DIY: How to make your own fabric fascinators/brooches

I found lovely dark red fabric in India that was used for the bridesmaid dresses, ribbon wands, and bouquet wraps.

I was in my fascinator frenzy and also decided to create fascinators or brooches from the same fabric as the dresses.

Here's the DIY for my fabric fascinators!

1. Cut fabric into several different petal sizes (an oval with a larger top). The petal may be rounded or slightly curved on top. The larger layers go on the bottom, smallest on top. You will need at least 18 petals based on 6 petals for 3 layers. You can gauge depending on size of petals.
2. Take 5-7 petals and place them around each other in a circle so the smaller ends are touching. Sew the petals to each other by sewing through the center of each petal (I made one long stitch across the center to gather the petal). You now have one layer of petals.
3. Repeat step two to create additional layers from your remaining petals.
4. Place the layers on top of each other to style how you want each of the layers to lay.
5. Sew through all 3 layers.
6. The center of the flower will be secure but you may have lots of stitch marks in the center.
7. Cut a small circle and sew this in the center covering the center stitch marks.
8. Glue or sew your center bead.
9. Glue a small rectangular piece of felt to the back. Glue a pin or alligator clip to the felt.
10. You're done! Voila - fabric flower fascinator!

Note: My silk/cotton fabric frayed very easily. Organza or a satin would probably have worked very well.

Yes, you can use silk flowers and real flowers for your wedding and some pics

Remember my debate about using real vs. fake flowers?

Well we ended up using real roses for my bouquet (my last choice but it turned out to be lovely and classic) and silk dahlias for the bridesmaids. The boutonnieres were made of roses as well.Closeup of both bouquetsCloseup of the lace on my bouquetWho knew? Roses can be pretty awesome.Bridesmaid bouquet in action along with her ribbon wand!

I did go to Whole Foods and got bright red gerber daisies but my cousin and mom didn't like them. They also didn't like the lilies my aunt and I bought for some tables. Good thing Whole Foods accepts returns on flowers.

My cousin ended up getting red roses at another Whole Foods. I think it was $30 or $40 for two dozen of the large roses and they held up pretty well. The dahlias were $3 each (50% off Michael's) and there were about 5 or 6 in each bouquet.
My cousin, aunt, and future cousin in law made all the bouquets and boutonnieres the night before (cloth from the dresses were made into ribbons covering the bridesmaid's bouquet's stems and some extra alencon lace trim covered my bouquet's stems). My family was ridiculously awesome. Let yourself be helped! So many things went wrong and I was also trying to see my out of towners so things were crazy that week!

So my final opinion: yes silk flowers (good quality ones) look fine and can be used in your bridesmaids or even your own bouquet. They're usually less expensive though not always. Their main advantage is that they can be made in advance and can be used after the wedding too!

Where to find flowers if you want to DIY your bouquet?

You may recall my flower dilemma.

I'm going to try to use real flowers for my bouquet for sure. My mom will not have it any other way.
I will still use the silk flowers for pew bows and likely for some of the bridesmaid's bouquets. So I'm taking a cue from J. Bride and using real flowers for me and a mix for everything else. Luckily I don't have to worry about them for centerpieces. We'll just be using mixed picture frames.
So here are the options:

1. Flower district/flower market - unfortunately I was super disappointed when I went. In NYC this is 6th Ave around 27-29 Streets and some streets in between. I was disappointed because I thought there would be more variety and they don't know what flowers they get every day. For red flowers, they only had roses, gerbera daisies, and some tropical flowers. Prices were ok, but not super cheap:
   - Roses are $2/stem
   
   - gerbera daisies about $2.50/stem
   - Hydrangeas $5/stem
   - Calla lilies (saw some beautiful orange ones) - $3/stem
2. Online wholesalers - I heard about and liked the variety at Fifty Flowers. But they sell in bulk and you would spend at least $150 for one type of flower only. This adds up quickly when there are about 40-60 small to mid-sized flower in a bride's bouquet. So alas, no to that for my needs. By the way, the big flower sellers: FTD, 1800flowers, and teleflora can have decent sales on flowers, particularly roses
   
3. Local large resellers, e.g. Whole Foods - Small selection of flowers, but the prices are surprisingly good. According to Cheap Wife, Costco prices on bulk flowers are amazing. For example, you can get 100 roses for $99 and 150 carnations for $75.

- Hydrangeas $5/stem
- Alstromeria (peruvian lilies) $8/10 stems
- Gerbera daisies ~$2/stem for the bunch

So I may end up doing Whole Foods for some simple Alstromerias,and mums (I had no idea these were just chrysanthemums, my birth flower and the ingredient of a very yummy tea).
My mom also insists these pink/purple gardens in her garden are divine paying no attention to my color palette.

I think I could totally be set for my bouquet for $25. I totally advocate just taking a look at your Whole Foods if you end up doing your own flowers.

I'm not beholden to a certain flower (do love hydrangeas but they die in 1 day), just a color (red, maybe yellow and pink) so I'm able to come up with some cost effective solutions.

What do you gals think? Who else is making their own bouquet?

Silk vs. real flowers - what do I do?

My mom has recently insisted that my silk flowers are a total no-no and I have to get real flowers. She says they won't photograph well. She also thinks they may be tacky.

Sigh, this would have been useful when my friend helped me buy them months ago.

But I wanted silk flowers because I could make the bouquets in advance and they won't wither in the gross August sun (our wedding pictures will span 10 hours - 9 am - 7 pm including the whole reception and before and after shots).

The colors admittedly are very fall like in keeping with the original wedding. But I think the dahlias are pretty cool still and I loved the amaryllis when I bought them at Michael's. My girls are wearing dark red dresses, some come with a poppy (red orange) sash. So I like red or yellow tones for the flowers.

I'm wondering whether to keep them at all and then if I can mix silk and real flowers.

Dahlias and tiger lilies

Amaryllis, dahlias, and tiger lilies

What do you think? Brutal honesty appreciated.

Paper flowers for everyone!

Ok, I have this bad habit of being inspired by EVERYTHING. But I was already thinking of giving flowers to all the ladies at the wedding. It would be so cute to make one for everyone to wear in some way at the wedding! I was inspired by this offbeat bride.

I think I'm following Jennifer's instructions on Elizabeth Anne Designs. Man, here I come Michael's!