Ah, such a pleasant day, and it’s not even over yet. Got up, ate, and denuded (or deflowered—hee hee) four of our rosebushes. On one of the other two, the flowers were looking droopy, and on the other, there was only one flower, and it was perfect, and I didn’t have the heart. I gathered everything else I needed and headed over to Lasairfhiona’s. The petals I gathered allowed us to make three batches of rose beads, although two were fairly small. We did one batch with benzoin and gum arabic in an iron pan (to turn them black, which seems to be the period way—esp. given that pretty much all they had to cook in was iron pots), one batch with benzoin and gum arabic in a glass pot (to retain the petals’ colour—although they’re drying pretty dark), and one batch without cooking, although we discovered we did have to add the arabic to make it all stick together. The latter batch was a mix of yellow and pink roses, and the resulting colour isn’t great. But that’s why we experimented. I made lots of notes and intend to type them up in a day or two and eventually sort them into an article; I also took some pictures of the process and results. In a few days, the beads should be dry enough to string.

Then we hauled Lasairfhiona and the girls (4 and 6) over; Wulfric stayed at home to veg. Lasairfhiona is taking advantage of our big cutting table, and the kids and Ken and I swam. Then we made dinner (burgers for the kids; yogurt/cilantro/mint chicken, asparagus, and garlic mashed red potatoes for the adults.

I doubt we’ll have many folks over for sewing, as it’s the last day of a holiday-weekend-long war. I may toddle out and cut out a tunic, but I want to watch a show about the history of Russia at 9.

No time for tunic cutting. As for the Russia show, very interesting. I didn’t pay close enough attn at the beginning (small children interrupting, starting to work on an embroidery project, etc.) so I wish I’d taped it. Ah well. I got a good amount of embroidery done on The Project That Cannot Be Mentioned, which felt good.

There. Typed up my rose beads notes, with a bit of added commentary for an article. It’s more of a “how to” article than a historical article, as I’m still tracking down some sources. But most of what I found didn’t give amounts or whatnot, so this article is intended to help others who want to make them. The historical documentation article comes next. In time for Gyldenholt A&S…

No writing tonight. A little sleepy, a little burned out. Will hit it tomorrow, no problem.

Annie Lennox’s “Diva” on iTunes. What a glorious voice. And my fingers still smell like rose oil. Mmmmmm…