Flowers Flowers Flowers!

I am SO excited about this post!  Almost more excited than I am for my birthday and the new season of Glee next week! 

Due to budget constraints, I had decided to do fake flowers for the bridesmaids, toss bouquet, boutonnieres, and corsages.  My bouquet and Lee's boutonniere will be made of real blooms and done by a florist.  Yesterday, Lee and I went to Michaels to browse the flower and wedding sections.  Lo and behold, flowers were 50% off.  We made some split-second decisions and decided to purchase the flowers we would need for the wedding.

We found an assortment of large roses for bouquets, small roses for corsages and boutonnieres, and small white cluster flowers.  We needed a few more large roses than they had in stock, but Michaels is nice and gave us a rain check.  When we returned home, I decided to take a stab at flower arranging. 

There are not many tutorials on the internet for arranging fake or silk flowers.  I looked at a few general bouquet arranging websites, and then I just decided to go for it!  Here is the end result.  I am so pleased.  :)

Here, Lee is modeling a bouquet.  We decided to wrap the stems in black ribbon to match the black tuxes with their black shirts underneath.  I wrapped white ribbon as an accent around the black.

 Another side view.

A view from the top of the bouquet.

Here's how the whole flower arranging process went: I started by de-leafing all of the flowers and cutting the cluster flowers into single branches.  Next, I grouped three roses around one section of small cluster flowers.  In the indentations made by the three roses on the sides of the bouquet, I placed another set of small cluster flowers.  I placed the leaves similarly.  

All of the flowers were secured to each other one at a time using floral tape.  I must note floral tape is the most difficult tape I have ever worked with.  As your hands warm it up, it gets gummy and makes your fingers incredibly sticky.  Not to mention, the tape does not stick to flower stems; it sticks only to itself.  

I covered the floral tape with 5/8" black satin ribbon.  I wrapped the ribbon around the stem so it overlapped and covered the floral tape completely.  I temporarily secured the black ribbon with a round pearl pins.  I then took 1/4" white satin ribbon and wrapped it around the black ribbon, securing the white ribbon with the round pearl pins where the ribbon crossed.  I made these crossings approximately 1" apart.  The placement of these pins also acted to further secure the black ribbon.

Tah Dah!  I have a bridesmaid bouquet.  Here's the best part: the cost for all of the bridesmaid bouquets, boutonnieres, and corsages will be UNDER $50!  Plus, I get to have fun making all of them.  I love being artsy-crafty.  

I have one final interesting tidbit for all of you blog readers.  I have had nearly 4,500 hits on my blog since I started it late last November.  Cool!