Even though it is still cold and it was snowing a few days ago, I can hear the birds chirping outside, store windows are touting warm weather frocks, and people are pinning bright springtime pins on Pinterest.

Suddenly I find myself loving peach again and other springtime colors. And I have flowers on my mind.

Oh flowers.....

If you are planning your wedding, or have planned your wedding, you know how much agony these delicate buds of joy can wreak on you and your wallet (as in $1500-$3000 worth of agony).

When I got married, I planned to DIY all my flowers. Three months before I walked down the aisle, I realized I didn't have enough time to make the arrangements, I would have to store them at my venue the night before, and my venue wouldn't let me store them anyway because they'd have to run the AC all night just for my flowers. My lack of planning ahead resulted 1-2 nights of sobbing, and a lot of stressful days - all at a time when I wanted to stop worrying about stuff and start celebrating!

I am just taking a guess here…but I bet I'm not the first person out there who has stressed out about wedding flowers...and I'm certainly not the last.

So in an effort to help at least one person planning their wedding avoid a few days of freaking out, I’ve compiled a list of things I would’ve done differently if I had the chance… please chime in and leave a comment if you have any suggestions too!

1) I would've figured out how many flowers I need earlier on. Once I had my venue selected and I had a general idea of what kind of decorations I wanted, I should've written out a list of how many flower arrangements I needed (how many boutonnieres, bouquets, centerpieces, etc.). It would’ve been just a ballpark list, but it would've helped me realize it's too much to do before my wedding and I probably would've looked into hiring a florist earlier on for some or all of my flowers!

2) Since I was planning to DIY my flowers, I should've come up with a plan as early as possible. If you are thinking about DIY-ing any of your wedding flowers – even if its just the bouquets – I urge you to figure out how much time you’ll need and come up with a plan as early as possible! Weddingbee's discussion boards are an excellent resource for advice on where to buy your flowers, success stories, and links to tutorials.

Here are some helpful tips that I remember from my research....

Practice in advance
Recruit a team of family and friends to help
Choose durable flowers
Allocate time to prep the flowers for the arrangements
Make sure you have a cool, dry place to store your flowers
Find someone with a truck or large van to be in charge of transporting the flowers
Make sure you have someone who can set up the flowers and deliver boutonnieres and boquets
Make sure your venue knows your plans and are ok with them
Make sure you have someone who can deliver and set up the arrangements, and your venue knows about your plans

3) Consider flower alternatives. You may realize that DIY-ing your flowers is not a viable option. The good news is that you don't have to use flowers for everything - in fact, you could get away with not having a single flower in your whole wedding.

If you're on Pinterest, you've probably seen tutorials for how to make flower arrangements out of newspaper, tissue paper, and other forms of paper. Recruit your bridesmaids months before your wedding and make centerpieces out of tissue tassel garlands, or attach some strands of tissue paper and tinsel to sticks and stick them in some old bottles. The possibilities are endless and the best part is, you can do it all in advance.

4) But don't give up on flowers if you really want them! I was lucky and found an amazing florist who was more affordable than going the wholesale flower route, and great to work with. And she grows all her own flowers! (Yes, I know I was really lucky!) But maybe you will be too if you do a little research! I suggest looking on the Association of Specialty Cut Flower Growers' website for a list of local florists and growers in your area.