I'm interested to hear opinions on this as well. For the longest time, I thought the mother of the bride throws the shower. I'm clueless about weddings, though, and was basing it on my friend's wedding of last year. (Her wedding was Aug 9 and I believe her shower was in late April or sometime in May...so that's quite a while beforehand) Well, since my mom isn't really in the picture, I figured I just wasn't getting a shower. (And this made me so sad!! Also, I work from home, so it's not even like I'd have the option of co-workers doing anything for me, etc) Then my FIs mom told me it's the MOHs job to throw the shower. Well, my MOH is pretty much a lost cause (I have so many regrets about asking her, it's not even funny), my FIs younger sister, who is one of my BMs, is going to be hosting it. (Essentially, it'll be her mom doing most of the work, but it'll be in 'her name,' so to speak

)
As for WHEN to do it...my wedding is July 3 and my shower is going to be June 7. I feel that this is SO close..too close, almost..to the wedding, but FIs mom did have a point that we wouldn't have anywhere to store the gifts, really, except for in our individual apartments (which have NO storage space...LOL), so this would make less time that we'd be living with 'extra clutter.'
My question is: since our wedding is on a holiday weekend, our reception vendor suggested we send our invitations out earlier than usual, just to make sure people don't schedule something b/c of the holiday. (Also, I want to add that we sent out Save The Dates with our Christmas cards, so most people who really matter to us already know about the date) I also feel that if we're pushing the timeline forward of when to send out the wedding invites, that means we have to do the same for the shower invites. So that means I'd be sending them very close together. The thing is, though, I want to time the sending of the shower invites and the sending of the wedding invites correctly so that it's not like the wedding one will get there before the shower, or even just slightly after it. Am I worrying over nothing? Is it perfectly fine for people to get the shower invite and then maybe a few weeks later get the wedding invite? Again, I'm basing this on other people's weddings that I've been invited to where I've gotten the shower invites MONTHS before the wedding invite came.
I hope my question isn't a thread-jack; I'm sorry if it is...but I'm just pretty clueless.
I really hope you get a shower, hun. I didn't think it was all that important to me until I realized I WAS getting one and I felt so happy about it! I hadn't even realized how much I wanted one.