There is one thing I enjoy more than freshly cut roses, and that is freshly dried roses. To be honest, I love everything about roses, from their buds to their flowers to the rose hips they leave behind. Last week I spent a very happy afternoon drying some roses and their petals, decorating our home and looking up recipes for the coming year to use up the abundance of rose hips our garden produces.
As you can see, I had many roses which were reaching the end of their natural life. I am far more proficient at keeping freshly cut flowers alive than potted plants (which I have absolutely no skill at all with😬). I’m even better at prolonging the pleasure they give by drying them.
The best thing to do is to set the flowers out and pick the best ones for drying:
I’ve found that the best ones for full flower drying are the ones that haven’t started to rot in the stem. Any which have stems that have started to go black are more likely to lose their petals during the drying process. You’re better off drying only the petals of those. Also, if any of the rose petals are beginning to go brown, they are not good at being dried, either as a whole flower or as just petals. They get binned. Below you can see the pile of flowers I am going to dry, the pile of petals I am going to dry, and all the rotten left overs which will be composted:
I used the sunny weather to my advantage and popped the petals on a tray outside:
I added a candle and it made a lovely centrepiece:
The flowers I divided into small bunches:
and tied them with some twine:
And hung them around the home to dry:
Roses are the gift that keeps on giving ❤️
Gorgeous! I love cut flowers.
Blessings, Dawn