Wedding Arrangements

As you can probably tell, I like to make things. I am that person that walks in to a store and sees something that I like and I say, "Oh, I can make that." Then when you add my mother into the picture...well we make things. Everything in our wedding except for the attire and the wedding cake myself or a member of our family made. Literally. I'm talking about our aisle decorations, every bouquet & boutonniere, every floral arrangement for tables, every centerpiece, every dessert (minus wedding cake), the dinner and groom's cake, and every paper good (save the date, invitation, programs, fingerprint bicycle, table reservation cards, dessert labels, seeded give away cards). Whew! We are so grateful that not only does our family know how and love to do these things, but that they were willing to do them for us for our big day. Here are a couple of projects that my mom, nana and I worked on in the months leading up to the wedding. 

Aisle decorations: mason jars Nana had laying around with lavender twigs from Hobby Lobby (bought at 50% off) and twine wrapped wiring picked up from JoAnne's for $3.99. 

Total cost for 10 = $25

We also added lace ribbon that we had left over from a centerpiece arrangement. 

Here's a shot of them in action at our wedding. We hung them off the aisle chair in every other row. 

And here is a lovely arrangement that we picked up on clearance for $1.50 at Old Time Pottery - obviously we were going to yank out those hideous orange flowers and take off the country barn ribbon that was around it. 

But first there was a trip to Hobby Lobby that needed to happen. This is what our workspace floor looked like for a bit while we gathered up all the floral I liked for arrangements. We also found a ton of succulents at Michael's that I bought with their 40% off coupon (yes I would go in the store everyday and bring 2 friends with me just to buy one succulent each). So below we had some Poppy flowers, lavender, fuzzy baby's breath, acorn looking things, spidery things and some lilies...you know Hobby Lobby - I don't think half of their floral department exists in real life. 

Here is the burlap bundle with it's lovelies ripped out. Luckily the foam base stayed in nice and snug so it made it easier for us to stick the new floral stems in so they wouldn't move around. 

So here is a shot of just one of the arrangements, we had 6 total and they all varied slightly. These guys stand about 24 inches tall and maybe 8 inches in diameter. Since they were are widest arrangement we used these for most of our 60 inch table centerpieces. 

Here's a shot of the lace ribbon, I think it made it a little less 'ball of burlap-esque'. 

And another burlap bundle with a Poppy and spidery looking thing.

Here is one of the tables we had set up in the office for us to store all of our goodies on until we decided where they should go. In the back corner are all the mercury glass votives I picked up at Michael's for $6.99 for a pack of 6 (again I used the 40% off - bring - in - a - friend scenario for every pack). Hey, that's about $2.50 off every pack! We also have most of the succulents gathered from Michael's and some clearance LED flicker candles that I had my friend who works at Pier1 pick up for me using her discount (I got connections, folks). 

Here is the centerpiece arrangement we used for the 48 inch tables. The crackle vases were $4.99 from Michael's with 40% coupon and all the floral came from Hob Lob when they had their stems 50% off. And yes this is an ivory colored blanket laid on my office floor into a (very) rough 60 inch circle so we could get an idea on how to arrange centerpieces. This is a no judging zone. 

Here is an official wedding shot that shows the crackle vase arrangement, the mercury votives, the LED flicker candles and even one branch display. The branch displays I got from one of my bridesmaids that used them for her mom's birthday celebration last year. You see some picture frames in the background as well. These were all gathered and made by my stepmom and mother-in-law. They picked pictures of Bryan and me at the same age and showed them side by side in frames....some were kind of embarrassing...

These guys came from Old Time Pottery for $1.50 each. They are supposed to stand like the ones you see on the left and are meant for a tea light. Our venue, however, doesn't allow tea lights that aren't completely incased in glass so one day I flipped them over and saw a hole in the bottom....

....hello tiny succulent vase! 

And there you have it, our DIY floral arrangements. The style might not be for everyone, but the point is, is that you can do a lot of wedding stuff yourself for the fraction of the cost. We plan on reusing many of the succulents (my favorite flower) around the house along with most of the other stems. For the rest that we have multiples of I am bagging them up with their buddies and plan on selling them as a bundle in our garage sale next month. Win, win.