Bridal bouquet charms are one of those wedding extras that you can take or leave depending on your budget and tastes. If you do relish the idea of a little bling on your bridal bouquet, then maybe a charm (or two or five) is the answer. Bridal bouquet charms come in many forms – from memorial charms to rhinestone animals to monograms to just about anything else small enough to be clipped on to a stem. With that in mind, here are some pretty pictures of bridal bouquet charms to get your mental motors racing. Enjoy!

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Maybe that should be spinspiration! Terrible, I know. But aren’t pinwheels fun? And there are so many great ways to use them in weddings that it would be impossible to list them all. Favors of pretty paper pinwheels with your names and wedding date printed on them come to mind. And how about using them in place of flowers in reception table centerpieces? I can even make it simpler – get a punch of pinwheels that coordinate with your wedding color scheme and stick them in the ground! Easy-peasy!

Gorgeous pinwheels for your bridal bouquet by Rule 42

Pinwheel wedding cake seen on Real Etsy Weddings

Bride and groom with pinwheels as seen on The Wedding Chicks

Pinwheels on a dessert buffet created by April Foster Events and pinwheel aisle decorations as seen on Wedding Bee

Pinwheel table numbers from Crossroads Cottage

Now I know what you may be thinking… what an odd, fussy topic, right? With all of the other things the poor bride-to-be has to think about while walking around on her wedding day – stand up straight! smile! where’s your train?! is your bodice slipping?! bra sweat!! MINTS!!! – why add one more worry for her to stress over? Hey, you know me, I like stress-free weddings and happy brides, but I also like thoroughness, and some people are concerned with the right way to carry a bridal bouquet (or groom’s bouquet).

After all, a too small bridal bouquet can look dinky and a too large bouquet can look overwhelming (and make your arms feel like they’re going to fall off). Carry a bridal bouquet too high up and the beautiful blue necklace you borrowed from your grandmother might not show up in your ceremony photos. Carry it too low, and your arms may fall asleep and your posture may change for the worse. And that’s just for your standard round hand-held bouquet. Choose one of the many less common types of bridal bouquets, and you run the risk of looking awkward.

I’m sure your know that there are lots of different kinds of bridal bouquets, from the regular (nosegays and cascade bouquets, for example) to the bizarre. How to carry some bouquet types is obvious – the arm sheaf and loose arrangements of calla lilies come to mind. But for other bouquets, a little help comes in handy. Before I lay out the help, though, a note about size:

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Can I just say that in some games of wedding this-or-that, I have no opinion other than SQUEEILOVETHEMBOTH. So it is in the case of traditional bridal bouquets and alternative bridal bouquets. I just happened to have faux flower bouquets at my own wedding, but I would have been equally happy with, say, feather bouquets and
origami bridal bouquets.

And why not? Pretty much all the alternative bridal bouquets, from flowers made of ceramics to crystal and wire to seashells (for real), are just as heavy as flowers (sometimes heavier) and still somewhat delicate. Plus, they’re awesome. Right now I am salivating over all of the beautiful paper flower bouquets out there.

Aren’t they sweet? A paper bridal bouquet can look as much like or as little like the real thing as you want. I have a soft spot in my heart for the paper flowers made of old book pages from Danamazing’s Paper Flowers, maybe because I’m just a book addict. But the others are lovely, too: A spooky, crisp paper bouquet from My Bohemian Summer, a stylized origami bouquet from 3D Cranes, and a pretty, girly paper flower bouquet from Desicra.

P.S. – I keep reading lately about carnations making a comeback, so I just wanted to toot my own horn and say that I wrote about the new wedding carnations almost a year ago. Ha!

Being that I’ll be performing my mom’s wedding ceremony in October – can I get a squee? – I thought it might be prudent to start collecting tips on how to write a wedding ceremony. What with my never having written one before. In my search, I came across the how-to sneeze page on A Practical Weddingg, which happened to include a tutorial dealing with writing a wedding ceremony. Sweet!

Now this is where I say that I feel for brides-to-be nowadays because there are a lot of wedding planning how-tos out there, many of which deal with DIYing this or that element of the ceremony and reception. It’s not easy to wade through them and truth be told, a lot of them are pure crap, which is why I’m gonna help a girl out and say that if you are thinking of DIYing wedding flowers, reception music, your wedding vows, or your catering… or even DIYing your entire wedding, handling your own wedding photography, and making your wedding dress, check out Meg’s awesome DIY wedding planning how-tos over at A Practical Wedding. You’ll definitely be glad you did!

For a decidedly different bridal bouquet, it’s all in how you use your blooms. Special breeds of flower or bouquet charms aren’t necessary when you’re carrying a glamorous glamelia bouquet, which is a composite bouquet made hundreds of individual petals sewn together to form an amazing larger-than-life blossom.

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Also known as a Malmaison rose, glamelias were popular in the 40s and 50s and are commonly made from rose petals but may be crafted from the petals of gladiolas, lilies, or other flowers.

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I’ve always loved iris. The shape appeals strongly to me, the colors are right up my alley, and they can’t be beaten for pure visual drama. If you’re thinking of working them into your wedding, here are some ideas to help you out.

You can start right out with your save the dates.
These buttons from Zazzle run from $2.89 each down to $1.89 each, depending on how many you buy. Not wild about this one? There are other iris-themed save the date items available.
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