A Rose by Any Other Name...

Ok, it's true.  I can sometimes be too resourceful for my own good.  I don't like things to go to waste, so my wheels always start turning when I'm faced with the plight of an object (or objects) that is about to be thrown to the wayside.  Yeah, I might, in fact, need those four empty toilet papers rolls to make a sweet craft.  That square of brown paper bag?  No, you mustn't throw that out...I could make a thank you card out of it!  Oh, let me turn that shirt with a hole into a lovely bird feeder (hey, I don't know, it could happen)!  For real, people, the possibilities are endless for reusing and recycling.  Thus, enter the most recent object of my attempted craftiness:

A rose.  Roses.  Well, rose petals to be exact.  A week or so ago, I came home to this wonderful and thoughtful surprise from Hubs: 

It was complete with a homemade dinner and dessert (sorry, ladies, he's mine)!  Well, I so much loved the soft feel of the rose petals under my feet, that I decided to leave them there...but just 'til the next morning.  I stared down the hallway at them, and thought, "Those are perfectly good rose petals, yanked off a dozen perfectly good roses.  I really hate to just throw them haphazardly away.  Hmmm, wonder what I can make with rose petals!"  And then the just like that, an idea came to me...

Rose Water!  I could make rose water!  People make rose water...right?

I actually had no idea what rose water is (besides being the water of roses, I assume).  And I had absolutely no idea what uses it has.  But by golly, I was gonna make me some rose water!

I gathered up all my rose petals and went on a mad search of the proper way to make rose water.   

Ok, so I don't guess I ever really decided if there is a proper way to make rose water.  I combined a few different methods that seemed relatively similar to each other.  And I actually ended up with two kinds of rose water.  Before you know it, I had this:

That's pure, unadulterated rose water on the left and...not as pure (?) rose water on the right.  (Sidenote: Those two jars are also victims objects of my resourcefulness.  We have like 800 of them stashed in cupboards all over the kitchen.) Surprisingly, the pure rose water didn't smell as good (or look as pretty) as the other.  But, either way, I did it!  I successfully made two jars of rose water!

I'm sure you are all wondering now what me and all my craftiness are doing with my rose water...

Absolutely nothing.  I still have no idea what to use rose water for.  And in about two weeks or so, Hubs will probably look at the two jars collecting dust on the counter and say, "Soooo are we gonna use this for anything?"  And I will probably have nothing to say.

But I had set out to save those perfectly good rose petals from certain waste and doom.  And save them I did.