Potpourri

To create your own potpourri, need following items:

• Large airtight, opaque container for initial mixing, like canister
• Dried plant materials
• FixativeEssential Oils
• Pretty jars, Sachets, or covered dishes to enclose the final products
  

Dried Materials

• Rose petals or buds from blossoms or bouquets given to you by your lover
• Dried fragrant herbs from your garden, such as basil, bay leaves, calendula or delphinium petals (for color), lavender, thyme, lemon, verbena, marjoram, mint, rosemary, rose geranium leaves, yarrow
• Bits of dried rinds of citrus fruits
• Balsam pine needles
• Curls of birch bark
• Eucalyptus leaves
• Whole or ground spices such as allspice, caraway seeds, cinnamon sticks, cloves, coriander seeds, nutmeg, or vanilla beans
• Bulk dried blossoms or herbs (untreated with fragrances) from herb stores

Fixatives
include gum benzoin, cedar shavings, clary sage leaves, frankincense gum resin, oakmoss, orris root, powdered sandalwood, tonka beans, vetiver root, or animal ingredients such as tinctures of ambergris, civet or musk.

Essential Oils

• Balsam fir (blends well with ceddar, rose, bay laurel)
• Bay Laurel (use in spicy, citrus or woody mixes)
• Cedar (woody, spicy mixes, also with balsam or citruses)
• Cinnamon (great with orange or citrus, also woody blends)
• Frankincense (with spice, citrus or rose-dominated mixtures)
• Geranium (florals, or to add fragrance to dried rose petal blends)
• Jasmine (floral blends, powerful with rose)
• Lavender (also good with rose and floral mixes)
• Lemon (goes well with orange, bay, spices, woody blends)
• Orange (fruity, spicy, woody blends)
• Neroli (powerful with orange and spice, also woody)
• Rose (beautiful with almost any blend, especially rose, or rose/lavender/cedar mix)
• Sandalwood (woods, spices, florals such as jasmine, rose and neroli)

Mixing Potpourri
If you're improvising, start with a little bit of each ingredient to get an idea of how they go together, both visually and for fragrance. Start with dry ingredients, and when you've got that part the way you want it, add your essential oils a drop at a time until you've got a delicious aroma.

A good basic formula to follow for improvisations is this: to every 5 cups of dried leaves, flowers or rinds, add two and a half tablespoons of fixative, one tablespoon of spices (if you're using them), and 3 to 10 drops of essential oil.

Then fill your aging container, no more than two-thirds fulls. Keep the container closed for 2-10 weeks, shaking daily, until the fragrance mature. Then package it in small wooden boxes, porcelain cups or sugar bowl, candy dishes, apothecary jars or baskets. Don't use metal and plastic containers, they react

with the essential oil. If your potpourri loses its aroma, then return it to the aging container, add a few more drops of essential oil and allow to age, again, shaking daily.