Our garden has several wild dog roses (Rosa Canina). There are fields and a farm next door, so the roses sit among the wild honeysuckle, elder and bramble in the hedgerow. To collect the petals I took a walk along the hedgerow with a bowl and touched each rose that was wide open and had lost half its petals and knocked off the loose ones which I then caught in my bowl. The scent is delicious. I brought them in and laid them on some paper to dry them out before potting them up in old jam jars. The best way to clean the jars and remove the labels is by simply putting them into the dishwasher. At some point the petals will be used generally in friendship, luck, and goodwill spells and incenses.
In the autumn, I’ll be able to collect in the rosehips to use in teas and syrups and also spells and incenses. Full of Vitamin C, I remember rosehip syrup well, as something that was given to us freely when my siblings and I were children. If you don’t have wild rose, then Rosa Rugosa, a hedging rose, is great for this as it has large hips, and the scent of the actual rose is stronger too. There is just something so beautiful and magical about wild rose though.
Another way to collect rose petals, and you have no garden or anywhere you can freely gather them, especially if you’re loathe to buy a bunch to tear them apart, or buy them on the online, is to wait until you have a vase of blooms that are past their best and you are thinking of throwing away. Remove the centre of those still in good condition. You will find the petals are still fresh. You can then dry them as usual.
There is advice online 
about drying rose petals quickly in the microwave. Don’t do it. Apart from the thought of microwaves interfering with the petals, they smell awful when they come out. Be patient, it takes less than a week to dry them out.
Thank you to my husband for running outside to take the photos.
