A small collection of appropriate soaps

Victorian Wedding Cake Soaps by soapychica


Glycerin Wedding Cake by DaisyCakeSoap


Wedding Cake Scented Cupcake Soap by DoctorSweetTooth

Congratulations to Sweetly Scented Lemmings' own Telesilla and her wife Darkrose on the happy day of their marriage! :)

Winning stuff is fun!!

So La Parfumer Rebelle does a give away each month and....

I won the July package, which was put together by Justine of Oh, True Apothecary and The Scented Djinn. And so today, the day before my birthday (and where the hell has the last 45 years gone, I'd like to know), I got a box. With stuff! And things! And stuff!

Two bright pink La Parfumer Rebelle t-shirts, one of which will fit me.

A four ounce canister of Scented Djinn's rose geranium powder. While I don't normally wear powder, Darkrose does and this smells good enough that I might end up using some too.

A little bag with ginger candy and some tea.

A bar of hemp soap (scented with lavender and rosemary) from Sierra Soapurri (who sound like they're somewhat local). It's got poppy seeds in it too, so it's nice and scrubby.

A little sample of her Mock Violet Eau de Toilette.

A .5oz bottle of the Boronia Eau de Cologne that I love so much.

AND! What looks to be at least 2ml of her brand new prefume, Serj. It's an eau de perfume whose key notes are: fir balasam, hyacinth, orange juice and ruh khus (which is vetivert that's been hydro distilled). I've only given this a quick sniff, but it smells really interesting and I can't wait to settle down with it and review it.

So yay winning things! It's not something that happens to me all that often and that it was stuff from Scented Djinn just made it even cooler.

Speaking of reviewing, I know I've been kind of quiet lately, but things around here have been a little hectic and tiring what with a certain amount of running around getting things done for the wedding. My lovely and talented co-blogger, Helens, is off on vacation for a couple days and I'm having the fun birthday weekend--dinner with Darkrose tomorrow, dinner with Darkrose and my sister Saturday, and our once monthly fannish get together on Sunday. I hope to review the Serj at some point during the weekend and also, I have two samples from Loreto for the wedding perfume; reviewing those will be fun because they're very similiar.

The Madness to My Method -- Part Six

6. My thoughts on naturals vs synthetics.

Unless you grow the plants yourself, distill them into tinctures and blend them into oil from a certified organic grower, you honestly just don't know what you're getting when you talk about something "natural." It doesn't help that "natural" and "green" are phrases that can be tossed around without necessarily meaning anything; unlike the USDA, which can certify food as organic, the FDA (which covers perfume, bath & body products and the like) can't.

Furthermore, there's the environmental factor to consider. Sandalwood, for example, is in high demand; is it more ethical and green to use natural oil or to refine a synthetic so vast numbers of trees aren't cut down or to use a slightly inferior oil from a grower who replants? Also, some classic perfume additives are animal in nature; is real civet more ethical than the synthetic version, given that you have to either kill the animal or harvest the musk from a live animal in way that is painful to the animal?

I honestly don't have answers as to whether all natural is a) possible at all and b) as green and/or ethical as we'd like to think. On the other hand, synthetics are chemically produced and there are undoubtedly waste products that might not be disposed of properly, plus there is the fact that I really do like the idea of an all natural product.

I think that, for me, it has to come down to a balancing act. I'm not well off, far from it; I'm disabled and my partner and I pretty much live on her salary--she does IT help at a university--supplemented by my very small Social Security check. I have to shop carefully for everything, both necessary stuff and frivolous things. I do my best to buy locally and to purchase organics when I can afford them and I do what I can around the house to lower my carbon footprint.

When it comes to perfume, I trust that the perfumers I patronize are using the best materials they can to produce the best product they can within a price people can afford. I trust them when they say that they don't test on animals. And I trust them, as part of an culture that strives to be independent and aware, to walk as lightly on the Earth as they can.

I can't ask more of them than I ask of myself.

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This is the end of the Method posts. Hopefully either tomorrow or Monday will see a new set of reviews, including still life with pomegranates and maybe a give away.

The Madness to My Method -- Part Five

5. My strictly independent status and how I choose what to review.

I'm not shilling for any company, large or small. If an e-tailer is running some kind of special and I send you there and tell you to mention me, I'll also tell you exactly what I'm getting out of it. I'm not famous or anything like that and my reviews aren't done as part of a marketing campaign. I pay for almost everything I review; the only exceptions are freebies sent with orders or gifts from friends.

I choose what to review pretty much at random. I've got a hell of a backlog of samples to get through and there are a couple of things that can slow me down. I won't review anything while I have a migraine or while my sinuses are acting up. I occasionally have deadlines for fan fiction challenges and there are times when I just need to chill and do nothing but play City of Heroes/Villains.

I do participate in decant circles now and then and will try to review the Limited Edition scents in a timely manner so that they're still available when the post goes up.

* * *

New reviews soon, hopefully. I've had migraine issues and our a/c is still giving us grief. I'm crossing my fingers that the most recent fix holds.

The Madness to My Method -- Part Four

4. Indie vs Big Perfume Houses and Celebrity blends

There are several reasons I wear and review perfume from small, independent e-tailers as opposed to say, the latest from Calvin Klein or Aquolina. The first, and sadly most important reason, is money. The small independent e-tailers keep their prices pretty low and are generous about samples and freebies. Also, the active trading culture means that I can buy a sample of a BPAL LE, for example, for $3 or $4.

There's also the matter of variety. While the choices at BPAL in particular can be overwhelming, it's also a lot easier to avoid notes that don't work for you when you have twenty different blends with saffron in them, each just a little different.

And of course, there are a lot of blogs out there reviewing big name-brand perfume. And sure, there are a lot of people writing fan fiction and that hasn't stopped me, but in this case, I think that the Indie perfumeries get short shift. Although, if you're reading this and you know of any blogs that review the indie etailers, I'd love it if you commented with a link.

Finally there's an indie aesthetic/feel/attitude and a sense of community that I like about the small e-tailers. As I said way above, I view perfume as a modern form of alchemy and there's something I like about the idea of someone sitting down in their kitchen/extra bedroom/garage and making something because they like the way it smells and think that other people might like it too. And the sense of being part of the community, of actually being a part of the process, is really wonderful. We talk about Beth at BPAL, Fabienne at Possets, Astrid at Blooddrops and Dave and Brianne at Mythos Mixtures; these are real people who interact with their customers via forums and email.

Having said all that, I've got about five perfumes by perfume houses up on my wishlist at Amazon and next time we hit the mall, I might try some of them at Sephora. I have nothing against the big houses and I'd be happy to review the occasional Big Name Perfume if I could afford it, but my focus will continue to be on the Indie houses.

The Madness to My Method -- Part Three

3. What you won't see here and what you will.

I simply cannot wear any blend that includes a cream accord. Everything I've ever tried with one has simply gone awful on me, either plasticy and fake, or rancid and sour. Likewise, you'll rarely, if ever, see anything reviewed here that includes rose among the notes. Maybe 1 in 99 blends with rose work on me, the rest end up smelling like soap. It kind of breaks my heart because not only do a lot of lovely sounding blends include rose, but I also like the smell of roses.

Because of the rose thing, I tend to have to stay away from most florals. Jasmine's another tricky note, I can usually handle it if it's not the dominant note in the blend.

Mostly, my tastes are pretty broad. My favorite perfume family is the Oriental; I like things from pretty much every sub-category in the family. I also like some of the Woody family and some of the Fresh family, particularly the citrus group. I tend to stay away from things described as "clean/linen" because they usually smell like overly scented dryer sheets to me.

The Gormound category is tricky for me. I stay away from the excessively foody scents; I'd rather not smell like cake, cookies or frosting, plus all too often, there's that cream accord in there. I usually do like what I call the "drinky" scents (BPAL's Swank, which smells like a pomegranate martini, is a good example here). I don't want to smell like a liquor cabinet, but a touch of rum or a hint of the juniper in gin really works for me. I also like some fruity scents, although usually I like them to feel kind of grown up and not smell like strawberry lip gloss or Spiritual Sky Raspberry Oil.

I also like several of the traditionally masculine scents, particularly cyphres and fougéres.

Due to the fact that most of the indie e-tailers throw in freebies, I'll occasionally review things that fall outside my already broad tastes.

The Madness to My Method -- Part Two

2. My qualifications and experience.

I'd like to say something here like "I went to Grasse when I was 17 and a whole new world opened up to me" but the fact is, I went to Grasse when I was 17 and ended up with a horrible migraine that day.

So no, I don't have any formal qualifications. Since my initial foray into BPAL back in '05 and my more recent return to the fandom (and yes I really do think there's a fannish element to the indie perfume scene), I've slowly trained my nose to recognize certain notes and I'm also reading about perfume to train my brain.

What I do bring to the table is enthusiasm and a love of scents, all scents. I love that moment when the onions and garlic hit the hot olive oil and the moment when you know that you were right to quadruple the amount of vanilla the Tollhouse chocolate chip cookie recipe calls for. I love the way the air smells near the ocean and I love the way my old neighborhood smelled when Coffee Works was roasting a batch of beans.

I would like to learn more about the perfumer's art; because I find it a fascinating combination of chemistry, art, and luck. To me it's the modern alchemy, and whether the work is done in someone's kitchen or in a lab in Paris, it's its own form of magic. Hopefully, somewhere along the line, I can find a local course of some kind. I don't know that I want to make my own perfume, but I'd like to train my nose a little better.

But in the end, I don't really think I need to know all the nitty gritty details of the process. Sure, as a reviewer, I come with my own likes and dislikes, but so has every reviewer in the history of reviewing. So in the end, I may not know much about perfume (although I'm learning) but I know what I like. Hopefully I can write about it in a way that you'll like and find useful or entertaining.

The Madness to My Method -- Part One

So since I've gotten a little more serious about reviewing perfume, I thought I'd talk a little about my process and what you will and won't see here. Since this turned into a seriously long document, I'm going to do it a piece at a time.

1. How I test/review a perfume.

I always start with clean dry skin that I've moisturized with unscented lotion. After giving the bottle a sniff, I put a small amount on, either on my wrist or on the inside of my elbow. I'll sniff it right away and then let it dry down. After that, I'll give it a sniff at five minutes, ten minutes and twenty minutes in. If it's still morphing after twenty minutes, I'll come back to it at thirty minutes. I'll keep notes during the process and then after about twenty minutes to a half hour, I'll note the staying power (unless it started fading early) and the throw, with the caveat that the throw won't be as big as it would if I were wearing it to go out.

The review write up changes a lot depending on a couple of factors. If I'm reviewing something for both this blog and a community or forum, I'll try to use the community/forum review guidelines. Given my druthers, I'd rather not use a guideline/standard form type thing because perfumes can vary so wildly. If I'm reviewing a single/layering note then I'm concerned with the way it smells both by itself and layered. And with a simple two or three note perfume (Possets' awesome Girls Love Vanilla is a perfect example) there's often no real difference between how it smells at five minutes and how it smells at twenty. On the other hand, the more complex blends do morph quite a bit during that initial half hour and so I tend to get a little more into the timeline involved.

Finally, I'll occasionally wander off into the land of memory because, scent is such a powerful trigger. I like to think that stories and such like provide a personal note and are entertaining.