DIY : Wedding Bouquet with Hydrangeas Base

Making your own wedding bouquet can be daunting so let these directions may it easy and fun!
Follow these simple steps to create your own bouquet for brides and bridesmaids!










What you need for this project:

• Hot Glue Gun
• Satin Ribbon or Opaque Ribbon
• OPTIONAL: Use Sheer ribbon to accent
• Wire Cutters
• OPTIONAL: Green Cloth Covered Floral Wire for accent flowers with too short stems

ACCENT FLOWER
Lilies:

• One lily per one Large Sized Hydrangeas or two Small Sized Hydrangeas

OR

Roses and like size flowers

• SML Bouquet – 3 Medium Sized Flowers
• MED Bouquet – 3 buds, 5-7 Medium and LRG flowers
• LRG Bouquet- 6 buds, 7-11 Medium and LRG flowers

BOUQUET SIZE

• SML 1-2 Hydrangeas
• MED 2-3 Hydrangeas
• LRG 3-4 Hydrangeas

The fullness of the Hydrangeas and the size of petals will determine how many to use. This bouquet uses 2 Hydrangeas of medium sized petals/flowers.  A step by step photo gallery provides you with the steps needed to make your bouquet!

1. Assemble all your tools before you start.  Make sure to clean surface before working with silk flowers to keep them from getting dirty.
2. Remove leaves from hydrangeas stems.
3. Decide how long of a handle you want on the bouquet.  Try 8-10 inches for handles completely covered with ribbon and 12 inches if you desire having some green stem showing.  Cut hydrangea stem to desired length, use heavy duty wire cutters so the ends have clean cuts, especially for exposed ends.
4. Use wire cutters to trim bumps and thorns from the stem to make sure the finished handle is smooth.
5. Make a comfortable handle to hold:
For one hydrangea, cut the leftover stem into 2 identical lengths
For two hydrangea, 1 identical length is needed.
For three or more hydrangea, cut additional lengths as desired.

HINT: Keep leftover stems for smaller bouquet handles.

6. Find when using multiple hydrangeas find the center and spread open the flower stems to create half moons or thirds as desired.  This will keep your bouquet looking even and ensure the fullness of this design.

7. Measure and cut the accent flower to one inch longer than the hydrangea flower stems.

HINT: If the stems are not long enough on your chosen flower, cut green cloth covered flower wire to needed length and remove flowers from stems.

8. Preheat hot glue gun.  Lay the spine of two hydrangeas stems against each other and apply glue to one inch section and allow to cool.  When set apply glue crease and affix the additional cut stem for the handle.  Fill the crevices with hot glue and with the side of you glue gun, use a sliding motion to flatten out and bumps from the glue and smooth out the handle.  Work slowly and allow glue proper cool time before applying more.  Careful not to grasp the hot glue while changing your grasp on the bouquet.

9. Fill in bottom of handle for a rounded finish; wrapping ribbon can show all the bumps left underneath if not careful!

10. Slip stems of accent flowers into base of the hydrangeas and one by one, glue in place.  [Image 16]  After the first flower has been glued, slip the other accent flowers into bouquet to determine placement and evenness of dispersement.

11. Unroll ribbon- DO NOT CUT! – decide how much will be used for the bow and  tail of one side, and hold against bouquet.  Lay ribbon along stem and flatten against handle.  Pull ribbon down and around the bottom.

12. Pull the ribbon around the bass of your bouquet and begin wrapping.  Don’t worry if there seems to be a ‘corner’ of ribbon at the handle bottom- you can glue it down after you are satisfied with the length and look of the bow, tails and trailers.

13. Wrap to the base of the flower stems, and once more around tying the two ribbons ends together. [Image 20]

14. Tie the bow, slowly tightening the ribbon.  Pull the tail down before tying the knot.  To adjust the bow length, press firmly against the knot and pull on the tail or the bow.  Once you are satisfied with the length and look you can insert to hot glue gun nozzle in between the ribbon into the know and give the trigger a gentle squeeze.  Remove glue nozzle and press down slowly to spread glue but not squeeze out sides- repeat on other side of knot if necessary.

15.  Fold ribbon ends in half and cut from the fold outwards and towards the tip to achieve this look. [Image 23-24]

Other pictured bouquets show how sheer ribbon can be used for tail, trailers and to accent the handle with additional detail.