Tips On Sending The Perfect Bouquet Of Flowers

Flowers are a way to let someone know you care, so it is no wonder that sending flowers is such a popular way to commemorate events, from the birth of a new baby to Valentine?s Day. In fact, flowers are also the top choice for letting someone know you?re sorry. However, not all flower bouquets are as nice as the rest. Before you send someone flowers, you may want to do a bit of research.

Before you do anything else, take some time to think about the type of flowers that this person enjoys. While most people love red roses, there are a few who prefer colorful wildflower bouquets or exuberant sunflowers instead.

Next, take a look at the different arrangements available. Some come in beautiful vases or include collectibles as part of the arrangement. Others come in simple vases that let the flowers shine.

After you choose the flowers you want, it is time to send them to that special someone, right? Well, while you may be ordering from a reputable florist, that florist may not be the person actually choosing, arranging, and delivering the flowers. Instead, when flowers are being delivered to someone some distance away, the florist passes the task of filling the order onto a local florist. Ask who will be doing the actual delivery and find out if that florist has a good reputation.

Once you send the flowers to the recipient, don?t be afraid to follow up. Many times, a disappointing bouquet is delivered, but the person who received it may be afraid to offend the giver, so doesn?t say anything. If you mention that you want to be sure the arrangement looks fresh and that it contains the proper number of flowers, the recipient will probably be much more forthcoming about the condition of the bouquet. If it sounds like there is a problem, follow up with the florist where you placed your order and the florist who filled it. After all, the person getting your bouquet should get what you paid for.

Finally, you may want to consider sending a very different type of flower, a living plant. This way, your gift will continue to remind that lucky someone of the event the flowers were sent to commemorate long after a fresh bouquet would be a distant memory. If you are sending flowers to someone with a black thumb, you may want to try sending a dried floral arrangement instead.
Gray Rollins is a featured writer for FlowerSendingSecrets.com. To learn more about floral arrangements and sending flowers visit us.

How To Make Candy Bouquet

A bouquet is usually made just from flowers, but that doesn't have to be the case. You can make your bouquet more interesting by adding other items, such as candy.

Yeah, you read correctly, I said, Candy!

Candy Bouquets are fun to make, look great, and they are a fantastic talking piece. I promise that everyone that sees your candy bouquet will feel compelled to comment on it. Young children in particular, will be absolutely delighted when they see your candy bouquet!

To make a candy bouquet, you will need:
- 5 Silk Rose Buds
- 1 Bunch of pearlies
- 2 Thin Gauge wires
- 1 Thick Gauge wire
- 9 Lollipops.
- Silk Leaves
- Stem tape (green or white)
- Ribbon

Step 1: Trimming the lollipops

Trim the lollipop sticks to about an inch or two in length, or just below the wrapper. Later, we will wire and tape the sticks just like normal flowers. We do this so that the lollipops can be moved around and positioned more easily.

Step 2: Trimming the Rose Buds

Trim the stems on the rose bud heads, and then wire and tape them.

Step 3: Wire the lollipops

To wire the lollipops you will have to put a twist in the wire around the stick of the lollipop. You will probably have to do this twice, to make sure that the wire is tight and wont come loose. The easiest way to do this is to use long-nosed plyers, and to squeeze the wire around the stick.

Step 4: Wire and Tape the Pearlies

Although you don't need pearlies in your candy bouquet, they can work well to soften the bouquet, and make it appear more like an everyday floral bouquet.

Wire and tape the pearlies. Place the wire alongside the white part of the pearly strand, and then stem tape in place.

Step 5: Assemble the Candy Bouquet

Now start to assemble the candy bouquet. Start the bouquet with the lollipops in a bunch, in one hand.

Then slowly insert the leaves between the lollipops.

Fan the lollipops into a circular shape, with the leaves facing out.

Place the flowers in next, keeping two lollipops between each flower.

Fill any gaps left over at the end, with leaves and pearlies.

Step 6: Add Figure-of-Eight Bows

Make eight figure-of-eight bows, for the last layer of the candy bouquet, and fan them around the base. You can use normal ribbons or curling ribon.

Step 7: Prepare the handle

The last step in making a candy bouquet is to trim and tape the handle.

That's it! Simple isn't it?

All you have to do now, is resist eating the bouquet long enough for some other people to see it!

Peta D'Silva has been making bouquets for over 14 years. Her website http://www.visionsofsilk.com, has lots of free information on making your own bouquets, including more details (and pictures) on how to make a candy bouquet: http://www.visionsofsilk.com/How_to_make_a_candy_bouquet.shtml

You can Make Your Own Cookie Bouquet at Home

If you like, you can make your own cookie bouquet at home pretty easily.

I recommend baking sugar cookies and using a cookie cutter with a hole in the middle, such as a flower.

Once you have frosted your cookies, fill the hole with a gumdrop or other similar candy.

Then stick one end of a cooking skewer into the gumdrop and the other end into a Styrofoam ball that you have glued into the bottom of a vase or other container.

Arrange your cookies in the vase, cutting some skewers shorter than others to more closely resemble a flower arrangement.

Another alternative is to insert the wooden skewers into the bottom of your cookies before baking.

If you use this method, be sure to gently push the dough around the skewer after inserting it. This method allows you to use a greater variety of cookie cutters, as they don't require a hole in the middle.

Just be sure to make cookies that will not be too heavy once baked.

At http//www.best-cookie-recipes.com/cookie-bouquet.html you could see a variety of cookie baskets and cookie bouquets, they're a great project to complete with your children to deliver to a neighbor or a teacher.

Experiment a little with different shapes and arrangements, and most of all, have fun!

Efrain Morales is the owner and webmaster of www.Best-Cookie-Recipes.com. He publishes a monthly newletter called The Best Cookie Recipe Exchange where he shares tips and techniques on how to use cookie recipes to bake gourmet cookies at home.

Bridal Bouquets - Here's 5 Alternatives

Bridal bouquets are the most popular accessories for brides to walk down the aisle. But what if you want to be a bit different? Here are 5 alternative ideas that will work for both brides and bridesmaids:

1) Wrist Corsage

This is a small arrangement of flowers that is secured to the wrist. Roses, orchids and other small-headed flowers work best.

The great thing about a wrist corsage is that both of your hands are free - ideal if you're going to be hugging lots of guests.

Bianca Jagger looked very chic having chosen a wrist corsage instead of a bouquet when she married Mick Jagger.

2) Pomander

A pomander (also called a kissing ball) is a round ball shape of flowers that has a delicate ribbon handle. This is easy to carry as the ribbon just slips over the wrist. Roses are the most popular choice for pomanders but you could also use gerberas or carnations.

Pomanders are often carried by bridesmaids and flowergirls, but can look spectacular for the bride herself.

3) Hair Decoration

Hair decorations can be both elegant and stylish. You can choose one large flower such as a lily to form the focal point of your arrangement. This type of arrangement is worn on the side of the head.

Alternatively you could go for a circular 'halo' arrangement, such as Audrey Hepburn wore at her wedding. She had a halo arrangement of white roses that was worn on top of the head.

In addition to flowers, you can incorporate beads, jewels and feathers into your hair decoration. Have a quick chat with your florist and you could come up with a unique design that suits your personality and complements your bridegroom's boutonniere.

4) Prayer Book

Another choice instead of holding a bridal bouquet is to hold a prayer book or bible. Some brides like to decorate the prayer book with a small arrangement of flowers and/or ribbons.

You could use a cherished bible that was given to you as gift, or you could buy a new one as a symbol of your new life and how you plan to lead it.

5) Lantern or Candle Holder

These are great for church weddings, especially if it is an evening ceremony. Candles are very romantic and will add to the ceremony. Use non-drip candles and a lantern design that fully encloses the naked flame to reduce the risk of an accident.

The base of the lantern or candleholder can be decorated with a small arrangement of flowers to match the colors of your wedding theme.

Paul Ajao is co-founder of wedding florists Pure Botanics. For great ideas on creating beautiful bouquets, centerpieces and boutonnieres for your wedding, check out his website at http://www.wedding-flowers-guide.com

Wedding Bouquet - On A Mission Keeping Up With Tradition

Flower bouquets the button hole and centre pieces will always be one of the star attractions at weddings. Flower posy/bouquets denote a blossoming maiden which evidently helps reflect her feelings and emotions. The planning of the wedding bouquet takes just as much careful thought behind getting it right for on the day as that of the wedding gown.

Whatever race/religion, bouquets will still always be seen as a tradition to be kept. The more of natures natural beauties lining church pews/aisles will send out a lingering aromatic fragrance and a vast amount of colour to brighten up your day.

What to take into consideration when choosing your wedding bouquet:

1. By choosing seasonal flowers you will save time and money, if you insist on blooms out of season then you may find they have to be shipped in from another country. Time is important when you order and receive the flowers, you will want them fresh therefore a stronger sweet smelling scent.

2. If you have silk flowers in mind then better still this way you are guaranteed your particular favourite flower no matter the time of year so no need to put the wedding on hold.

3. Do not make the mistake of letting the bouquet outshine or cover your figure if you are of petite frame the reason being is, your posture maybe affected thus giving off the wrong image of how your wedding gown should look. If the elegant style of the gown is to stay then make sure to choose pastels instead of strong vibrant colours. (Depending on the wedding outfit of course)

4. Make sure that your flowers still hold up for late afternoon photo shoots should your wedding service take place in the morning. A preferred method by brides to keep the flowers fresh while not posing in front of a camera or piling on the pounds at the wedding feast, (who cares now you got your man)only joking is to have a bouquet holder close at hand. Ask the florist for advice on which flowers wilt more quickly than others, by having this information under your garter you will at least know the ones to avoid.

5. On your first visit to the flower shop don't let the florist conjure up what they think you have in mind, they are not mind readers, It is only you at this point knows what you are looking for. Make it easy on both yourself and the florist by taking a photo of the style and design of the bouquet, another good idea is to bring along a sample piece of gown fabric so that the wedding coordinator/florist can select the correct shade of flower to compliment the wedding dress. Additional touches to Bouquets include ribbons lace beads or pearls.

6. Say it with flowers and mean it, why not choose a flower that has special meaning? Take the Stephanotis which stands for happiness in marriage, then we have the Rose denoting love and being true, another fabulous flower is the Tulip with a meaning declaring perfect love, why not have them all if your betrothed means that much to you.

7. Bouquets are becoming more personalized these days so design yours to suit your personality, everyone else is so why not you. Clusters of flowers more widely known as nose gays can vary in sophistication and will fit any personality. Beauty prevails in the flower cascading bouquet which is seen a lot at traditional weddings.

Flowers where the stems are wrapped in ribbons are called Hand-tied bouquets. It is these bouquets that bring a casual aura more often to garden ceremonies. We also have the Contemporary bouquet where flowers are arranged tastefully in a style with no geometric form but still as gorgeous as any other hand held bridal piece, normally used in sophisticated weddings.

8. If your choice is Roses, Lilies, Orchids, Tulips, Stephanotis or Daisies for your bridal bouquet then you have just picked the top flowers that have dominated many a wedding in the past and in the future to come.

Hours of research brought me to this fabulous site and hey what do you know everything you could possibly need is all here to make your wedding day special..Well worth a visit dont just take my word for it http://www.your-wedding-planning-help.com.

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Wedding Bouquet Preservation

You've put all this effort into finding mementos for everyone else, but what about you? Of course you'll want to save a piece of your own wedding as a token. It's become increasingly popular for women to keep their wedding bouquets. It can be done, ladies! Nevertheless, in order to keep it, you need to preserve it-and you don't need silk flowers to do it!

If you haven't decided which wedding flowers to use for your bouquet yet-let us make a suggestion: Red Roses. If you decide to use white, they will look ivory after you preserve them. And by preserving them, we mean dry -freezing them. Fortunately, many floral businesses dry-freeze their bouquets in advance. You can request to have this done. The actual process is called: substantiation. During this process, the water is removed from the petals and turn from a solid state to a gas. Then a post-treatment solution is applied to the bouquet to keep moisture from entering the petals.

Most florists will tell you that roses are the best wedding flowers for preservation. Tulips and any other waxy flowers are probably some of the worst, as the waxy substance slows down the removal of moisture. Carnations too, can be preserved. But unlike roses, which undergo substantiation, Carnations are usually silica dried.

If you silica dried your floral arrangements, you're probably wondering what you can do with them now. Silica drying is a temporary solution. Well, many brides take their silica dried flowers and dip them into hot paraffin. This will gift them a very glossy protective coating that will keep moisture at bay.

Nevertheless , green and foliage can be kept with a glycerin solution. Ivy for instance, will do best if you immerse the entire foliage into the solution. Note: many women swear by this method-place a few drops of green food coloring into the solution, as it's been said to keep the leaves from turning brown.

It's important to take several precautions after you've preserved your flowers. For instance: don't place the foliage or flowers into direct sunlight, as the natural colors will fade and dissipate. In addition, placing them in a vase or shadow-box will keep the dust from collecting on them.

It's always a good idea to practice on other wedding flowers and plants before the big day. This way you're no longer experimenting, you'll want exactly how to get the job done. Whichever method you try on your wedding bouquet, you'll be satisfied with fresh-looking long after your wedding day has come.

Jen Carter is owner of My Wedding Blog, a wedding planner all about weddings. The following article can be found in our wedding flowers category

How To Make A Candy Topiary Bouquet

Candy bouquets make great centerpieces or gifts for just about any occasion. Here are some instructions for creating your own candy topiary bouquet in either a flower pot or mug.

1. Either buy/find a flowerpot or mug to match your theme. For instance, for Mother's Day, you might want to use a flowerpot or mug with a Spring floral theme.

2. If you are using a mug, you will want to buy a piece of floral foam (to cut to size and put inside the mug base), a dowel rod (to stick in the base and form the topiary) and a Styrofoam ball (to stick at the end of the dowel rod and form the upper end of the topiary). If you are using a flower pot, you can buy the supplies described for the mug or you can buy one of the pre-made topiary forms that set directly in the flowerpot. I've seen these forms with a Styrofoam pot-shaped base and Styrofoam ball top at Michael's and Joanne Fabrics. If you go with the pre-made form, you can hot glue it directly into the flower pot.

3. Once you have your form in either your mug or pot, you should hot glue Spanish moss or other decorative items such as shells, dried flowers, etc to the to the top of the base foam to basically hide the foam that makes up the base.

4. Buy some floral pins and hard candies. I recommend getting hard candies that color-coordinate with your theme such as fruit bon-bons in pastel wrappers for Mother's Day or Easter and red/white hard peppermint candies for Christmas. Take a metal floral pin and stick it through the end of the candy wrapper (just outside the twisted end) and then stick the floral pin with the attached candy on to the round Styrofoam topiary ball. Keep repeating this process until the entire ball is covered with hard candies and you can't see any Styrofoam peeking through.

5. To dress up the candy bouquet, you can floral pin ribbons or small silk flowers between some of the hard candies. Also, tie pieces of ribbon around the dowel right below the Styrofoam ball. It looks great if you leave the ribbon tails long enough to hang down and disguise the wood dowel. I recommend either using curling ribbon or 1/2" wide organza ribbon for this task.

You've successfully completed your candy topiary bouquet!

Be sure to visit our Chocolate and Candy Gifts page to get more great candy bouquet and candy gift-giving ideas. We have edible candy bases and other unique candy gift ideas for birthdays, get well, Christmas, Valentine's Day, Easter, Mother's Day and more. Make your next candy bouquet gift memorable by buying it online at Cookie Gift Baskets.com

FTD Florist

One of the best surprises for a woman on a special occasion would be an unexpected delivery of flowers, whether in the home or office. The joy of receiving flowers from a loved one or an admirer is incomparable.

Most florists, in order to attract more customers offer free delivery services. At the store, the customer can choose the flowers he wants in the arrangement. The florist may assist him in the selection, making sure he gets the right kinds for the occasion, and arranges them for him. But for busy people who cannot make the trip down to the local florist, the Internet is a good place to find and visit florists too. Florists now have websites where customers can conduct transactions such as browse for flowers, choose from the available arrangements or specify certain details, and order and pay for bouquets to be delivered to a particular address.

All a customer needs is a credit card, and he can send flowers to anyone, anywhere. A customer can even send flowers to someone in another state or part of the globe if he orders from a florist with national or international coverage. Other independent florists may offer the same service and use couriers. They may or may not charge extra for the delivery service.

Other florists are more creative in their delivery service. To make the experience more complete for the recipient, they accompany the delivery with a song or dance number from the delivery agent. They can accommodate special requests from the customer.

The business of selling flowers hinges on the ability of the florists to keep the flowers fresh and vibrant-looking, even when the bouquets travel long distances to reach the intended recipients. Florists have developed methods and packaging designs to keep their flowers fresh for the longest time possible.

Florists provides detailed information on Florists, Retail Florists, Florist Delivery, Online Florists and more. Florists is affiliated with Best Florists Online.