Wedding Wednesday: The Flowers!

I've been dying to share all the details about the flowers from our wedding! You might remember me mentioning that I was going to take on the daunting task of creating all of the bouquets, boutonnieres & wristlets myself. (I did a trial run bouquet here and followed this tutorial here.) Although it was time consuming, everything turned out absolutely beautiful, exactly how I wanted them to look, and the best part of all. . . I saved hundreds of dollars by doing it myself!

Let's start from the beginning. . . Friday afternoon before the wedding (which took place on a Saturday) I went to Costco and pretty much wiped out the flower section! For my bouquet I purchased two dozen white roses and a large bouquet of white flowers, which I can not identify. (At the time I could care less, they were inexpensive and fit the bill!) For the bridesmaid's bouquets I purchased all of the magenta colored flowers I could get my hands on in the Costco flower section. I even asked an employee if they had more in the back and was escorted to the walk in refrigerator where I was able to pick out exactly what I wanted. (Hey, it never hurts to ask, right?!) I felt like I needed a couple more unique looking flowers for the bridesmaid bouquets so we stopped at Trader Joe's where I picked up a couple of bouquets of magenta colored dalias. I kept all of the flowers in 10 gallon buckets until I was able to start arranging them. At about 11:30 pm the night before the wedding I got started! Luckily I had a couple extra helping hands.

I also purchased 13 potted orchids from the farmers market the weekend before (for only $8 a pop!) to be used for the bouquets, boutinears and wristlets, in addition to using one orchid on each of the 9 tables at the reception. I plucked the orchid blossoms off of the plant and attached them to floral wiring using floral tape in order to give them a 'stem'. This was quite tedious and time consuming, but I was determined to have orchids in the bouquets!

To see the full tutorial on how to create your own bouquet, go here. They explain it much better than I ever could! . . . Anyhow, once I had assembled the bouquets using floral tape, I kept the stems long and left them in sitting in water over night in the 10 gallon buckets. 

We were up until 2:30am the night before the wedding getting everything done. Yes, it would have been nice to get a good nights sleep, but honestly it was a lot of fun and totally worth every penny that was saved by doing it myself.

The morning of the wedding we woke up at 7:00 and wrapped the bridesmaid bouquets with burlap, secured them with pins and cut the stems. At the last second I realized I didn't have enough burlap for my bouquet but my sister saved the day by having some extra satin ribbon on hand. I actually liked the way my bouquet turned out wrapped with the white ribbon more so than if all had gone according to plan and I had used the burlap!

I created a couple extra orchids with wire stems to use in my hair, my step daughters hair and for my two nieces.

I made turquoise beaded wristlets for the mother of the bride, mother of the groom as well as for my sister-in-law. I also made boutonnieres for all the men (fathers, brothers, stepson, etc.)

The stems of the boutonnieres were also wrapped with a bit of burlap and secured with hemp twine. Out of all the flower arrangements I made, these were honestly the toughest and trickiest! The stems of the orchids were so delicate and I broke several in the process. But luckily I had extra! Everything turned out perfect and they all looked fantastic for the wedding!

Here's a few more close ups of the gorgeous flowers;

Here's the breakdown of everything I made:

(1) Brides bouquet
(3) Bridesmaid bouquets
(1) Small bouquet to toss
(6) Boutonnieres
(3) Wristlets
(5) Orchids for hair


And here's the breakdown of costs:

Floral wire, floral tape & pearl head pins - $15.00
Orchids - $32.00
Roses - $17.00
Other white flowers - $9.00
Misc. magenta flowers - $35
Dalias - $26
Turquoise beads for wristlets- $0 (I already had a ton of beads and beading supplies)
Burlap and hemp - $0 (I used what I had leftover from other wedding projects like the table runners and banners) 

Total cost: $134.00

So what do you think?! I really loved the way everything turned out and do not regret tackling this time consuming task the night before and the morning of the wedding. It's all about planning and patience. If you are willing to take on such a massive DIY project in order to save a ton of money, go for it, that's my motto! Everybody at the wedding could not believe I had made all the bouquets, which was the best compliment I think I could have received!

If you haven't done so already, make sure you enter the latest giveaway for a $75 giftcertificate from Bae Home & Design!

Wedding Wednesday!

Well, I've been happily married now for over two weeks. The wedding was so memorable, so perfect and so much fun! We strived to have a relaxed and casual beach wedding with a rustic and bohemian vibe and I think we achieved just that. There are thousands of pictures from the BIG day but I tried to narrow them down to just a few favorites to share with you. . . Take a peak at our wedding;

We were married Saturday, October 15th on the beach in Aptos, California. I prayed to the weather gods for six  months that we would have clear skies (and no rain) on our big day, and sure enough it was gorgeous out! The fog started to burn off and the sun peaked through the clouds just as the ceremony began. I walked down the aisle as my husbands brother played 'All You Need is Love' on the acoustic guitar. We had a short ceremony (about 10 minutes long) and a good friend of ours was the officiant. Him and I collaborated just two days before hand to put together the ceremony. It could not have been more perfect - just enough laughs and just enough tears were shed by everyone in attendance. My stepdaughter carried an abalone shell with our rings tied into it while my step son served as the best man. My two sisters (who happen to be twins) played 'rock, paper, scissors' just moments before walking down the aisle in order to determine who would be the maid of honor while my cousin (and good friend) served as the other bridesmaid.

We asked a friend to take pictures for us, and she did a phenomenal job!  Our 'getaway' vehicle was a car we borrowed from a family friend - a red, 1967 Chevy Chevelle with black racing stripes - so hot! The reception was held just 10 minutes away at the La Selva Beach Clubhouse. After searching high and low for the perfect place to hold the party, we settled on the Clubhouse because it was SO affordable and had a lot of rustic charm. We even had a fire going in the huge fireplace all night night long! I kept the decorations simple - burlap table runners, potted orchids and loose flowers in mason jars adorned the tables. We served beer, wine and sangria and for dinner we served traditional Hawaiian food that got rave reviews. We had a dessert buffet table with all sorts of cookies, pies, cakes and candies to choose from. It was seriously one great party - we danced and drank and ate all night long! It was nothing fussy nor fancy, just a lot of love and a lot of fun, which is just our style.

There are so many more details to share that I will break it down into a couple of other 'Wedding Wednesday' posts over the next couple of weeks! I hope you enjoyed the peak into what was seriously the best day ever!

Wedding Sneak Peak!

I know I said I was taking a blogging break until November 1st, but I am dying to share with you some details from my wedding, plus I miss all ya'll! So, to tide you over until I return, here's a quick pic taken after the ceremony on the beach:

More to come next week, I promise! Until then, I hope your having a wonderful October. I can't wait to get back into the swing of things and share more that's going on with my projects as well as all the details from the wedding!

xo,

Wedding Wednesday!

This wedding was featured on Style Me Pretty a while back and when I first saw it, the images went straight to my inspiration files without thinking twice! I love everything about this Rhode Island beach wedding from the flip flops to the Caribbean steel drummer! Take a peak and see why;