The Scientific Side of Wedding Planning.

Interview with florist #3 was yesterday, and I'm REALLY hoping that he ends up being our wedding florist. It's pretty much dependent on the quote we get from him and the experiment being conducted in our apartment today.

When speaking with all three florists I told them basically the same thing:

• Flowers aren't a huge deal for us. We want something nice, but this is not a budget buster for us.
• I'm fairly stupid when it comes to flowers, so outside the big ones (roses, daisies, tulips, carnations) it's strictly "look at the pretty purple one!"
• We both like the look and feel of gerbera daisies and think it would be cool to have that be the main flower.
• I also gave them our idea on centerpieces thus far (wanting flowers to pretty it up and bring consistency to the tables.)

Florist #1 (he of the urinal floral arrangements) insisted that gerbera daisies wilt really fast and look really crappy when they're wilty. He struck me as the type where we're supposed to tell him our colors and just trust him 100%. Or, better yet, let him decide our colors for us based on the arrangements he'd like to do. His work was good, but a bit expensive for our budget (although it's the only formal quote we have thus far, so we'll see how that plays out).

Florist #2 didn't offer any visual aides during our consultation. I didn't even realize until I was walking back to my car. No photos of past work. No current displays sitting out in the shop. Nada. Based on the conversation we had I believe she has my bouquet being made of roses (which would be nice, but really I don't care if there's not a single rose around on the day), and has dahlias and gerbera daisies as the centerpieces.

Florist #3 got it. When I said we were thinking of gerbera daisies he grabbed a few from the buckets behind us, grabbed some bear grass, and in about 30 seconds had a very striking mock-up I could look at. He then grabbed one of the small daisies, did a little twist with some of the bear grass and we had ourselves a boutinniere. He suggested potted gerberas as centerpieces because their very cost-effective, and wants to tie it in with the rest of our centerpiece idea to make it all come together. He thinks it's FABULOUS that Sweetie and I met through the personal ads of a local alternative newsweekly, and AWESOME that he's actually met someone that met their spouse that way now. After the floral consultation side was done we just sat and chatted for a few minutes.

Number 3 gets it. Yeah, I'm gonna' trust him a lot of the way, but we've got to work together as a team to make sure it all reflects Sweetie and I on the big day. And he was just a lot of fun!

The quote will, obviously, make an impact, but my gut tells me will be able to find a way to make it work.

So I went and bought some gerbera daisies this afternoon. I'm not putting them in water, just seeing how fast they wilt and how nasty they look when they're wilted. They strike me as a hearty enough flower that they'll be fine for the wedding. I suspect that they just don't work well in florist #1's standard bouquet, but we're leaving in the hands of science right now.