While we all offer fresh flowers to Gods at our home either daily or on noted festivals, we hardly know what do you with them when they dry-up the next day. Most of us throw them away or put them under some tree in a temple adding to the environment waste. But did you know that there are some of the surprising ways to make use of that floral waste? A designer house in Mumbai has established a sustainable business by recycling the floral waste from Siddhivinayak temple and the results are designer-wear fabrics. We can take some inspiration from them and utilise the floral waste in our house or a near-by temple and bring to our daily use.
Here are 3 surprising ways to do it:
Create a mesmerising potpourri
Take the floral waste and let it dry for a day or two. Mix these dried flowers with your favourite spices – you can choose from cinnamon, star anise, clove, dried citrus peels etc. Put these together in a jar. Add a few drops of essential oils from aromatherapy range or you can add the drops of your favourite perfume too. Seal the mixture and let it mature for over a period of 10 days. Your potpourri will be ready to mesmerise your guests next time!
Convert your rotten flowers into a scent for floor mopping
Take 1/4th cup of dry or rotten flowers and mix it with one cup of baking soda. Add a tablespoon of salt to it and your fragrant floor mopping solution is ready. You would no longer need a room freshner or any other kind of room perfumes.
If you have any solid light colour scarves, you can dye them with natural flower colour and create an eco-friendly designer scarf for yourself. All you need to do is to dry the used flowers for 2 days. Soak the cloth you want to dye in hot water for a few minutes. Wring it and spread it on a flat surface. Place the petals of the flower all over and fold the cloth into many layers. Now steam the folded fabric for 15 minutes to heat each side. After this process, open the fabric and let the leaves fall off on their own. Dry the cloth to get a beautiful eco-dyed scarf.
