Rose Petal Craft Ideas
Whether you're helping kids make gifts for their moms, or planning to pamper yourself with a handcrafted luxury, these rose petal craft ideas will get you started. With gorgeous rose petals from the garden, you can craft homemade delights that satisfy more than one of the senses and evoke the essential beauty of one of nature's most extravagantly beautiful flowers.
Fresh Rose Petals
If you've grown the roses yourself and can be confident that the flowers have been grown organically and never exposed to pesticides, you can use the fresh rose petals to make edible treats or fragrant skin elixirs. To make tasty crystallized rose petals, wash the freshly plucked petals and pat them dry, trimming off the paler area closest to the stem end. Brush each petal with a mixture of beaten egg white and granulated sugar, lay the petals on a sheet of waxed paper and let them dry. You can eat the petals as they are or use them to decorate cakes. To make rose water, harvest the petals from four good-sized roses, place them in a small saucepan of water and heat slowly (do not boil) on a low burner until the petals turn transparent. Remove the pan from the heat, and once it is cool, strain the rose water through a sieve, squeezing the petals gently to maximize liquid extraction. Keep fresh rose water in a small spray bottle in the refrigerator for up to a week. Use it on your face and neck whenever you need a cool, refreshing and fragrant pick-me-up.
Dried Rose Petals
Preserve your rose petals by drying them carefully, and they can serve as the central ingredient in aromatic potpourris and bath scent sachets, or become decorative elements on handcrafted items. Pick mature blooms in the morning, carefully pull off the petals and spread them on a paper towel. Allow the petals to dry in a well-ventilated place, out of direct sunlight. This might take several days. Combine 3 cups of dried rose petals with 2 cups of dried lavender, 1 cup each of cornflower petals and lemon verbena, along with 1/2 cup of orris root and 1 tablespoon each of cinnamon and allspice, for a fragrant potpourri. Add a few drops of rose essential oil if you wish to intensify the rose aroma. Dried rose petals also make beautiful and unusual elements for a decoupage project: apply them to the surface of a notebook, a vase or a trinket box with white glue or decoupage medium, for a touch of summer that lasts and lasts.
These rose petal craft projects will be fun to make and to give for any special occasion.
