A shower present for the kid who is already there

Who each present on the table is actually for

Sort a shower table by recipient rather than by price and it comes out lopsided in one direction.

The baby

Onesies, blankets, a stuffed rabbit. All of it gets used and none of it gets remembered — the person receiving these presents will have outgrown most of them before they can hold a spoon. That is not a criticism. It is just worth noticing that the person the whole afternoon is for is the one attendee who takes nothing away from it.

The parents

Diapers, bottles, the stroller. These are the presents that get used the hardest and disappear the fastest, which is exactly what they are for. Most of a shower list is this category, and the people who bring it are usually right to.

The shelf, years later

The framed print, the engraved thing, the memory book with blank pages nobody fills in. Bought with the best intentions and judged much later, by whether anyone ever picked it up again.

The child who is already there

In a second or third shower there is a kid in the room, about three or four, watching their mother open presents for somebody who has not arrived yet. Almost nobody buys for that child, and they are the only person present who is old enough to notice.

Buying for the kid who is already there

This is the present we can make. A 24-page story where the older child is the main character, drawn to look like them, built from what you know about them rather than from anything about the baby.

It works at a shower for a reason that has nothing to do with sentiment. The afternoon is arranged around a person who is not there yet, and the child who is there spends it being told to be careful with other people's things. A package with their own name on it changes the shape of that afternoon, and it keeps working afterwards, because the book stays theirs when the visitors stop coming.

We write for ages 3 to 8. Under three the story gets read to them rather than followed, and it may be worth waiting a year rather than buying something they will meet too early.

What we can't make for a first baby

If this is a first child, there is nothing here for you to buy, and it is better to read that now than after paying.

• The pictures come from photographs. We ask for two or three photos of the child so the character in the book looks like them. Before a birth there is no face to draw, and a story about a baby who has not arrived is a story about nobody in particular.
• We don't sell a voucher. There is no card you can put in an envelope now and redeem when the baby arrives. If you want to give this to a first-time family, the honest version is to say so on the day and order it once the child is old enough to be in it.
• Newborn photos don't solve it either. A book made from photographs taken in the first weeks is a book about a person who changes completely by the spring. The range we write for starts at three for the same reason.

Getting the photos without spoiling it

There is one awkward part, and it is worth naming. You need two or three clear photos of a child who lives in someone else's house.

• You may already have them. Family group chats and shared albums usually hold more than enough. Faces need to be visible and reasonably close; the child does not need to be looking at the camera.
• Asking a parent gives the surprise away. That is the trade. Some people ask anyway and let the parent in on it, which also gets you a better book, because the parent knows what the kid is into this month.
• Ask the other parent instead. If the shower is for one of them, the other one is usually happy to be the accomplice.

Timing it against the shower

Count back from the date of the shower rather than from the due date — showers are usually held weeks before the birth, and the book has to exist by the afternoon you are handing it over. The clock is 7 business days from the day we have your photos. If you want it as an object rather than a file, add the time it takes you to get it printed.

What happens when it gets opened

Shower presents are opened in front of everyone, one at a time, and narrated. A book about the older child gets handed to the older child to open, which makes them the center of about ninety seconds of an afternoon that is otherwise not about them at all.

It also does something for the parents that a registry item can't. They are being congratulated all afternoon about a person who does not exist yet, while privately wondering how the one who does exist is going to take it. This is the present that says somebody thought about that.

If you are the parent rather than a guest, the question is not what to bring to the party but when to hand it over — the new sibling page works through the four moments people pick and what each one trades away.

How ordering works

Three steps, and the first two are done before you close the tab — nothing to install, nothing to post.

• You pay $9.99 and tell us the child's name, age and whatever you want in the story on the payment page.
• You upload two or three photos of them on the page you land on straight after checkout — pick the files and you're done, no email to write. Prefer email? Send them to info@kater.jp from the address you paid with instead.
• The finished book comes back to the address you paid with as a print-ready PDF within 7 business days. If we miss that, you get a full refund without asking.

One thing worth knowing before you count backwards from a date: we're in Japan, so business days here are Japanese weekdays. Weekends and Japanese public holidays don't count, and they don't fall on the same days as yours. How the 7 days are counted is written out on the refund page. If your date is tight, email us before you pay and we'll tell you whether it fits.

Related pages

Worth reading first

• What changes between 3 and 8, and what to give at each step — Age by age from 3 to 8: what shifts, and where a picture book fits
• What to write inside a book you're giving a child — Six inscriptions, what makes each one work, and where to put them

Other occasions

• Birthday — What to tell us so the story sounds like this year's version of them
• Christmas — How the timing works with no carrier involved, and what to do when it's already late
• New sibling — When to give it, what belongs in the story, and what a book can't fix
• From grandparents — The three questions to ask the parents, and how to read it together from far away
• First birthday — Sorted by when each present actually gets used, and what a one-year-old does to paper
• Mother's Day — What changes depending on who it's from, and how to count back from a date that moves
• Easter — What survives the week after Easter, and why the printing has to happen before Sunday
• All guides — what to look for before you buy any personalized book