Flowers.  For some brides flowers take up a significant chunk of the wedding budget.  Does it always have to be so?  NOPE!  The gals over at SmartBride have some tips when shopping around for flowers that I wanted to share with you guys today.  Their floral expert Alex Bazos from Flur Designs Inc. shares with us her list of  Top 10 Budget Friendly Flowers:

Top 10 Budget-friendly Blooms

1. Large Oriental or Asiatic lilies. They fill space like nothing else and provide an ultra-feminine look with loads of drama!
2. Hydrangeas. During the summer they’re available inexpensively from BC and their large size means you can use less.
3. Disbud Chrysanthemum. Also known as the spider, snowball or commercial mum. These are available in white, lime green, lavender and yellow, plus they’re inexpensive and will last all day!
4. Mokara Orchid. By removing blooms from the stem, your florist can make sure a few stems fill an entire bouquet. Bigger and fluffier than other orchids, they’re great in centerpieces and look incredible submerged in water!
5. Dianthus (a.k.a. carnation). There are many amazing varieties of dianthus on the market today. Simply put, there is no other flower that has such intense and saturated colour. They come in eggplant, hot pink, neon orange and even lime green! Use them deep inside a bouquet or in a centerpiece for added colour and texture. No one will even notice that it’s a carnation.
6. Stock. Widely available throughout spring, summer and autumn, Stock is fluffy, delicate and inexpensive. Have your florist pinch out the tips for a frillier texture. The best part is the amazing fragrance of spices and honey.
7. Ti leaves. These come on a large stock which can be cut apart and used as accent foliage. Its bright and varied colors help to enhance other elements of the bouquet or arrangements. Try tearing it into stripes and looping for a great boutonniere accent.
8. Spray Roses. If your heart is set on roses, but your stomach can’t handle the price point, these blooms will solve your problem. They easily clump together in a bouquet creating ruffles of roses throughout. You’ll be happy to know that they are roughly one-third the cost of a standard rose!
9. Seasonal Fillers. Adding a textural component, fillers can transform a bland ball of roses into a unique and interesting bouquet. Fillers include: leptospermum (spring availability), heather, pieris japonica (feminine and available in the fall), eringium (a great blue thistle), etc.
10. Anything Big. Size matters. The larger the individual blooms, the less you’ll need and (generally) the easier the bouquet is to put together.

And what about budget blowers?

1. Calla Lilies. At between $9 – $15 per stem, your florist will need several dozen to make an average size bouquet with this petite flower.
2. Roses. At $5 or $6 each, they’ll quickly add up!
3. Stephanotis. Most florists will insist that you purchase a full box of 25 blooms. At $5 each you’ll need a large budget.
4. Freesia. This is one of the most requested add-on flowers. Brides often want to add scent to a bouquet and don’t realize they could be adding an additional $50 to the price of their bouquet for this little bloom!
5. Small flowers. Use very small flowers like anemone, lily of the valley, ranunculus, or cornflower sparingly as an accent to save some cash.
6. Out-of-season Flowers . Tulips in November or peonies in January are going to cost you. Buy seasonal and you’ll be rewarded with fresher flowers and a lower price.

More from SmartBride:

2011 wedding style from Monique Lhuillier

Wedding accessories by Oscar de la Renta

How to budget your wedding flowers

So apparently it’s California wedding week over here at La Belle Bride!  I’m going to throw on that new Katy Perry Cali song (I’m a Snoop Dogg lover) and just go with it.  And let’s be honest: Who among us couldn’t use a little California wedding inspiration?  Sunny skies, gorgeous florals…and is it just me, or is everyone cute over there?

Okay, permission to get a little mushy -  I’m going to ask  you guys to take a look at my favorite photo from this post.  It’s the one of Janelle and Bradley killing themselves laughing during their vows.  Literally, I love that stuff.  We just got a glimpse into what Janelle and Bradley are like on Thursday evenings, when it’s just the two of them eating take out and watching television.  They’re buddies.  They get a kick outta each other.  Check out those dancing pics for more proof.  I love it.

AS ALWAYS, hats off to Melissa Brandman, Southern California photographer extraordinaire for catching those amazing little moments that have turned me into a bit of a puddle.  xoxo!

Our bride Janelle: Brad and I both have a simply yet classy aesthetic. We wanted to bring in a country feel but with elegant undertones. To be honest – when I thought about my wedding, there were only a couple must-haves. I wanted my Dad to perform the ceremony, my best friend of 17 years to be my maid of honor, and I wanted to have dainty mints as a favor (a long time favorite of weddings when I was a kid). With that in mind, the entire wedding process was really easy in that there was nothing that “I absolutely had to have” and in the end we ended up having everything we could have ever wanted.

One of the themes in our wedding was a tree – from our engagement photos, to our invitations, to our wedding site – Brad and I loved the simple rustic elegance of big sprawling trees. Going off this, we really tried to keep a natural feel in our wedding – the backyard ceremony, the mason jars for drinking, spring blossoms and a bbq dinner just all seemed to fit.

Being on a budget, there were a couple of ways we were able to do it ourselves, save money and end up having what we really wanted. The first was in our invitations; Brad designed the tree themed invitation and had them printed at Vistaprint. Vistaprint is a fabulous website that lets you custom design save the dates, invitations, programs etc, and besides being inexpensive, they also often has free giveaways with your order. Brad also took the design from our invitation and designed the program, which we then glued on to popsicle sticks to make fans for our guests! I put together our favors by buying mini brown bags from Michaels, ordering a custom made tree stamp off etsy.com, and purchasing my favorite mints from Rite Aid! A couple of hours of assembly line and lots of laughter and voila! Adorable favors.

However my favorite Do It Yourself project actually was done by the hands of my amazing mom-in-law, Teanie. Teanie is a beyond talented seamstress (she made Brad’s sister’s wedding dress – talk about pressure) and after hours of pouring through bridal websites and finding nothing remotely close to what I wanted and being quite expensive at the same time, I asked her if she would take on the project of making the bridesmaid dresses. I couldn’t have asked for a better wedding miracle! I found a pattern that I had liked with a similar “crumb catcher” pattern as my wedding dress, and then with the help of Teanie, we found the perfect sunflower yellow and ivory fabric. I had wanted ivory on top, because lets be honest, yellow is not everyone’s color. Teanie was able to make the dresses for 35 dollars per dress! Talk about a steal!

Hahah I’ve probably rambled on enough – but I’ll leave with this, the whole day was perfect. It truly was. From a personal viewpoint – having both our Dads perform the ceremony and having our family and friends there and getting to marry my best friend, nothing could have topped this day. And from a practical standpoint – our vendors rocked! If you are getting married in the Southern California area I can not say enough about the beauty of McCormick Ranch, the tasty-ness of Green Acres and Skiff’s Cakes, the adeptness of Alvaron Entertainment, the tailored and delicate expertise of White House Florist, and the wonderful artistic skills of our photographer, Melissa Brandman.

Wedding Coordinator: Morgan Thrower  |  Venue: McCormick Ranch, Camarillo, California  |  Wedding Dress: Angelina Faccenda  |  Wedding Hair: Euodia Salon |  Wedding Makeup: Cathy James, Los Angeles Makeup Artist  |  Bridesmaid Dress: Teanie Benham (the groom’s mother)  |  Menswear: Mr. Tuxedo Rentals.  |  Caterer: Green Acres |  Wedding Cake: Skiffs Cakes |  Invitations: Designed by the Groom and printed at Vista Print |  Florist: White House Florist |  Entertainment: Alvaron Entertainment & Events |  Photography: Melissa Brandman Photography

Hello friends! Just finished a delightful holiday here in Canada. It was gorgeously hot out! So to help us appreciate the heat a bit more I thought we’d throw this amazing rustic Vermont wedding into the mix today. You winter 2011 brides, listen up! Because Emily and Mark’s wedding today is the ultimate in winter wedding cuteness. I’m so a sucker for bird themes (please see the DIY section if you don’t believe me).  But I am also super diggin’ the floral touches.  Emily’s bouquet is just perfect.  Anemones are a seasonless flower in my opinion.  Love them!

So enjoy these darling photos taken by the talented Nancy Gould while Emily shares with us some details from her wedding:

The inspiration for our day was the barn itself. We knew we wanted something casual but elegant and when we saw The Inn at the Round Barn we fell in love. I decided on a bird theme using them on the invites, escort cards that I put together, and favors that I made. For the flowers I wanted all white to keep it simple and elegant like the barn. I also put together the desert bar, I love glass jars and this was a good excuse to buy some more J I made the runners for the tables and wrapped glass cylinders with vellum paper to give a nice glow. We had a ton of candles, in assorted sizes. The planning for the wedding took nine months and I would slowly work on projects in the evenings. Mark helped on some but I actually found it fun to do most of it myself. I slao had many great finds on etsy.com – such as the charm around my bouquet – my headband and by bridesmaids gifts. It was so exciting to see it all come together at the wedding – it looked better than I had imagined. We had an amazing evening and only wished it had lasted longer. We only had about 65 people which was a perfect size for us – intimate – all our favorite people in the world. We got so many compliments and everyone seemed to have a wonderful time. I joke with Mark that we need to have a wedding for each season – winter done!

Vendors:Venue and Wedding Coordinator: Inn at the Round Barn | Wedding Dress: Pronovias – Madelines Daughter | Shoes: 6pm.com | Wedding Hair/Makeup: Kaylee  | Bridesmaid Dress: Priscilla of Boston & Marshalls |  Menswear: Mens Warehouse  |  Caterer/Cake: Cooking from the Heart – Inn at the Round Barn |  Invitations: Wedding Paper Diva |  Entertainment:  Peak DJ  |  Bridal Veil: Madelines Daughter  |  Photography: Nancy Gould

Oh yes indeed. It’s my Style Me Pretty guest bloggin’ day and this one is a killer post featuring an eclectic wedding shoot by Jessica Zais and Stage Right Etc.  This one is NOT TO BE MISSED.  British Columbia beauty, a gorgeous stylish bride and so many little treats and ideas to steal!  Head on over to Style Me Pretty to see an intense amount of wedding inspiration.

You know me and vintage.  We go together like gravy on potatoes. Vintage weddings get me every time.  Even when it’s just a subtle hint of vintage love, as is the case with today’s darling Phoenix vintage wedding.  Oh boy this is cute.  And it’s a DIY wedding to boot!

Jessica and Daniel represent that couple that everyone knows who are just cute as buttons.  We all love them and kinda want to squeeze them.  I mean just check out the photo of Daniel waiting for Jessica at the alter.  I melt.  And that brings me to another amazing aspect about this wedding:  the photography.  Marianne Wilson is absolutely dreamy with her lens.  I love the candidness of each and every shot.  Cyber high five to you, Marianne!

Other points of intense cuteness include those amazing hanging cranes, Jessica’s lovely hairpiece and the tiny hint of turquoise she incorporated with her dress.  So did these two cuties let their stylish vintage day go to their heads?  I beg you to find a more humble chick than our Belle Bride Jessica:

I grew up with a very creative mother. We were craft-project hounds and homeschoolers, so I knew store-bought elements wouldn’t be enough for my wedding. I wanted to share bits of our lives with all our family and friends in attendance. Everything I could DIY was DIY’ed, from the invitations, the flowers, and the centerpieces to our vows, the “Wedding This Way” sign, and even my dress! The result was about as mish-mash as you can get, but I wouldn’t have it any other way!

To start off, the ceremony was in the beautiful Japanese Friendship Garden in Downtown Phoenix, echoing my parents’ wedding in a Japanese garden in Hawai’i. We had a friend officiate our ring warming ceremony, and we wrote our own vows. I was crying after Daniel read me his, and by the time I finished mine, everyone else was crying with me! At the conclusion, my parents presented us with leis overnighted from Hawai’i by my aunt.

My bridesmaids rocked the dresses they picked out, and my dear little sister (and MOH!) designed and crafted both her dress and my own. We all had DIY daffodil bouquets and boutonnieres made from flowers that I purchased online from a grower. My hairpiece was some $5 clips and a piece of netting all bunched up under them. Finish it off with some $20 jewelry from Etsy, and voila! Instant bride for a total of about $350!

The reception was a blast! We finally settled on a Mexican restaurant with a great private patio area so we could share the local cuisine with Daniel’s East Coast family. My mother, sister, and mother-in-law helped me with all the decorations – in more ways than I originally thought! When I got to the reception, my jaw dropped because there were hundreds of paper cranes everywhere! My parents, my grandfather, and family friends all contributed. How that many people kept that many cranes a secret is beyond me.

And that wasn’t the only surprise! I surprised Daniel by dancing the Hawaiian Wedding Song hula for him, but only after he and his groomsmen surprised me with a rendition of “For the Longest Time” by Billy Joel. iTunes played the whole night without a hitch, and the it was full of dancing and chatting and impromptu karaoke. My only wish is that we had more time to spend with all the people we love. Thankfully, our fantastic photographer caught it all. Even amongst all the DIY, I knew I had to splurge on my photographer, and I’m so glad I did! These are some of the happiest memories of my life, and I’ll be reliving them forever. I actually think teal and yellow are my new favorite colors!

So humble!  Thanks Jessica and Daniel!

Interested in seeing another fabulous vintage wedding by Marianne Wilson?   Check out our real weddings area for Jana and Matt’s gorgeous vintage wedding.