Weddingbee Blog

I crack myself up.

I’m writing this post while my nieces are down for a nap, so it’s going to be short and sweet with lots of pics. Hope that’s OK.

Getting anything done with a two and three year old around is pretty much impossible. Don’t even get me started about the disaster that was “helping” Aunt Veggie plant the centerpieces yesterday. That’s another whole post.

OK, so I’ve been knocking off wedding projects left and right this week, and last night was boutonniere night.

Supplies:

• 2 packages of feathers (pheasant and quail) for about $2.50 each
• One bunch of dried yellow flowers, about $5
• One stem of fake pussy willow, about $2.50
• One roll of floral tape and one spool of floral wire, which will both get used again for bouquet making

I have no prior bout-making experience, so I kind of just went for it. Here was my first attempt:

I liked it, but it was a bit poufy at the bottom and the feather stem wasn’t quite long enough to stay in well. So I made some adjustments including trimming the down off of the feathers a bit, and wrapping a piece of floral wire around the base of the feathers. I didn’t get any pictures of these steps, but when trimming the down poufy bit at the bottom, I tried to just follow the natural line of the feather. You can kind of see what I mean in the left bout in this after photo.

I twisted about 2 inches of floral wire around the stem of the feathers and crimped it closed with a pair of pliers. This really helped me have more length to wrap the tape around and made them bendable, and easier to position at the end. I read about adding toothpicks or other hard bits in with the stems to make them stronger, but the dried flowers were sturdy enough, so I didn’t need to add anything.

I made 10 total, for groomsmen, ring bearer, and dads, and it took me about two hours. The only thing I have to do now is wrap some nice ribbon to cover the tape and find long pins. With each completed project I feel just a little more relieved.