Flowers, Galore!

Yesterday, I met with our good family friend who also happens to be a florist - and thus, our pre-selected wedding florist - to go over the preliminaries of discussing what our flowers will looks like for the wedding.

First, our lovely florist met me at a floral arrangement shop (conveniently near my house) where she has worked for some time. The shop itself is closed on Sundays, so we had the whole place to ourselves which was really lovely. I also want to say how much easier it is to have vendors whose work you know first hand (she did my father's and brother's weddings and is helping my mom with hers now) and who you can trust to be completely honest in every necessary way. I definitely wasn't worried about being talked into something that I wouldn't like or about choosing flowers that are too expensive for whatever reason. I could also trust her to be patient with me as I am not a flower or gardening type of woman. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy flowers, they're pretty, I like floral scents, but....you know, I simply don't know anything about them - especially not at a wedding level.

So we looked through books, she explained what was what, asked questions about the overall style, the bouquets in particular, the venue, and walked me through the whole process.

Another great thing on having someone you already know: I didn't have to tell her my wedding colors - she already knew them.

Ultimately, we came down to that we'll have a robust but not extravagant amount of flowers and the overall tone will be something with good dimensions, texture, interest, and with less structure and formality.

None of this:

More of this:

The latter fit the venue better, but more, they fit me better. I know I'm a control gal and I like things 'just so' often, but I'm also not prim. Nor am I simple. The variation and dimensionality are attractive to me and seem so much more interesting and appropriate for us.

Although we weren't actually doing any trial bouquets/arrangements or anything, our florist did pull out some beautiful flowers and put them into a rough sense of what it likely or possible (the colors aren't perfect, I took the photos with my phone):

It was so pleasant to just talk and look and touch and laugh and enjoy it.

So far, a lot of the planning has been fraught with difficulty for a variety of reasons and it was just wonderful to work with someone in a relaxed environment and just know that I was going to be able to have what I want from it.

We also set up a time to go to Rush Ranch together so that she can get a real sense of what it is that we're working with here and how we can make the most of our floral arrangements and choices.

Our florist also happens to do wedding coordination -- comes in handy, doesn't it?

Thanks, Elise!