Aging Crochet Roses with Tea

 My mother recently found a pattern for tiny crochet roses, and when she showed them to me I thought that they would make some lovely earrings. One problem however, most of the jewelry I make has some sort of steam-punk element, and these roses, while beautiful, needed a bit of , well, age. I've used black tea to age paper before so I thought I'd give it a try with these.

For this project, you will need some form of black tea in a bag, a shallow bowl or plate, a paintbrush, and, of course, your little flowers. I used chai tea because it can be over brewed a bit and it doesn't hurt the flavor (and it's one of my favorites), but you can use whatever black tea you have on hand. So grab your favorite mug and make yourself some tea.

Let the tea steep for three to five minutes then remove the tea bags.  Squeeze the remaining tea out of the bag into your shallow bowl (I used the lid of my mug, but anything with edges would work nicely).

If the flowers you are aging are colored you can dunk them in the tea and forgo the paintbrush, but if you try that with the white ones they will end up being a little too yellow. Let your flower soak in the tea for a couple minuets, then pull it out and squeeze all the excess liquid  out. Let it dry completely. 

If the flowers you're aging are white, use the paintbrush to put tea on only the tips of the petals, soak the tips so that a little will run down into the center. This should give you just enough yellow to give them the perfect off white, vintage color. 

Here are some before and after pictures of the ones I did.

The rose on the far left is the white one I dunked, the color is more even, but a little dark for my taste. The one in the middle is the unprocessed one, and the one to the right is the one I used the brush on.

The pink roses turned out a little better I think