Making Your Own Wedding Flowers

A good friend of mine got married last weekend. She and her fiance are on their way to dental school, so being poor college students, they needed to keep their wedding budget in check. Her sister made the wedding cake (she is a fabulous cake decorator; something I am jealous of.). A family friend took the wedding photos. Her mom used her digital camera and a photoshop program
to create darling wedding invitations. She bought her dress on the clearance rack and had it altered ; creating the dress of her dreams, for a fraction of the cost. Her reception was in a friend's backyard so they could take advantage of the summer flowers (and minimize the need for decorations), and friends and family helped prepare and serve refreshments (beverage dispensers, tablecloths, and serving trays were also borrowed from friends and family). That left the flowers. As many of you know, professionally designed flowers are uber expensive, and can be a budget breaker. So, I offered to do her flowers as my gift to her!

I have been making corsages for Child #1's dance dates this past year, and I figured if I can make corsages, boutonnieres and bouquets can't be much harder. After watching a tutorial on creating bouquets, I was off and running! With wedding magazine in hand (and a few color swatches) I hit the flower displays at the local groceries stores (where I live it is Albertson's and Fred Meyer's). These displays are treasure troves for inexpensive bulk flowers. I bought the rest of the supplies at Joann's Fabrics, but any craft store carries the necessary items. After an afternoon of sweat shopping, my masterpieces were done!

The boutonnieres (the groom's is in the center):

The Mother's corsages:

The Maid of Honor's bouquet:


The Bridal Bouquet:



Important things to remember:

• Keep your flowers as fresh as possible by keeping them in a bucket of water in the fridge until you are ready to use them.
  
• After making your bouquets cauterize the ends of the stems with a barbecue lighter (just place the flame on the end of the stems until it turns a light brown). This will keep the stems from oozing on the dresses.
• Refrigerate the flower arrangements loosely covered (empty deli and bakery containers work great for this) until you are ready to use them to keep them as fresh as possible.
• If it is a big project enlist some help. Any project is much more fun if you have someone to shoot the breeze with while you are doing it.
  
• Don't be afraid to try. I have zero professional decorating skills (and I have never taken a flower arranging class). I just simply googled how to instructions on the internet and found pictures on line or in magazines.