love is in bloom floral wedding shower

My littlest brother (who is nearly a foot taller than me, but 11 years younger, so I can still think of him as little!) is getting married in June, and while his fiance already feels like part of the family, I was excited to get to host a bridal shower to make the welcome to our clan official. Inspired by the lovely pink and green floral invitations for the wedding, I went full-on flowers for the shower, from the Rifle Paper Co. e-vite design to the cookie shapes and decorations - and to our activity: arranging our own bouquets!

I find decorating to be super easy when it's Rifle Paper Co.-inspired - just string up this lovely banner with your phrase of choice (or the couple's initials), and add a bunch of pink stuff like napkins, plates, beverages (sparkling rose, rose cider in adorable pink cans, and pink lemonade all went perfectly), tissue paper flowers, etc. The scalloped disposable plates were a favorite find at Target, and the sweet love napkins too. The food I kept fairly simple, with a cheese board and some fruit/veggie trays that my grandmas kindly offered to bring, and then some cookies cut out in flower shapes and frosted with coordinating colors.

No need to decorate with any real flowers, though, since everyone was going to be making their own bouquets! I always love a creative activity for a gathering (cookie decorating, decorating onesies for a baby shower, etc.) as a fun way to interact with friends and family, so I was excited about this idea - and it went so great!

Some tips/ideas for hosting a floral arranging party:

• Cover tables with disposable tablecloth so that when the party is over, you can just pick them up with all of the leftover leaves/trimmings and dispose of the whole kit and kaboodle.
• Set out supplies: a small vase for everyone (I ordered these online), a few sets of scissors/clippers for cutting stems, floral tape, the little plant food packets that come with store-bought flowers, and of course lots of flowers and greens.
• Provide a few pointers on arranging to your guests: this post and this post are useful. I had some floral tape and showed how to make a grid shape on top of the vase to help hold the shape of the bouquet, then how to start by arranging greens around the outside, add a couple of focal flowers, and then fill out with some smaller supplemental flowers. Nice to have an inspiration photo or two to show as well (mine was this) for those who feel a little out of their element with floral arranging.
• Plan for about 3 focal/bigger flower stems per guest and then have 2-3 options for supplemental (less expensive) flowers and plenty of greens. Trader Joe's is a fabulous source for these, but so would yard clippings for much of the filler materials (it's just too early in the season for that around my yard yet).
• Plan for about 45 minutes for the activity. And some wine to loosen up anyone who is hesitant about their creativeness...ha!

It was so fun to see how different the 13 bouquets turned out, even with everyone having access to the same materials - and to spend some time being creative with the lovely ladies of my family and sister-in-law to be.