’s why I asked each of you to bring an item you consider simple but meaningful to your life on this starship. I’m going to put each one in a time capsule to keep in the ship’s storage area until I can give it to my child on their 18^th birthday.”

And then, each guest, no matter what species are home planet they’re from, will present an object that is meaningful to their life on the starship. 

And, I think I’d really enjoy that baby shower. 

Cornelia Amiri is the author of over forty books in a wide variety of genres, including science fiction romance. Her latest release is Rare Finds. You can find out more about her here. 

I think we’d all enjoy that baby shower! What do you think a baby shower in space would be like?

Perilously yours,

Pauline

P.S. Why am I talking about baby showers? Well, in my “reality” writing world, I’m releasing a new short story in my Big Uneasy series. It’s called The Family Way and it is set during a baby shower. You can find out more about it here: https://paulinebjones.com/books/the-family-way/