Perfume oil

Even though measuring by volume is not a totally accurate measure it will probably suffice in the very beginning. It's recommended to dilute the EOs before blending to 10-20% in carrier oil or alcohol. You can use a disposable pipette to measure out 1-2mls of EO then add enough carrier oil or alcohol to make it up to 10 mls in total. Giving you a dilution 10-20%.

The rest is quite simple.

20% of 60 drops is 12 drops
50% of 60 drops is 30 drops etc...

Your final blend will then already be diluted to 10-20%. if you found it too strong you could add 60 drops of your carrier and then have a 5-10% dilution.

Just another note that carrier oils and alcohol do not mix but essential oils are soluble in either. So you have to decide from the outset whether you will make an alcohol or oil based perfume. Whatever you dilute your essential oils in will be what you have to use for your perfume base.

There is another thread already with book recommendations, just search for it. I don't have any recommendations as I'm beginner myself and got the info I posted above from reading this forum and advice given to me. I plan to work with oil based perfumes rather than alcohol because I prefer perfume thats dabbed rather than sprayed. From what I can gather your absolutes are alcohol rather than oil soluble, you may be able to mix them with your carrier oil with DPG ( dipropylene glycol) which is an oil miscible alcohol. Its quite cheap and easy to buy.

I recently posted a thread titled DIY naturals kit, you may want to have a read of that as several kind folks here posted lots of recommendations or basic notes for me. I'm sure it won't be long before more knowlegable forumites offer you their help as well.

The reason its recommended to dilute your EOs before blending is so that you can smell the nuances of each one as you blend. EOs neat are so powerful they dampen your ability to discern the entire aroma. You won't get a true sense of your scent as you blend if they are not. It's also a way to limit wastage of your expensive materials if you are discarding a dilution rather than a concentrate. Try it for yourself, put some undiluted EO on a smelling strip and then a dilute of the same oil on another one. The diluted EO will smell fuller and more pleasing. I learnt this when I bought some very expensive pure neroli oil, it smelt acrid and horrible in the bottle nothing like neroli at all until it was diluted down to about 5% then it blossomed into that gorgeous flower.

I've posted on my blog about books I recommend, but my top recommendation for you is Tony Curtis and David G Williams An Introduction to Perfumery - details on the blog.

Absolutes are alcohol soluble, ethanol, possibly also DPG ( although I've not used this myself yet).

I don't use alcohol at all. But you need it if you work with absolutes as I've read here they won't dissolve in oil.

All absolutes should dissolve in ethanol as ethanol is the final solvent used in their production, however that final stage is occasionally done with hot ethanol so you can sometimes struggle to get them into solution in cold ethanol (and for safety reasons you should never heat ethanol at home unless you have special equipment to contain the explosive vapour).

Most absolutes will also dissolve in isopropyl myristate.

Generally speaking it is best to avoid heating absolutes - the reason they are produced is to capture those elements of the scent that would be lost in the boiling inherent to essential oil production - if you must heat them it is best done quickly and briefly.

Also notice that if you chose to work in an oil carrier (like jojoba or fractionated coconut oil (aka capric/caprylic trigyceride)) rather than ethanol, you can't use ethanol at all because the two don't mix.