Such "parties" aren't as common as the coverage in popular culture would lead one to believe. None of our kids (or their spouse's siblings) have had them with their kids.

Well, I am not sure I understood the question so I apologize for being dense. You asked "Would you consider doing this with hydrangeas if you were expecting?" Expecting... as in a baby? I have not heard of parties where they reveal the baby(s) gender (yet).

Hydrangeas are typically used in weddings but there is nothing that says you cannot use them at other times and in other celebrations, of course. My usual observation though is to let florists supply them versus growing the blooms yourself... and letting your own plants provide the blooms because there is probably a large list of possible bad outcomes. The plants may not open the blooms when you want, (depending on the time of the event) you may get late frosts, and the blooms may open too early or too late. Unexpected (bad: think dry) weather can affect the looks of the colors. And blooms may not hold pretty if the event is late in the growing season. Even though paying for them is bound to be or feel expensive (hmm, I do not know how much they charge), if you can delegate something that important to someone like a florist who has a bunch of hydrangea blooms sources, it would be worth it.

There is a mophead often mentioned for these uses called Hydrangea macrophylla Wedding Gown. It has white sepals that appear green in some sections because not all parts of the bloom are mature and white so the immature "section" look green and people seem to like that. It is used in bouquets. There is another called White Wedding that gets a lot of publicity from Souther Living Magazine. It is a paniculata whose bloom is thickly white. It normally would bloom later than Wedding Gown (mid to late summer?). There are bound to be other varieties that only florists use/sell too. I am not sure how to force them to bloom early or late but, that would be something the florists could take care of.

Sure. Hydrangeas as cut flowers are lovely. Having a whole shrub might be a bit tricky to produce at the moment of revealing gender. Example, what if your reveal party happens in November?

As a side note, my hairdresser said she just purchased a hydrangea called "Blushing Bride" as a big hint to her boyfriend. She said it didn't work. And then I really bursted her bubble when I told her those kind of hydrangeas really don't do well in our part of the world. But no reflection on her pending nuptuals!

Hydrangeas are BEAUTIFUL cut flowers and if there is money one can always get a flower for the occasion...It is my experience that the "gender reveal" generation finds any reason it can for a gathering/party....Destination party for turning 30 is the most recent I have been made aware of...

I have never heard of them. Are they in place of baby showers?

probably a matter of taste, culture context etc.

I find those gender reveal things totally overblown, personally we did not know the gender/ sex of both of our kids till they "popped out"

to the dismay of my DMIL who wanted to know whether she should knitt a pink or blue babyjacket, I suggested orange or light green.

apart from that I find the potted "florist hydrangeas" awfully overused, you can buy them almost all through the year, their flowers last for ages and when planted outside they never grow well (at least not in our warm z7) because basicly they are (throw-away) bouquets with alibi-roots

just a thought...

I wouldn't want to know the gender of the baby, but I never opened a Christmas present early either. Part of the wonderful experience of the day is the surprise.

I love hydrangeas in any shade. I think the gender reveal parties are stupid.

I agree with the gender reveal parties being stupid. Florist hydrangeas would do what you want but it takes work to get the acid basic ratio for a plant growing in a yard to show either color. Then what happens if there is a storm and you are stuck inside.

i love hydrangeas. Re Gender Reveal.... to each his own. I will say though, that I was so happy that DD has not known the gender of any of her children- recently had #3. Whenever it was mentioned that she was expecting (with each one of them) I have to say people were always kind of surprised when asking about gender and the reply was she wants to find out at delivery. (you know, the old fashioned way).

No judgement-but I like that way too.

Heh, we had an ultrasound, the tech told us it was a boy - I couldn't see it, but my husband went and told everyone it was going to be a boy - so boy everything at the shower my co-workers gave - and guess what? Good thing gender reveal parties weren't a thing back then I guess.

(He had set up the baby swing in the LR, and every time I would look at it and try to picture the baby in it, all I saw was a girl. So on some level I knew.)

"None of our kids (or their spouse's siblings) have had them with their kids."

I think your kids are too old. That is, I think when your kids were having kids, gender reveal parties were not yet a "thing."

They use balloons, confetti, cake and various other methods to reveal the gender at parties , why not hydrangeas.

" "None of our kids (or their spouse's siblings) have had them with their kids."

I think your kids are too old. That is, I think when your kids were having kids, gender reveal parties were not yet a "thing." "

Thanks for guessing but you're way off.

Let's see....

None of my grandchildren are older than 6. One was born in the last 12 months. One kid's in-law family had two babies born last summer (different mothers, not twins). Another kid's in-law family has had two babies born in the last 18 months (same, the babies were cousins, not twins). No "gender reveal" parties, which i think are a pretty dumb idea but to each his own.

Not keen on the parties, nor with lumbering a baby with the pink/blue cliche from the start.

My niece had a gender reveal party with both of her boys. Everybody said they did it mostly for the cake. The cake was very good. I love hydrangeas.

We will probably have kids in the next couple years. I love hydrangeas, but macs don’t do well in my zone without winter protection so what would I do with the flowers after?

We will also not be finding out the gender. I don’t want a bunch of overly gender specific baby gear in pink or blue, with stereotypical “Little Slugger!” Or “Daddy’s Little Princess” on it. Not my style. I much prefer neutral colors like navy, white, gray, beige, etc.

My only experience with gender reveal parties was with some friends for baby #2. Toddler son helped them open a box and out floated pink balloons. Mom’s face was radiant, so happy - and then toddler pulls out a t shirt which said ‘just kidding, it’s a boy!’ Mom’s dismay and attempted recovery captured on video for all time. I thought it was one of the cruelest things I’d ever seen. Been sour on them ever since, but as others have said, to each their own.

Just going to add the oldest of our 3 grands is not yet 4 ..no gender known before so no gender reveal parties and imagine this... no showers either .

As salon and Sydney bring up, many expectant parents either don't want to know in advance the gender of a new child or don't want to communicate it to others. That was exactly how we felt, we didn't want to know so we had nothing to disclose to anyone.

Only one of our kids communicated in advance what they learned, and it was with their express instructions that only the grandparents (us and on the other side) and siblings (our kids and those of the other side) would be told.

Indiana, that was downright cruel.

Never been to a gender reveal party. It is solely for the parents to decide. But I love Hydrangeas! They are so needy of water, hence the hydra in the name, that here where it gets like a desert at times with high temperatures they are difficult to keep alive. I was so excited that there was an established hydrangea bush at this house. I wondered how they managed to keep it alive out there. Well apparently the faucet that was located near the hydrangea had a steady drip. And it was enough to supplement regular watering. Of course we didn't know that and my husband put a garden hose on the faucet so it was easier to water. But it stopped the drip! My hydrangea, bless it's heart, is now in hydrangea heaven. May it RIP. I cried.

The preceding comment interested me so I looked further. The entry in Wikipedia has a different explanation for the name, sourced to a publication from Cambridge University Press

"‘Hydrangea’ is derived from Greek and means ‘water vessel’, which is in reference to the shape of its seed capsules."

You know, when I made this thread a few days ago, I knew these parties weren't super popular, but I never expected to see this much hatred for them. From the few youtube videos I've seen of them, they just looked like a fun way to announce the gender of your baby (if you don't care about being surprised). I just thought this would be a fun way to use hydrangeas, since they come in the two colors often associated with babies.

We've been to a couple, both family. I'd never heard of one before receiving the first invitation - that little guy is now 5 yrs old. It was fun. Lots of good food. Mom knew the gender but no one else did including Dad. The baby was their first, they didn't have a Reveal with the second. A girl, now 2.

We went to one last Fall, another nephew having his first, and neither the Mom or Dad knew the gender until the Reveal. The older brother had permission to receive the ultra sound results. No one really cared the gender, either would be loved, but it was a chance to get together and support the young couple on their 'new adventure'. I think I took a gift to the first, only because I wanted to. I don't remember buying a present to take to the second but not for any reason other than I may not have seen something unisex that really 'spoke to me' for a nursery not yet decorated.

Big showers later for both young Moms. We're a big family. Babies have everything they need and then some.

I don't lean heavily to the blue/boy, pink/girl either. I'm not a 'girl' who loves pink and I'll pick up things not gender specific. Lots of cute things in yellow, mint, gray, navy, red these days if were talking childrens clothing ;0) But wait until these little gals are 2-3 years old and clamoring for pink and glitter. It never fails to happen.

Don't worry about it. Thare is a few people on here that must take grumpy pills every morning. They usually don't contribute anything to the actual question asked and believe that they are always right. I went to my first reveal last year. It was fun. It is always nice when family and close friends get together, for food, laughs and conversation .

Yes perennial, no worries, no comments were personal. At least mine weren't.

Not this thread specifically, but there are also some regulars on this forum whose comments seem so consistently uninformed or wrong-headed that they make it very easy for others to disagree with them authoritatively.

My coworker used both pink and blue hydrangeas as decoration at her baby's gender reveal party. (I did not go,but I was beset with AAAAAALL the details leading up to it.) Everything was pink and blue,the flowers,table decorations,some of the food. I suppose to furthur the point of....which is it!?!?!?!

They built a homemade volcano and used colored smoke bombs to reveal the gender. It was pink smoke.

To clear up an apparent misconception some types hydrangeas can have their color adjusted by changing the acid/basic composition of their growing medium. The ones you purchase at a florist are adjusted this way or by adding color to the water so the plants transfer it to the blooms. One of the reasons why when people plant they can be disappointed in the color after a couple of seasons when they do not know this.

We found out what we were having with the first two. After being disappointed when we found out what the second child was, (the pregnancy was SOO different from my first that we were convinced it was a boy) we decided not to find out with the last two.

I only know one person that did a gender reveal, my SIL. It wasn't a big party though, she just brought cupcakes to a family gathering with my parents and us and served them for dessert.

I personally think they are silly and overblown.

Interestingly, the woman credited with creating the gender reveal party thinks it's ridiculous and she regrets it.

https://www.today.com/parents/mom-who-popularized-gender-reveals-regrets-it-now-t159796

I never did have a baby, but I knew early on I didn't want to know until he or she showed up. Maybe for me it was a dread of the color pink, should this have been a girl... ;)

It's not always the case but during our "grow the family" years, my wife and I were like-minded that we didn't want to know in advance about the gender of kids in gestation and we told our medical providers that message. Nor did either of us have a preference about it with any of them. Our hopes in each case were to have a safe delivery of a healthy child. We wound up having both genders represented among the group (>2) but that never mattered and still doesn't.

I was present in the delivery room for each birth. our obstetrician (who was a joker in normal times) said the same thing each time as he pulled out the baby, something to the effect of "Well, do you want to know your child's sex NOW?"

TG, for us, the "gender reveal" was part of the information passed along in phone calls after each birth.

Elmer- just to clarify, we didn't have a preference, we just built up in our heads the IDEA that we were having a boy and we started envisioning what that would be like, what he would be like. When the Sono showed we weren't, we were basically mourning that idea. Once she arrived, we were so overjoyed that we both agreed we weren't going to do that again.

The gender didn't matter and as soon as they arrived, we were elated.

We did it a little differently than you in that, I wanted my husband to be the one to tell me who was born. So with the last two, as soon as they came out, he proudly told me their name (we had boy and girl names picked each time)

We told others when they came to the hospital to meet her.

Okay. We heard each time from the obstetrician.

We didn't do any speculating or advanced planning during the pregnancies because we really didn't care. My parents respected that but there was one annoying family member who wouldn't accept our preference - my mother in law. Not the brightest bulb in the chandelier on a good day, she ignored what we told her each time and had convinced herself each time that we really DID know and were playing a game to keep it from her. So she constantly asked stupid questions about what she thought would be indications, like "does the baby kick as hard as a boy would or was it more gentle like a girl?". My wife had to keep asking her to back off when it got to be too much.

We had no hospital visitors. We didn't live near any family and we asked them and friends to wait a few weeks (or whatever the docs had recommended) before coming to our house to visit.

Beware there are more than one variety of hydrangea. The older standard hydrangea is white and is winter hardy and not as fussy as the blue/pink plant. The blue/pink plant dies back to ground level in winter leaving a dead, woody stem. It has to grow a new plant from the root each spring. Fortunately, this plant will bloom on new stems whereas the old standard blooms on year old stems. The pink and blue hydrangeas are the same plant! The color of the blossom depends on soil acidity. Blue blossoms are produced when the soil is acidic and pink when the soil is on the basic side of neutral. Getting the proper acid level is a bit tricky. You can overdo it and kill everything. Garden stores sell a sulfur compound to acidify the soil around the plant. Its a slow release type and only one application is needed before blooming season. The correct amount is a trial and error procedure if you do not have a test kit. Start with the recommended dose and increase it if the bloom did not turn blue, but of course, you'll have to wait until next season to adjust the dose. Acidification is additive as new doses adds to what was left of the old dose. The amount remaining in the soil at season's end depends on rainfall and leaching rate.

My advice, if you want to use hydrangea for a reveal party, buy the blooms when needed from a florist ( if available). Hydrangeas only bloom once per season, but their blossoms are long lasting when left on the plant. By September, the blossoms tend to turn green as the seed matures. Unless you have a commercial green house with staged crops of hydrangea, forget about trying to grow blue or pink hydrangea for a reveal party. Trying to time the arrival of blossoms with the baby's progression is too daunting.

My kids are both in their 40s. At that time there was no option for knowing unless you absolutely had to know more about the baby for some reason.

My daughter had a gender reveal party for her first child using a cake, it was pink inside. Now that child is 5 and last Saturday they had another reveal letting my granddaughter hit a piñata where pink confetti came pouring out. So much fun for everyone. Stupid or not, we enjoyed it.