If you’re looking for DIY bridesmaid’s gifts, I recently devoted an entire post to that.

Bridesmaid Bouquets

Approximately $8 each

I didn’t really have a color scheme in mind and actually just left it up to the girls to pick whatever they wanted to wear. Since my own dress was off-white, I decided I’d just go with basic white bouquets with off-white ribbon. I bought two dozen carnations, 15 white and 9 a springy green color, 3 “football” chrysanthemums, white floral tape, wide off-white ribbon, and a narrower off-white ribbon.

Using the mum as a centerpiece, I arranged the carnations around the mum holding the flower tops all at the same height. I wrapped the stems very tightly with the floral tape and then evened out the lengths afterward. To cover up the tape, I used the narrow ribbon around the stems. I then tied a big bow around the very top with the wide ribbon, leaving the ends very long for a little bit of drama. Since I made the bouquets two nights before the wedding, I left the stems long for a day so they could sit in water.

I had issues with the ends of the ribbon fraying, and since I was in a pinch, clear nail polish worked perfectly.

Hair Barrette

Approximately $5

I had some leftover narrow ribbon and floral tape from the bouquets, so I decided to make something for my hair. I had Jason pick up one rose and carnation and bound them to a comb by weaving floral tape in between the teeth of the comb and around the stems. Much like the bouquets, I covered up the floral tape with the narrow off-white ribbon.

I included one leaf from the rose to make it a little more dimensional and life-like.

Frosting

Approximately $1 per dozen cupcakes

Because of the short time frame, I couldn’t really afford to be a bridezilla about many things related to the wedding. One thing I really wanted, however, was red velvet cake with cream cheese frosting. I had never had red velvet cake before, so I was pretty dead-set on it. Unfortunately, our cake plans fell through at the last minute, so I decided we would go for red velvet cupcakes instead.

We called around (the day before the wedding, mind you) asking about red velvet cupcakes and while one place could make them, they only used butter cream frosting. I really wanted cream cheese frosting, so we ordered the cupcakes un-frosted so I could frost them myself. I used the frosting recipe from the Neely’s buttermilk cupcakes, omitting the cocoa powder. I must say, it was probably the most delicious cupcake and frosting combination I’ve ever consumed devoured!

Favors

Approximately $0.50 each

Even though we weren’t having a formal reception, I still wanted our guests to have a little something to go home with. I decided to turn the standard wedding bubbles into favors for the occasion. I had found this awesome plantable confetti (paper with wildflower seeds woven in) and I was determined to use it for something.

I divided up the confetti and put it into a cellophane “treat bag” you can find in the candy making section of craft stores. My pal Kélé over at How Delighted let me use her template for the favor tags, which was a huge time saver! I just changed the text, printed them, and punched them out with a 2″ craft punch. To assemble, I put a piece of leftover ribbon through the bubble top, then tied it around the cellophane bag once. Finally, I strung the tag onto it and tied a bow. It was a little bit tedious but totally manageable for my small ceremony of only 30 guests.

Conclusion

By now, I’m sure you think I have a few screws loose for volunteering myself to do all this for the wedding, and you may be right. But I really did have fun doing it–I liked being able to add special touches that made my day a little more unique.

Regardless of where the nuptials took place, I knew I wanted to have my three bridesmaids standing up there with me, and so I began to mentally plan bridesmaid’s gifts for them. My mom has helped out a lot, so I wanted to make her one too. In general, I wanted the gifts to be:

• Reusable
• Consumable
• Natural, if possible
• Home-made

Since I like flowers so much, I decided to do a flower pot theme, where the “plants” were the gifts. First, I headed to Michael’s and found some cute and extremely colorful flower pots. I got some ribbon to accent the rim and tied a bow.

Next, I found some Jelly Belly Jelly Beans (in cappuccino flavor) that could be my “dirt.” I lined each pot with a plastic zipper sandwich bag and poured the jelly beans in.

To show who each pot belonged to, I thought it would be cute to make a label like the ones that come in potted plants. I freehand drew a general shape for the tag (I didn’t have any on hand or I probably would have traced one) onto some card stock and cut four out all at once. I also picked out some of my own photography to use as the flowers, looking for photos to match the flower pot colors.

With a little rubber cement, a gel pen, and some research, I completed the labels. I decided to put the origin of each girl’s name on the label. The name meaning would have worked well here too.

After that, it was time to assemble the goods. I wanted to get natural products that were likely to be consumed. I went with Burt’s Bees hand sanitizer and lip balm, as well as alba body wash. For some little accents, I found cute gerbera daisy writing pens at Pier 1. I also got a fake gerbera daisy for each pot as a little filler.

To fill up the pots, I actually ended up taking out a lot of the jelly beans to give a more “buried” look. I started with the tallest item as my base.

I continued with the next largest and added a the filler daisy as sort of a background.

I added the smallest item and filled in the pot with the “dirt.” I stuck in the name tag and the daisy pen.

And voila! Home-made gifts that I’m actually quite tickled about.

To create a flower pot gift of your own, you will need the following:

• Flower Pot
• Plastic zipper bag or flower pot liner
• Ribbon
• Rubber Cement or Glue
• Card Stock
• Gift products
• Fake Flower
• Flower Pen
• Jelly beans in a brown color
• Photo Paper
• Stock plant photos