Keeping Your Special Roses

You can keep more than just roses, but I was drying my yellow roses which were given to me by my wonderful boyfriend and thus the title was written. You may recognize these roses since they were used in this post where I talked about Autry and how he has helped me to realize that life isn't about the big things, but the little things instead.

The roses used in the picture are the very same that Autry had given to me in July as a surprise. He showed up after work one day with a stuffed pony in his jacket and a dozen yellow roses behind his back. It was wonderful!

Now for the purpose of this post... I have only one other flower bouquet which I have dried and saved they are the flowers I caught at a friend's wedding in 2010. I had never caught the bouquet at a wedding before or since then so they are special. I am thinking they might be displayed at my own wedding reception...not sure if I will actually do that yet or not.

Here are a few photos of the flowers Autry gave me. Aren't they beautiful?

Drying Flowers
When your flowers are getting to the end of the 4-5 day range (could be more or less...I think mine lasted 6 days) then it is time to pull them out of the water and wrap a bunch of string around the ends. I use basic sewing thread, but you can use yarn or something else you might have. Before you wrap the ends make sure the flowers are arranged like you want them to stay once they are dried, then wrap away! Make sure the stems are secured before you stop wrapping.

Hang your flowers in a place to dry for 1 1/2-2 weeks.

Hang your flowers in a place where they will be out of the way. I chose to hang them in the bay window since there was a hook which could hold the flowers by the thread. (You can see that I wrapped the stems with a LOT of thread!)

These flowers have been drying for about 4 days.

Now it's time to wait. My flowers were left in the window for 8-9 days. Basically you want the whole flower to be dry. If a week has passed and the flowers still don't look dry all the way then you can leave them for another week. Leaving them to dry won't hurt anything.

Once your flowers are dry they should look about like this:

Now store them in a vase and display them proudly for years to come!



This vase was found at a garage sale last week for .50 cents!
I love the design. It is so beautiful!
When I get married this will be on my dresser in my bedroom.