Diana

I'm not sure what to make of this one. I wore it all day, and I can still smell it on my wrists after doing makeup all day today, & washing my hands repeatedly. Putting it on, and really, all day, it was mostly sweet pipe tobacco and just the barest, tiniest hint of leather. But for some reason, my brain vacillated between interpreting it as tobacco and saliva. Yeah, I know. There is clearly something wrong with me. I think this is yet another Yule blend I am going to have to revisit in a few months. If it stays like it is, I really think I'll have to swap it. If the wood & leather & linen develop properly, I'll keep it.

I was a bit leary of this one, because most of the reviews likened it to cat pee + grape koolaid. Nevertheless, I really wanted to try it, so I took the plunge and ordered a 5mL bottle. Going on, it does have very strong grape notes. Sweet. There's almost a lemony burst, followed by a strong eucalyptus type of scent, which is most likely the juniper. It sometimes goes lemony on me for some reason. After the juniper dies down a bit, there is a bit of the oakmoss smell, and I think a bit of the sage. It's still a bit fruity, but a touch of earthiness. After a few hours, it gets a sort of floral tinge to it. It smells almost like fresh jasmine (not the usual BPAL jasmine). It is reminding me strongly of something else that I can't put my finger on. Something like modeling clay that I used to play with? I don't know. I really didn't get any civet at all, strangely enough! Maybe it's just an issue of aging, since this is a fresh batch of Puck, but only time will tell. Suprisingly, I really like this a lot!

Curiouser and curiouser. Milk and honey with rose, carnation and bergamot. This is one of the first 5mLs I ever bought, yet it's taken me over a year to review. Heh. This doesn't change at all on me, from wet to drydown. The throw is average; you can notice a scent, but it doesn't waft away in clouds of aroma. It does last a fairly long time as well. I put it on at noon and could still detect it when I went to bed at 2am. It's sweet; the milk & honey are soft, creamy & comforting, but not cavity-inducing. The carnation & milk are really the stars in this blend. I actual dislike carnations as flowers, but as a perfume ingredient, it's quite lovely and almost savory & spicy. The rose is barely detectable and adds a nice bump to the floral notes. If you are not a fan of roses, I promise, you may not even know it's there. I amp up roses a lot, and I didn't realize there were roses in there for the first 3 months I owned this! The bergamot is also a barely-there component, adding a very soft citrus note to the blend. Even if you don't like citruses, you may not realize it is in there, much like the rose. Bergamot isn't quite as sharp as lemon or lime, so it's not very jarring at all. This is what I call a BPAL classic.

This smells like hot chocolate. Nothing funky or weird or morphing with this one. It's yum.

I can't believe I haven't reviewed this yet. Wet, it's veeeerrrrry sweet, but as it dries it is tempered by the vanilla. It's pretty strong & has an excellent throw. Sweet, but not tooth-achingly so. It's pretty and everyone seems to love it when I wear it. =) A great oil to have on hand in standard rotation.

This reminds me a lot of Cerberus, but not as heavy. Not so much 13. I get more of an almost artificial, saccharin kind of orange from that. This is much zestier citrus. The mandarin (maybe in conjunction with the tea notes) is brighter and sharper than I'd expect; it smells more like lemon. The tea/tobacco combine as well, so it's brown-smelling. Not quite dry, but a bit acidic maybe? The cocoa kind of lurks and peeks out slightly, but I am not lucky to get a full blown chocolate aroma. It's unusual, but I like it.

I was very excited about this one, and yay, it is here! I slathered it on this morning and it was instant super cologne! Eieeee. The leather note morphed into something really weird & funky, just like Les Infortunes did on me. Like the smell of vinyl furniture in a heavy smoker's house. A few minutes later it started to smell like pizza sauce. I swear I'm not making this up! I went & reread the notes for this, then went & put more on. Suddenly & magically, it fixed itself. The second application didn't go all funky & it started to smell more like the notes. It became very woodsy & slightly spicy. The cedar & lavender & carnation were the most obvious at the wet stage. As this began to dry, the vanilla & musk notes took over for the flowers. NOW I am totally in love. This is like the bastard child of an orgy between Golden Priapus, Dee and Les Infortunes de la Vertu. Sexy and warm and woodsy and UNGH. Liquid sex in a bottle. I'll give you my crown of conquest, baby.

Disclaimer: you should check out the FAQ section for the lab and on this site; this may well already be covered. Alas, the 21-45 refers to business days, which means 4-9 weeks. This is always the case, not because of the holiday. In actuality, the Yule orders that were placed before 11/15 were all shipped out already, resulting (in most cases) a turnaround of only 4 weeks, which is rather fast for the lab. Hand-blended speciality oils + high volume = long waits. For most of us, it's worth it. Your 12/5 order most likely has not shipped yet. It has not even been 4 weeks yet. You will receive a "click & ship" notice when your order has been taken to the post office. You can also view the "click & ship" and the "I got my order" threads in this forum to see from which time frame people are receiving their orders. Hope that clarifies things for you. ETA: You are generally charged after you pay. If you ordered through CCNow, just ignore the status updates. They are misleading and don't actually reflect when/if your items has shipped.

I swear I must have either a mutant nose or mutant chemistry. Putting it on & in the bottle, it reminds me of "new" Samhain. Like watered down cinnamon. After a few minutes, it starts to get a weird, wet, funky fruit note to it. It smells a lot like the pear note that BPAL uses a lot, and which I dislike. It smells tart and a little overly sweet, and in combination with the cassia, it's a bit plasticky and sour. I'm guessing the culprit is the plum, which is odd because it usually agrees with my skin a lot more than this. After 2 or so hours, the sour-tart-sweet smell dissipates greatly, to my pleasure. I'm still not getting patchouli or tonka or tobacco (WHY NOT???). It seems to have gone a bit more perfumey, but not overly so. It's the red musk finally warming up and getting into the action. I like this stage a lot more. Still, there's a lingering sourness in the background, but it's not as bad as the wet & initial drydown stages. The jury is out on this one. I really want to love it, but the weird sourness is quite off-putting. I think I need to try it a few more times, and perhaps let it sit for a few weeks to see my opinion of it changes with some time.

In the bottle, it smells of orange blossom rather than oranges. There's a medicinal greenish note, which smells almost of rosemary, but it's the lavender. Putting it on, the orange starts to smell like real citrusy, juicy, orange. The lavender is more evidently lavender, but it still smells like the green part of the plant rather than the flowers. As this dries, it smells like gilded oranges and parchment. I love the initial drydown; I can't keep my nose off of my wrists. It's dry from the amber, but there's a hint of wetness. However, this doesn't have much throw, and it doesn't seem to be particuarly long-lasting, which is makes this rate less than it would have, had it produced a cloud of Clio-aroma around me. I'm a slatherer too, and it's very faint on me. I will definitely keep the bottle, and cross my fingers that the ingredients develop further with a bit of age.

Heh. Seems like the last 3 oils I've reviewed have been strawberry! In the bottle, I get glorious honey notes with sweet fruits. Slightly floral, but they seem to be all sweet top note florals. On the skin, it's mostly sugar + strawberry. It's stayed this way all day without much perceptable change. The honey seems to have disappeared. It's mostly strawberry candy/gum. There may be a slight vanilla-ish tinge to it, but honestly, my skin amps up sweet fruits like WHOA, so it's hard to really pick anything else out. Sweet and cute and very fun. =)

CDLXXXVI This reminds me a lot of something between Strawberry Moon & Bordello. It is very juicy, wet, bright fruits at first... strawberry, pomegranite, or possibly plum. Something red, I think. They are sweet sweet sweet with just a touch of tartness to them. After a while, the intensity fades a little and becomes a bit more creamy (which is why it reminds me a lot of Strawberry Moon). It's a little more rounded out now and while it is still sweet, it is now kind of sultry. This is a Bordello-ish scent. I think this is my favorite out of my Chaos Theory oils! (Last reviewed by Nachtwulf.)

This is one I keep meaning to try propery, and I have nothing to do today except wrap gifts and play video games, so if I stink, who cares? In the vial, it's earthy. Dirty. I'd think there was patchouli in here if I didn't already look at the notes. Putting it on: Whoa momma! Opium. Ow. Opium doesn't do anything bad on me per se, but it's STRONG. It is almost headache-inducing; very sharp & perfumey. (FWIW, I can't stand CK Obsession or YSL Opium, which both smells similar to this, IMHO). Drying: Still strong opium notes. The civet & musk peek out timidly every once in a while. I wish the musk note were more prominent, because it's sweeter and less heady & sharp. The civet? Actually I don't mind it. I was always afraid of it, but it is neither cat pee or poop or B.O. on me. It adds some depth to the musk & opium. A bit later... the opium is finally starting to settle down. The civet & red musk are pretty ok. Probably not something I'd wear often, especially considering the overpowering, perfumey opium, though. Hah. I'm a mutant. Everyone else hates it because of the civet, I am not super fond of it because of the perfume associations.

This smells like liquid candy strawberries. After a few hours wear, I can detect the cream note, but it's mostly on my wrists. In my shirt it smells very sweet strawberry with a touch of a tang to it, maybe the herbs that are in the mix. This is very cute & girly and slightly silly. I enjoy the youthful happy quality of it, and smelling edible is just a bonus.

In the bottle, the oil smells clean. Like freshly washed skin. Putting it on, the florals emerge, and turn into a soft white bouquet, mixed with a little vanilla, a little musk, turning into a sweet powdery smell. This actually reminds me a LOT of Morocco; they must share quite a few ingredients. This wears on for hours without fading or changing much. It's a soft vanilla musk, sweet without being foody or cloying. It's very lovely and soft and pretty. It actually has some qualities that remind me of Vanilla Fantasy/Vanilla Lace (my friend's staple perfume)... vanilla with just a hint of something else. I'm glad this came back so I could get a big bottle. =)

I love the "masculine" scents. I almost prefer them at times. The only one that hasn't worked on me was Casanova, but everything else has been fantastic. =)

In the bottle: super peppermint. wet, on the skin: super peppermint. nose tingling peppermint. it smells just like candy canes. after about 20 minutes, the peppermint fades, quite a lot, but it is still detectable. there is a sugary-almost vanilla like note that comes out, and this takes over as the main component as the mint fades. i don't think it's vanilla, maybe a light musk or a sugar musk or something else that i'll just make up, but it's sweet and cool and yummy. it really keeps this from being a super kiddie type scent. i really like this a lot!! ETA: I let my aromatherapy friend sniff at this one (she loved the name of it, and had to give it a whiff). She thought the thing I thought was not-quite-vanilla was possibly tonka. FWIW.

Wet, this is reminiscent of Kunstkammer. It has luscious, bright, juicy orange notes. As this dries, and wears throughout the day, the orange is still there, but just lending a juicy fruity note to the cacophany of floral notes. Floral notes that I actually like! This reminds me quite a lot of Blood Rose, because of the wet, lush rose notes, and a bit like Bearded Lady because of the vanilla note. The vanilla doesn't really stand out, but it just lends something to the mix. It's sweet and pretty and yummy. Another win from the Demon in my View series!

The Click & Ships are emails that you get to the account from which you sent your order. They are sent when your package is all bundled up & taken to the Post Office. Once you get one of those, it's usually 2-10 days until you get your order. Other than the notification that your package has been shipped, the Click & Ship info is essentially useless because the Postal Service never updates the information until after your package has been successfully delivered! I'd say if you haven't gotten a C&S yet, you should be getting one soon. I've personally got 5 outstanding orders! It can be quite a wait, but it's well worth it IMHO. Don't be afraid to ask questions! You might also want to check out the BPAL FAQs area of the forum for more detail.

In the bottle, it is very minty. Frost Moon minty. Wet, on the skin, it's very very simliar to Frost Moon. Cool, pale mints and no sweetness about it. As this dries, there is (on me at least) an upsurge of a very cold aquatic notes. I don't like aquatics very much. Luckily, after about an hour, the aquatic tones down and the mint comes more into play. At one point this smelled decidedly dusty, but now it's all cold mints with a slight pale flower note somewhere in there. I am enjoying this. It's a cool scent, and I bet this would be fabulous in the hot of summer. Not my favorite mint blend ever, but it's nice.

In the bottle it smells exactly like cream cheese frosting. YUM. On, it smells like angelfood cake, sugar, frosting and more YUM. My sister asked who sprayed vanilla when I was at my parents' house yesterday. My brother said I smelled like cream soda. YUM. Either way, this is light, sweet, foody heaven. Definitely in my top 3 of Lunacies. YUM. IF YOU HATED IT, SEND YOUR BOTTLES MY WAY, KTHX.

This is an odd duck for me, and slightly difficult to describe. There's just something inherently difficult about trying to describe something as intangible as scent, and this one is is harder than usual, because I don't have a frame of reference for what I'm perceiving. The orange blossom & vanilla are very strong when this is wet, but as it dries, the vanilla becomes the dominiant note, but with a weird edge. The orange blossom disappears after about 15 minutes on me. This reminds me greatly of the first BPAL I ever tried, Blood Kiss, which I hated (and now I'd like to retry a year or so later, as I've grown to appreciate some of the notes a bit more since then). The vanilla has that same quality to it in this. I thought it was perhaps the poppy (in BK), but it must be something else, since Hunger has no poppy listed. The vanilla has an almost dusty, musty smell to it. Maybe it is the black narcissus? I'm not sure exactly what notes go into making all this happen, though. This is not foody, floral, nor particularly sweet. I can't really tell if I like it or if I'm just ambivalent towards it. I don't mind smelling this way, but I don't know if this is something I'd purposely try to smell like often to warrant an actual bottle. I think I can make out alright with the occasional imp that lands in my packages. Still, I cannot stop smelling my wrists or tucking my head into my shirt!

In the bottle, it's sweet, slightly buttery. There's a note that smells vaguely of frankincense, but I think it's actually pine. Wet: The pine note becomes more prominent. The sweet buttery note is very strong. After a few moments--> drydown: The pine settles in. It remains very faint in the background, but it's not all that noticable. The buttery smell softens. It isn't as strong as it is in any of the GC catalog oils, and it's sweet, almost caramel like. Maybe a hint of vanilla. I can actually still smell this the next morning. It is really nice & comforting. And I like it SO MUCH more than last year's version, which went all wonky, nauseating syrup on me. If you like foody ones, grab this one up before it's gone.

In the bottle... roses. Shocking, I know. They smell a bit velvety or dry. Putting this on, wet... Roses and witch hazel (??!!!?). Honest to god, it smells like witch hazel mixed in. Kind of weird and slightly unpleasant, but not totally gross. This only lasts for a few moments. Initial drydown, within an hour... this starts to turn into a pure rose scent. Tea roses, perhaps. The kind that are strong & heady with a slight citrus note to them. Now I'm wondering if I should bother with this. It smells like plain roses, but not so spectacularly realistic like Rose Red. Of course, as I consider that statement, it morphs more. The roses have softened, and a dry base note has emerged. I cannot for the life of me put my finger on a specific component, but it is dry, slightly woodsy or herbal note, or maybe a resin. NOW I love it. Damn it. I'm definitely getting more of this before she goes away.

Putting this on, it is almost a dead ringer for Skadi. It has very similar piney-juniper notes, crisp and cool smelling. After about 5 minutes there is an eruption of a citrus, which I also get with Skadi, but this is stronger. Grapefruit, possibly. There is a brief "clean/green" stage where it almost smells like it had some Embalming Fluid added to the mix. Now that I've had it on for a few hours, it's still crisp & green with a slight citrus bite to it. There is also something else in the background... a musk perhaps. It has an almost creamy quality to it, not unlike Dorian's white musk note. I was sad that there was no Skadi this year, but Snow Bunny actually surpasses my expectations and has eclipsed Skadi as one of my favorites! I'm definitely going to stock up on this one. I absofuckinglutely love it.