Scents Of Summer Part Two

The teddy bears were tidying out the large cupboard in their Craft Room recently and suddenly came across a big tray full of dried herbs and flower petals. "What's this?" asked Charlie, holding it aloft.

"Gosh! They're the flowers we picked back in August!" exclaimed Bubbles, "We've forgotten all about them!" If you remember, the bears had picked the last of the Summer flowers with the intention of making them into pot pourri (a medley of different dried flowers with spices and herbs added - in fact, anything that smells nice - that can be mixed together and left out in a room to perfume the air with the scents of Summer). You can read all about that in their previous story by clicking here.

"Oooh, yes!" cried Lizzie. "You were going to show us how to turn them into pot pourri, Bubbles!"

"Well, they are certainly dried enough now!" laughed Bubbles. "Let's get some more things together and I'll show you how to make it. First of all, we need a big jar to put them all in, with enough room to add a few more ingredients," he began.

"We have one of those big Kilner jar thingies that we use for jam," said Lizzie. "I saw it yesterday in the kitchen."

"That will work great!" replied Bubbles. "It has a sealable top to keep the air out, and we can see everything through the glass. We'll also need some spices - can you gather some of them, too, while you're in the kitchen?" he asked Lizzie.

Lizzie ran round the kitchen finding the Kilner jar, and then looking through the spice rack. "Anything in particular you want?" she called to Bubbles.

"See if there's any cloves, cinnamon, nutmeg or bay leaves," Bubbles replied.

Meanwhile, he went upstairs to their Christmas Cupboard (this is where they kept everything to do with Christmas). He found some orange peel and some small, whole clementines which they had dried many years ago. Then he searched and searched for a really important ingredient, muttering to himself all the while "I know there's some in here somewhere," as he rummaged deep into the back of the cupboard.

"A-ha!" he exclaimed at last, "I've found it! Just what I was looking for!" and in his paw he held a small jar of something labelled 'Orris Root.' There was also some dried lavender in the cupboard and he took a few sprigs of that. He found some pine cones too, and brought everything down.

"That's an awful lot of things to put in our jar," Charlie pointed out when everything was piled up on the table. "Can I help?" he asked.

"Of course you can," replied Bubbles and Lizzie together. "There's a lot to do. First of all, we need to add all the ingredients into the jar in layers, starting with the dried flowers and herbs. You can be in charge of that, Charlie," said Bubbles.

So Charlie poured in the dried flowers. "Now, Lizzie, you can add the orange, pine cones and clementines," Bubbles prompted, "then I'll add some of the spices." There hadn't been any dried bay leaves in the kitchen, but Bubbles added a few cloves, a couple of sticks of cinnamon (broken into small pieces) and a whole nutmeg.

"What's this orris root stuff?" asked Charlie, reaching for the small jar. "Shall I add some of this too?"

"Yes, please," replied Bubbles. "And we'll add the sprigs of dried lavender now too - both of these are called fixatives," he explained, "and they absorb and retain the scented essences so the pot pourri will last longer."

Charlie very carefully added a little bit of each of the dried lavender and orris root. "Did you make this yourself, Bubbles?" Charlie asked.

"No, I actually bought that at the Craft Shop," Bubbles replied. "It's made from the roots of iris plants grown in the Mediterranean, and it takes about four years to dry out! Then it is milled into this powder. I didn't have time to make my own!" he laughed.

"Now, all we need is some essential oil," continued Bubbles. "I think we have some in the living room that we use in our candle diffusers."

Lizzie duly skipped into the living room and found a box of different essential oils. She chose the lavender oil, as it was her favourite scent.

"Good choice, Lizzie," said Bubbles when she returned. "If you put just a few drops in the jar. Not too much or it will only smell of lavender!"

Lizzie let a few drops of the lavender essential oil fall into the jar. "What if we hadn't had essential oils?" she asked Bubbles, worried that their pot pourri recipe would be ruined without it.

"You could always have used some other perfume," he explained, "but it would have taken more than a few drops - essential oils are very concentrated so you don't need so much."

"Right! That's it!" he then declared. "All finished. We just need to seal the jar and leave it for a couple more weeks, shaking it every day or two to mix up the contents. Shall we take it in turns to do that?"

So they agreed that they would take turns to shake the jar every couple of days, and made a reminder on their noticeboard so they could check and tick it off when they had done it.

"What will we do with it after the two weeks?" asked Lizzie. "I've seen bowls of pot pourri set out so that the scent fills the room. We could do that."

"Yes, let's put out a couple of bowls so that the room will smell of Christmas!" Bubbles declared. "We could also sew it into the lining of cushion covers or pillows. Or we have some muslin bags in the cupboard and we could fill them with pot pourri and hang them on door handles or over the backs of chairs at Christmas. Or we could give them as presents to our friends."

"Oh, I like that idea," said Lizzie. "Alfred and Gerry helped us to gather the flower petals, so it would be really nice to give them some little bags of pot pourri as a thankyou."

If you gathered flowers earlier in the year when the bears did, maybe you can turn them into pot pourri too. You may need some help from an adult to find all the right ingredients, but it will smell divine and scent your house for ages.