Thrifty Floral

Flowers are supposed to only take up approximately 10% of your wedding budget, however than can often accumulate to much more than just that. Or it can quickly increase your budget astronomically. This is especially true if you have an extended bridal party or family. We of course needed the flowers for the bridal bouquet and the grooms boutonniere, but we also had a large amount of extra flowers. Our bridal party consisted of four bridesmaids(2), four groomsmen(2), the best man(1), the maid of honor(1), four ushers(4), two attendants (guest book and gift)(2), and the ring bearer(1). We also had to have two mother corsages, two father boutonnieres, two stepmother corsages(2), and two step father boutonnieres(2). Then there was the grandparents. We had four grandmother corsages(2) and four grandfather boutonnieres(2). So needless to say, we needed lots of flowers. LOTS of flowers.

You can order flowers from local groceries, like this one, but even then you can spend a fortune. $AVINGS TIP: If you're not dead set on the smell of the flowers, go with silk ones. You can save a fortune, get them a head of time by a long shot, and even make them on your own if you possess the time and skill. In the local area, a "simple" package of in stock fresh flowers at the local grocery is $200. This includes the bridal bouquet (and toss bouquet) and the groom's boutonniere, two bouquets and boutonnieres for the bridal party, and two mothers corsages and fathers boutonnieres. Each additional bouquet is $30 (making it that $90 for our wedding party), each extra boutonniere was $6 (an extra $84) and each additional corsage was $8.50 (an additional $34). We've now gone from a simple $200 to $408. It may not seem like much of a difference but remember these bouquets/corsages/boutonnieres are not in my choice of flowers. Colors yes, flowers no. Clearly not our choice, we didn't want to spend double and have it possibly not be something we liked.

So we went with silk flowers. The thing I liked about our flower arrangement was that I got our flowers weeks before the wedding. I didn't want to have to worry about a florist being late on the big day. Or not showing up at all. You can call me a control freak, that's fine. But at least I knew that if the flowers weren't there I could find them and get them there. Much easier than trying to get a hold of a florist. I don't have the skills to be a florist, although it is a interest I wouldn't mind pursuing, so I could not make the arrangements myself. So I outsourced. I found a lady on this site who made all of our floral pieces, except the grandparent corsages, for a mere $273.99. That price has shipping included! The entire package included:

1 Bride's Cascade bouquet (11" wide by 20" long) (pictured right, top)
1 Maid of Honor round bouquet (8-9" round) (pictured right, second)
4 Bridesmaids round bouquets (8" round)
1 Toss round bouquet (7" round)
1 Groom's boutonniere
2 Mothers corsages (pictured right, third)
1 Bestman boutonniere
4 Groomsmen boutonnieres (pictured right, with corsages)
2 Fathers boutonnieres
2 Stepmothers corsages
2 Stepfathers boutonnieres
7 Ushers boutonnieres

Now the flowers that were used were two of my favorites: lilies and roses. They all came pre-assembled and ready for use. All I had to do was label them, to make sure we had all the right pieces (which we did) and check for missing/broken parts, typically due to shipping conditions.

The only problem we had was the handle of the cascading bouquet. It was a little loose but since I looked over the bouquets, I knew to be wary of it on the wedding day. I could have super-glued it back together but I wanted it to lay flat later on. (Another option was to send it back to the artist and have her fix it, but I wasn't sure shipping time and costs if it would be worth it. Besides, I'm a DIY'er so I knew if I needed to fix it I could, keeping superglue handy, just in case.

Since we got so many of our pieces in this arrangement, I had more time to get everything together. The arrangement started out with only seventeen pieces, but after sending an email to the artist she seemed more than willing to nearly double the package size for us, and for what I thought was a decent amount. I was very pleased with the entire package, as it freed up my time, and my piece of mind. Less worry = Happy Bride!

Now, remember I said that the package didn't include grandparent corsages or boutonnieres? Well I made them myself. Yup. It was easy too! You know those flowers the dollar store sells, that people often use on graves? Well I bought two bunches of them, a dollar each. and got two spools of ribbon (baby  blue and brown), also a buck a piece. I pushed the leaves up closer to the flower bud, cutting about three inches down on the stem. I cut about six inches of ribbon, each color and created a loop shape, as shown. Then I used craft glue to glue them together. slipping the the stem through. I then sewed a safety pin onto the ribbon.

The corsage was a little more difficult... I had to cut it down do that it would lay flat on the wrist and then punch a hole into the ribbon (not necessarily an easy feat) and then make sure that the stem wouldn't be poking the wrist. Then it was just a matter of the each grandmother tying it on.

Until next time on Wedding On The Cheap, Happy Planning....