When All Hell Broke Loose Part 1

So we still don't have all of our professional pictures yet. And it pains me to say that I have no idea when we will be able to afford the image CD. So in the meantime, I thought I might as well start a few recaps of things that happened before the wedding.

As you might guess from the title of this post, not everything went smoothly leading up to the wedding day. I knew things could and would most likely go wrong but it all seemed to happen in a three day window right before the wedding and that stressed me out majorly! I didn't expect it to all happen at once!

My mom and I had been working closely with the Food City floral department manager Olivia (she's amazing by the way and works at the Sevierville location). I went in knowing what I wanted, a deep yet bright purple carnation. I had seen some in an arrangement in a local restaurant and she said she had placed the order for them and knew exactly what I was talking about! Still to be sure, we had her order a few stems so that I could be 100% positive that it was in fact the correct color purple. The stems we ordered came in and they were PERFECT!!! I was sooo happy...you have no idea. So we placed an order with her for the number of stems we needed for my bouquet.

On Wednesday the 28th of April, my mom and I were to pick up the flowers for my bouquet at Food City. When we arrived and the worker pulled the carnations out of the cooler I almost cried. They were absolutely without a doubt not the right color! They looked maroon, not purple!! I was beginning to freak out. The wedding was Saturday, what would we do!? Olivia wasn't there that evening and the lady that was working didn't know anything about the order because Olivia had handled it all from the beginning. She was so sweet and so worried and offered to do anything she possibly could to help.

Since my mom had worked in a floral shop when she was younger, she knew there was little possibility that the carnations could change so drastically in color and become the correct color. But we had to try it. So my mom requested that the stems be freshly cut and placed in warm water to make the blooms open faster. We were to go back in the following morning while on our way to Knoxville to pick up the cake.

To our astonishment, the carnations did open up more and change into the correct color! It was amazing, my mom had never seen or heard of flowers changing so much in color....especially overnight, neither had Olivia. I was sooooo relieved!!! As were my mom and Olivia. Poor Olivia was stressing about it as much as I was, she's so sweet! So all was again well with the flowers and the panic attack I was about to have vanished.

Here are some pictures my Aunt got of my mom making my bouquet and the toss bouquet. Making my bouquet turned out to be a two person effort that kept us up until about 2am the night before the wedding!!! I was so tired, as you can see from the pictures. It had been a very long day for me. My mom was up even later than I was working on the bouts for the guys. She's amazing I tell ya!!

The darker carnations are for my bouquet and the boutonnieres. The lighter shade of purple carnations were used for the toss bouquet. We ended up getting that bunch for free because they weren't very fresh. But for the toss bouquet, that didn't really matter. The baby's breath was also originally only for the toss but I loved what my mom was doing with it so much that I wanted the baby's breath in my bouquet as well. We also purchased a Peace Lily from Food City for $9.99 and used the leaves from the plant to frame the bouquets.

My amazing mom making the toss bouquet.
Mom and I working on my bouquet.
The finished product!! It was everything and more that I wanted in a bouquet!! Purple, full and absolutely stunning!! I even took it on our honeymoon in a cylinder vase so I could enjoy it even more! I tried to dry it but unfortunately because the flowers were so tightly packed, it began to mold and I had to throw it away.
My bouquet in action! More pictures to come when we can get the image CD! (Source)
Charles's bout also made by my mom. She made I think around 8-10 bouts. She used one large carnation, some baby's breath and some english ivy leaves from our backyard. They all looked awesome and held up very well throughout the day! (Source)

Next up we head to Sam's Club in Knoxville to pick up the cake and cupcakes!