Sans Bouts

I'm not sure what happened first. All I know is that I got it in my mind that we did not need boutonnieres, and that these could be a viable alternative for live flowers.


Here's another view. Pretty cute, huh? I had even considered incorporating some of them into the 'maids bouquets to tie it all together. The instructions seemed simple enough. All I needed was fabric, floral wire, floral tape, modge podge, scissors, and a little bit of time. Those last four things I already had. I found some cute teal and green fabric, the wire and the tape at (my fave) Hobby Lobby.

What seemed like a really cute idea turned out to be a complete and utter disaster! Its so bad I couldn't even take a picture to show you. I just threw it away. All in all, the materials cost very little, so I didn't take a huge financial hit on this crafting failure. If I had to mass produce them they would have been about $1 each, if that much. However, this was my leading contender for boutonniere alternative. So I needed a new plan.

Enter pocket squares.

When MamaP and I first discussed the guys going sans bout, she suggested pocket squares. At the time, I was not sure you could wear them with tuxes. Turns out, people do, and they're considered to be quite chic when done well. (Besides, its not like the guys are dying to wear flowers on their lapel - lol).

Once I found that out, I started thinking about colors. My first choice would some teal and green combo. That was quickly shot down. Then I thought green or teal would be nice. But I was having a hard time finding some online that didn't look cheap or weren't terribly expensive. MamaP suggested I contact our tuxedo "vendor," MW Tux to see if they could help us out. And it was at that point, that I decided to delegate this to the PHI.

Especially since he's always offering to help.

Yesterday while strolling through the mall, we stopped into MW Tux to ask about pocket squares. It was his idea to stop in there, since he hadn't completed his pocket square recon. Turns out that the tuxes already come with pocket squares! But they're black. Against a black tux. And the other options are ivory, red, and other fairly standard colors. They don't carry teal or green. So, if we wanted teal, green, or some combo, we'd need to find some other place to get them from.

What did we decide?
Black pocket squares it is. Something like this:

{found here}

To summarize:
- We decided against live flower boutonieres.
- I thought I could make fabric flowers to use instead.
- That was my first crafting failure.
- Change of plan: pocket squares.
- Tuxes come with black pocket squares.
- We're going to use the black pocket squares.

I love that the current plan manages to save us money. Boutonnieres from the florist would have been about $8 each, and the fabric flowers would have been $1 each. Their pocket squares won't cost us a single brown penny! I would have liked them to be in a wedding color, but frankly, I don't think the guys care. And if they don't care, I'm going to try not to care either.

Well, not that much.

Whatcha think? Boutonnieres: necessary? not needed? good place to save in the budget? opportunity to do something different? Do you plan to have your guys wear them? Why or why not?

♥