gwynhwyfar

In the vial, this blend is overwhelmingly rose. It's like a rose party (even more than Two-Five-Seven!) where the roses are running wild all over the place because there's no adult supervision. I don't get any other note at all because the roses are just totally out of control ... and it doesn't get much better on my skin. The only difference being on my skin makes is that after drydown, there's a bitter herbal managing to make its way out of the choking stranglehold of the roses.

I loved Thunderbird and mourned it's passing into the mist of obscurity. I was hoping for something with a similar feel in Thunder Moon. And hoping for the best, I ordered two bottles. Wow! I'm glad I did and I almost wish that I'd gone for three so I could gift decants of this out to some of my favorite men. This is for me, a very masculine kind of oil. Not that this will stop me from wearing it because what it ends like smelling like is ... I was rubbing against a nice smelling man in the middle of a thunderstorm. And there's nothing bad about that! This is ozone and that 'clean' feeling of the air after the rains, and along with all that, something that smells to me like a very good men's cologne (I didn't get the 'cheap department store' that some people did). What makes it even better is that over time, the cologne dries down and fades out and I get all storm, all the time. This has a decent throw and is fairly long-lasting, which is a Good Thing . Overall, absolutely a winner. Not Thunderbird, but still a gorgeous storm scent that I'm quite happily to have some of to wear and share.

I love the name of this oil. However, the scent itself wants to wind itself down into my lungs and strangle me. It's a rich, dark scent -- heavy pine tar and very dark musk. Very strong with a lot of staying power (I got some on my finger when I opened it and it took the loss of a layer of skin to get rid of it.) If you like strong pine scents, check this one out. This is definitely not for me.

*swoons* I am officially in love with all BPAL dragon's blood blends. This one is another winner for me ... this is all rich and spicy dragon's blood with a strong apple base, at least for me. I can't WAIT to age this and see what happens to it when it's a little bit older. I'm hoping that the other notes get to come out and play but even if they don't, I love the spice-sweet-resin with apples scent. This is definitely not a subtle blend, though.

I'm going to agree with this very enthusiastically. Thalassa for me is the perfect ocean scent with a hint of a delicate feminine perfume. Also ... Undertow, Jolly Roger and Bayou.

I sniffed this at ECWC in June but had run out of testable skin, so this was the top of the list to skin-test this time around. When I did so, there were others lingering around warning me that this went soapy. But it smelled so lovely so I risked turning into soap-freshness ... and ... wow. This is true to the bottle on me, and then some. It turns into a really rich sugar-sweet incense that is lovely and intoxicating. It kept getting better and better with time and by the time I went to bed, I decided that I might well need another bottle soon because this one might go away. There is a hint of florals but it's a light thing, under the incense, though I do think that there might be carnation in based on the incense and floral scents that I get. And my father really liked it, too, which is an amazing, amazing thing.

My vote would be for Boomslang, because the other two are stranglingly and nauseatingly sweet for me.

You mean that there's MORE coming??? OMG - at this rate I'm going to have to get a 2nd job! Beth recently confirmed somewhere (I think it's in the speculation thread) that the Carnaval will be extended past the January '08 date. And for something related ... the oils from CD that I love include: Thalassa Mme. Moriarty Xanthe All of the Snake Pit (with varying degrees of love) Thalassa is IMO the best aquatic/ocean scent from BPAL ever ... for me, this ends up smelling exactly like the ocean with the wind blowing over it and a faint hint of a delicate perfume. Mme. Moriarty and the Snake Pit oils are all delightfully resinous/spicy. Xanthe is a lovely sweet oil ... one of my favorite fruity/sweet scents right now. Yes, I will be entering mourning when the CD leaves town.

For me, things that put me in mind of a star-strewn sky and nighttime (Some more than others) ... The Moon (Tarot), Luna (Celestial), Bat (Salon), Bat-Woman (Salon), Chiroptera (discontinued), Urania (GC), Night-Gaunt (GC), Mouse's Long and Sad Tail (GC), Szepasszony (GC), The Lady of Shalott (GC)

I love mints and this was on my wish-list for a long time. Today was a hot day and I decided that it was a perfect day to give this a test-drive. In the vial ... I get lots and lots of bright, shiny, LOUD mint. A very blue-green and rather zingy kind of scent. Since I love mint ... I don't even pause before putting this on my skin, prepared to do a happy dance of minty joy. For about four seconds, that was what I did ... And then I-don't-know-what came up off my wrist and tried to strangle me. Instant headache -- If I were going to guess, I'd guess that it has pennyroyal in it because this is the same kind of headache that I get from pennyroyal. Sadly, I had to scrub the top layer of skin off and the scent is still faintly there. So it definitely has strong staying power. It's a shame that it wants to kill me.

In the vial ... this is a light, slightly sweet fruity scent. Kinda ozoney, kinda aquatic ... all around lovely. On my skin, it's yet another train wreck. In this case, I get something that I have no desire to smell like. Lemon Pledge. I'm not sure how it happened, and I had to sniff the vial a few more times after it turned, but it's pure furniture polish on my skin. Go figure ...

Le sigh. Eventually, I'll work out what combination of notes does this, but this beautiful scent ... is pure Johnson and Johnson baby powder once it's had some time to warm up on my skin. It never changed, either, staying a nice, strong baby powder up through until I showered. It is a gorgeous scent in the vial -- light and very spring-like. Sadly, my body chemistry doesn't like it. Ahh well.

*just stares in utter disbelief at her bottle* I had the opportunity to test the first incarnation of Blue Moon and quite liked it. I was looking forward to the return so that I could pick up a full bottle. The bottle came to be as a gift from a friend ... And the oil hates me. In the bottle, it is everything that I could ever wish for. Pure and delicious delight. Sheer, floral, sweet, herbal, chilly (all lunars have a chilly edge for me) and just amazing. On my skin? Herbal baby powder. Real baby powder, only with a slightly herbal element. This breaks my heart.

I'm going to second the suggestion that you look into another option besides skin application -- citrus notes generally just fade quickly but with something that isn't skin, they might hold out longer. I have a fair amount of luck with even applying it to my hair. Of course, re-application is always another option and in some cases, really the only one that can keep the oil strong all day long. I'll also suggestion Shattered -- it could be just me but I've noticed that for me, the grapefruit in that sticks around longer than in some other blends.

Eos would be my first and strongest suggestion. Though I will temper the suggestion with ... if you don't like jasmine, it probably won't be your friend. The jasmine is definitely there, though it's fairly well-behaved in Eos. My second would be Cottonmouth. I'm still waiting to see how it ages (though so far it's aging beautifully). The narcissus and calla lily hold their own fairly well with the red musk and patchouli of the Snake Oil. It's more spicy than you're going to find in a daffodil, but the spice suits the strongly scented narcissus quite well. For me, Kitsune-Tsuki's daffodil get's crushed into submission by the plum. Which is sad, becuase in the bottle, I quite like it. I just don't really want to smell like I was rolling around in fresh plums. *grins* I would also add the Limited Editions of Flower Moon (2005), Snow Moon (2005), and Pink Moon 2005 as potentials for finding your daffodil, especially the Flower Moon. My personal affection is for the paperwhite variety, but I definitely can relate to your love for those cheerful little yellow flowers. I hope that this helps!

Normally, I would suggest layering it on a nice, sexy man. And, of course, picking it up via transference. But that isn't especially helpful. My serious suggestions would be Snake Oil (because I'm finding that Snake Oil layers amazingly well with just about everything), Dragon's Milk (ditto as Snake Oil, with a different layering effect), Brisingamen (because the ambers should layer wonderfully and Brisingamen has some more feminine notes), and single-note ambers. I know that single note BPAL ambers are just about impossible to find but for this, you could pick up a SN amber from just about anywhere and experiment with different ambers. Good luck and have fun!

*big eyes* I think that I got an alien bottle of this. Because it smells nothing like my expectations and nothing like any of the other reviews. What I get is ... cake frosting. The super-sweet sugar-frosting that you get on birthday cakes for little girls when you buy the cake at the grocery store. It smells like that out of the bottle and it continues to smell like that on my skin and for a good, long time after. There's a hint of mint to it, but it's faint, like the birthday party is taking place in a garden where there's mint growing. While I have nothing against cake frosting, I prefer not to smell like it and so this bottle is going to be swapped out. With disappointment, since I was hoping for a sweet mint for the summer. Alien cake frosting! *grins*

This is lovely in the bottle. Spicy and floral and sweet and I really wanted to love it. For the first couple hours, I did. Especially that first hour. It was complex and rich and all the things that I could have hoped for. But then it turned to dust. Sweet dust, with a hint of baby powder to it. Off to the swap post it goes.

I adore the scent of apples, so I had to get an imp of this (and almost ordered a bottle unsniffed). As it happens ... I should have followed that impulse. This is a beautiful apple scent -- the apple is there, and strong, and unmistakable. But the apple is also warped and twisted by the combination of green and bitter herbs. For me, this is the apple of the Garden, with a snake lying twisted in the heart. The apple that dropped Snow White, with poison lurking in perfect flesh. The very image of sweet temptation with a bitter and poisonous result. This is a unique and delicious apple and one that I will wear quite happily. My only sorrow about this is that it fades down fairly quickly for me, so I'll definitely be experimenting with ways to keep it around. And picking up that big bottle.

This is delightful. Today is a chilly and rainy day and I reached for a cheerful bottle ... and nothing is cuter than that bottle label! And then ... the true delight came. In the bottle, this is all sweet. Luckily, that isn't what it stays. Once on my skin, I get a beautiful spicy floral with a hint of candy to it. I get a touch of white (light!) musk, and a little bit of something woody, all with that amazing 'cool' effect that all the lunacies have for me. This is a keeper for me, that's for certain ... I keep sniffing at my wrist because it's so cheerful and happy. Quite a contrast to the last Pink Moon, but still delightfully spring-time and light.

Red musk, vanilla bean, pomegranate, patchouli leaf and wild plum. This is one of the few CD scents that hasn't betrayed me by doing evil things upon my skin. I love Snake Oil (especially aged) so I was expecting good things from the card reader o'doom. Today being a kind of warm-but-grey day when I was stuck at inservice, I decided that it was a perfect day to take her out for a spin. I figured that I might be bored to tears, and surrounded by coworkers who were also bored, but at least I should smell nice. I was not disappointed. All day, I kept thinking 'what is that wonderful ... oh, it's still me ... yay!' This is all heady musk and vanilla and spicey loveliness. Definitely a keeper and when I see how she ages (and how much I'm using her), I might well need to get another bottle before the Carnaval leaves town (even if I'm hoping even more now that it stays around forever ...) On a scale of 1 to 10 ... this gets an 'ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh, yeah, come to mama, baby.' *giggles*

In the bottle: sweet tea. Like southern-style 'sweet tea' -- sugar and honey and tea-mint. Nice and interesting and I think 'this might be perfect for summer.' Then I put it on my skin and I am betrayed. Pure honey. It's a very nice pure honey but I have SN honey so I don't really need this to be pure honey. Off to the land o'swap it shall go, hopefully to be loved by another as it cannot be loved by me. Sniff. I was so hoping with this one ...

I agree with this. For me ... The Highwayman would be a good Jareth scent ... leather and cinnamon and vetiver and just a hint of florals, like a good gentleman's cologne ... or from the crushed innocence of the girls that fall at his feet. Other than that ... maybe Casanova, with that leather-anise-patchouli-lemon-vanilla vibe. For Sarah ... Jailbait. For me, that's like a little girl dressing up in her mother's clothing (candy and sweetness and the lingering base notes left from her mother's perfume that are all through the clothing that she's trying on) and for most of the movie, even at the end, that's how Sarah comes across. A little girl trying to be an adult, without really understanding that she's going to lose some things that are precious in the process.

*giggles to herself* That's a fair description of what I get from skin musk, but I also get a very similar thing from white musk ... Which makes me happy because I'd be rather sad if white musk had any sharpness to it. I just wish that there were more BPAL blends with the skin musk in.

I'll take a shot at it. It's a musk, but not a heavy scent like a red or black musk ... it has a lot in common with a white musk for me. It's light and clean and fresh. But it has that 'fresh-washed skin' scent to it, for me. For me, it's this hint of musky warmth that is just light and sparkling and gives the perfume a spring/summer feel to it for me. Okay, that went well. Did that clear up anything at all? *grins*