Wedding Post #15: The time has come…Flower practice

It has finally started to get a touch nicer (read: it doesn’t rain constantly, it lures you into a sense of excitement with a day or two of sun before pouring on you). With this slight shift in temperature and with the season I have been noticing peonies and sweet peas popping up in the farmer’s markets so I knew it was time to start practicing making my bouquet.
I had held off until now because there were mostly tulips out there which, while lovely, probably won’t be in season and seem much more fragile than I, joe-blow non-florist, can handle. Peonies are all over the blog world and people are gaga over them. Brides go to extreme measure and cost to include them in their wedding décor.


I was lucky to see booth after booth full of pink, white and magenta peonies for a STEAL.



They are a great early summer flower and make me excited for what is to come but peonies aren’t the be-all-end-all for me. They can start to look unruly and timing them just right for opening seems a bit tricky.
I had ~$46 cash with me so I set out to get a good amount of flowers to test bouquets and bouts. I brought a canvas grocery bag to carry my loot (I was taking the bus home) but only $15 in my bag was totally full!






When I got home I stripped all leaves from the stems and separated out my loot by flower type.
I got a ton!


I soaked them in a bit of flower food for a few hours (while we went ring shopping for M) before starting in on my work.
I followed a tutorial I found on apracticalwedding.com and tried building my bouquet while holding it to myself and using a mirror now and again to watch the look.



I think it turned out great! It is maybe a bit lopsided but I let the shape be determined by the peonies rather than trying to force a shape. I think a tad more tweaking could happen but so far I am pleased.



Wrapping the ribbon is not too tough but securing it is trickier and I’ll need to figure that one out.

Taking a picture is hard though

The Bouts were up next. I kind of thought these would be easy but they turned out kind of meh. I did like them when I pinned them to M’s jacket. They’ll be made from whatever flowers are available so all of the above is subject to change.



I think there’ll be a bit more practice but I am totally good with the plan for now.