sarahmarie

This didn't smell remotely cough-syrupy to me. For me, it was a very sweet cherry smell - overpowering and first, but then the wood came out and evened things up nicely. My skin seems to like to bring the wood out in things, and it works out well here. It's a very dark, very red scent, and I picture dark cherries in a bowl, on a table of dark wood, and a red dress in a dark room. This is due in part to the lab's description, but the scent really does evoke those things - it matches up very well. After a little while, this turns almost creamy on my skin. It's still woody and I can still smell the sweetness of the fruit, but it goes deliciously smooth and just slightly sweeter. It's very regal - I would want to wear this when I need to feel womanly or confident, and it's not really a casual scent to me. I think this is such a cool scent. I can't say yet whether it's something I want a big bottle of, but I'm going to keep using the imp and see what happens.

This is a little late, but Aunt Caroline's Joy Mojo smelled like cotton candy on me...at one point. (It started off sort of strawberry, then went bubble gummy, then it was chocolate for a litlte while, then cotton candy. ) So that might be a good one to try, too.

The cedar came out most for me, as it seems cedar likes to do on my skin. That's okay though, I like cedar. There was a touch of incense to the woody smell though, and that made it seem far different than the other cedar-y scents I have tried. It smells sort of high and clear on me, if that makes any sense. It made me feel focused and centered, and while it wasn't necessarily my favorite scent to wear, it evoked a sense of calm and relaxation as soon as I put it on. I will definitely keep the imp for those times that I need to feel peaceful and centered. It isn't really me (at least, in the sense that I wouldn't want to wear it every day), but it is beautiful.

I like this a lot! It's very tart and red, and it almost smells juicy. It makes me want to lick my arm. This scent seems both grown up and playful to me. It's very sweet at first, but then it turns into the sort of tart that makes your mouth water. It doesn't seem to last very long on me, but only a couple of oils have so far. This is going on the list of big bottles I want!

This starts out momentarily too strong and sweet on me, but it mellows very quickly. At first, it makes me think of berries - maybe strawberry. Then it turned into something that reminded me more of bubble gum. After a little while of that, I started to think it smelled like cotton candy...and then, I was sitting in class, and I kept smelling chocolate coming from my wrists - but just vaguely, and just for a few minutes. It settles into a mostly cotton-candy like smell, with something vaguely herbal somewhere underneath that only peeks out sometimes, mostly when I sniff my wrists directly. I changed my mind many times about what this smelled like - but all of the smells were happy ones, and it got me through a really boring, frustrating class. At the end of the class last week, I felt annoyed and impatient, but this week, I felt much calmer. Maybe it was the Joy Mojo at work.

Sadly, I had the same experience as feycat. Black Cat on me was incredibly strong, sharp, and soapy. It gave me a headache, and was very difficult to wash off. It sounds like such a cool oil, I wanted it to work out - but sadly, my skin didn't want anything to do with this one.

I love this scent, and I haven't even worn it myself. My husband put some on when it came in my most recent order, and it smells wonderful on him. I want him to bathe in it. It's such an inviting scent. I hope this becomes available for purchase in a bigger bottle soon, because I want to get more for him as soon as possible. In the meantime, maybe I should try it on myself. But I had to post this review preemptively anyway, because I love it so much.

In the imp, I wasn't sure about this one, but the moment I put it on, my mind started to change. It went right from sweet and overpowering in the imp to crisp, bright, and sparkley on my skin. I don't really smell what I can definitively say is booziness - I smell a sort of sparkle, a tingle behind the fruit that I assume is the alcohol. The pomegranate smell...well, it's been a while since I've smelled a pomegranate, but it reminds me of one. It's a bit orangey too, but not very much (I don't like orange scents, but I love this). And it appears to have more staying power and throw on me than other scents do. My husband came home and smelled me (a common practice in the last few days, since i just got my first two orders) and told me I should wear this one all the time. So it gets his vote as well. I will be adding this to the big bottle list. It just smells so bright and happy, and I know I'm going to want it around.

In the imp: this smells very...floral to me, which is funny since most people here seem to be smelling either the tea or apple-ness. It's pretty and light, and it seems very perky. Wet: Largely floral, still, with a fresh sharpness. It's still very light and peppy, and I like it. Drydown: as it's drying, I can smell the apple that some people are smelling, but only briefly. Mostly, I still smell a tickley floral smell. I guess it's peony, though it's been a really long time since I've smelled a peony. After a while: hmm, it's still nice and light and pretty, but it does what so many scents with floral components seem to do on my skin - the flowers jump out, overpower everything and dry down in kind of a sharp way that makes me feel like sneezing. I like this one at first, but I don't like how to changes on my skin. I'll try it again and see if it improves, but this is probably not going to be a bigger bottle purchase for me.

Wow, I really love Wrath! At first, it was all cinnamon on me, but now the dragon's blood has come out too - I'd never smelled it before, but I knew it based on all of your descriptions! It's deep and sweet and really balances out the cinnamon. I can definitely see (smell?) the wrath in this scent - it's a very deep, seething kind of smell. But oddly, I also find it kind of...comforting. It's very warm and very sexy. I only put a little bit on because I was nervous about the cinnamon, but my skin is not burning and I can smell it quite easily, wafting up from my arm. It's great, and I think I will add it to the I Want a Bigger Bottle list!

I love Aizen-Myoo! I wore it to my first long day of classes today, and I kept noticing my pretty smell and feeling a little bit perked up. At first, I smell a lot of...mandarin orange. I don't know what's actually in this scent, but that's what I smell the most! Other notes come out as I wear it, and it changes over time - but not really in a way I can describe. What I can say about it is that it's bright and has a very sparkley sort of feeling. It's happy and light and fun, but it also has some depth and sensuality. It is fruity, but not in a way that screams fruit, if that makes any sense. I want a bottle of this one!

I guess this is Jack II, but I'm not really sure. In the imp, this smelled very buttery - my husband said it smelled like buttered popcorn, too. On my skin, the butter doesn't come out except in a whiff now and then in the air around me - it's not there at all if I sniff my arm directly. Most of what I get when I smell this on my skin is spice - pumpkin pie spices, very very strongly. I think I smell the pumpkin a little bit, but what comes through the most is a strong spice. I like this - it's warm and smells delicious. Unfortunately, it smells most delicious in the imp, and it doesn't seem to have much throw on me - but I really like it and would consider buying a bottle of it, eventually.

I just tried Alecto for the first time yesterday, and at least for the first little while, it smelled very Christmas-y to me. It fades to more of a straight cedar on my skin, but I love it and it still makes me think of winter, at least in a cozy-in-a-warm-house kind of way.

A-ha! Ladies and gentlemen, we have a winner! In the imp, I can pick out the olive underneath, but the cedar and the raspberry leaf seem to come through the strongest. It's a very fresh, woodsy scent even with the sweetness of the raspberry, and it's very nice. It was also exactly what I needed to smell after trying Bon Vivant earlier today and finding that after a while, the sweetness of that made me feel sort of headachey and icky. Alecto lifted me right out of that, and refreshed my nose. Aaah. Wet: It smells much like it did in the bottle. It starts out smelling a lot like Christmas to me (and by that I mean, woodsy everygreenish scent, I guess. ) My spouse and I sniff my arm repeatedly. After a while: It's dried down nicely, with the cedar becoming the scent that holds out the most. I can still smell the cedar being rounded out by the olive, and the raspberry has mostly faded away, leaving just a hint of...kind of a rich feeling, not quite sweet. And there's a very subtle, warm spicey scent that's very faint and sort of mingled with the cedar (I'm not sure what vetiver is, maybe it's that?) It doesn't smell like Christmas anymore. (I don't know much about describing perfume, so forgive me if I'm needlessly wordy!) All in all, this one is great. It's not strong now - it's been about 3 hours and I have to sniff my arm to smell it - but I love it. This is the first scent I will be adding to my future list of possible bottles. And I didn't even pick it out for myself - I got it in a swap (and thank you! ). Hooray for Alecto!

When I first opened this and put it on, I loved it to death. For maybe the first hour, it was wonderful. It started out very crisp and boozey, over fresh strawberry. The champagne soon went away and was replaced by the plasticky-strawberry scent others are describing - just like a scented doll. That lasted a few minutes, and then the champagne came back, raising my hopes. It was balanced, delicious, and it made me feel really happy! I was pretty sure I would want a bottle of this. But now it's been a couple of hours, and the plastic is back. It's strong and sweet and giving me a bit of a headache. I'm pretty dissapointed, because it started out so wonderfully, and it really did give me a rush of happy feelings! I seem to be having bad luck with my chemistry so far (although I have only tried 4 scents at this point, I'm awaiting my first imp order). I will try it again, as with all the imps, but I think I may end up swapping this one.

I *loved* this scent upon sniffing it in the imp. Oh! Grapefruity-goodness. When I first put it on, I can distinctly smell each of the notes. It starts out very grapefruity, but that fades to somewhere in the middle pretty quickly. Meanwhile, I can definitely smell the apple blossom, and that comes forward, mingling with the tea and getting just a little bite from the ginger. It is light, but it has snap. I love it. After it dries down though, things get a bit dicey. Unfortunately, it seems that my skin likes to take any floral scents (based on my very limited experience) and shove them forward right away, then sharpen and soapify them. The first time I wore this, that happened very strongly after about an hour (after going through a short phase of smelling like lily-of-the-valley, in a pleasant enough way). This morning though, I put it on again before leaving the house in the morning. I worked for 4 hours, running around in air-conditioning, and the scent faded a lot, but left a light, nicely mingled floral-grapfruit scent on my skin. *That* was nice. I'm giving it one more try right now, to see if it goes the pleasant light way or the soapy floral way. We'll see. Right now it seems stronger than before, which is kind of weird. All in all, if this one bombs, it's my skin's fault. I think this is an awesome fragrance, and I hope my skin is kind to it.

Oh, oops - I just saw that you already said you checked for similiarities. I don't know how I totally missed that the first time. Sorry about that

I'm new to this too and don't know too much about anything yet, really, but I wonder if those scents that you tried all had any common ingredients? If so, perhaps something in them specifically doesn't agree with you, and you got lucky enough to get a bunch with the same ingredient. Check the notes for each one and see if you see any similarities? Also, I found that one oil I got in a swap smells a little better on me if I cut it a bit with the vitamin E oil I use on my skin regularly. I just put on a dab and then slater the area with E oil, spreading it around. So it's possible that cutting it with something will change things...but I'm not sure if there's a better way. I'm sure someone else will have suggestions, though

I feel like I should write a review of this, and I've wanted to - but I honestly don't know what to say about it! I like it, but I'm having a hard time describing it. The first time I wore it, it really didn't agree with me - but I wasn't feeling well that day, so I tried it again and it was much better. Let's see: In the imp: I think this smells very good - floral, but warm and sort of...round. That's what comes to my mind for me anyway, that it's sort of a rounded scent and that's why it's not overwhelmingly floral to me. It seems to start in one place, and arch up and around, and come back to where it was in the first place - if that makes any sense. It's sort of a floral-spiceysweet-floral arch. On me: the first few minutes are what I like best when I wear this scent. It's still floral, but very spicey, warm and also sweet in a calming way. It's not cloying or sharp. I think I'm probably smelling the jasmine at this point, and the bergamot underneath. It's delicious. After a while: It's still very nice, but this is when I start to like it a bit less. It sharpens and takes a slight turn towards...something that makes me feel sneezy. It's still warm, and still not cloying, but it's a little too sharply floral and kind of soapy on me. I like it though, and I will definitely be using up this imp. It's not a dramatic change, but it's a bit of a shame anyway since I like the first few minutes so much!

I second recommendations for hydration, sex/orgasm, etc. Also, make sure you're taking a multivitamin and getting enough calcium. Also, for cramps - I don't know what you use, but using a reusable menstrual cup has made my cramps much easier to deal with. For some reason, a lot of women I know who use them say that they reduce their cramps too, or cause less cramping than tampons. Plus, cups are really just cool - they're better for you, the environment, and your wallet (once you buy it, it's good for up to 10 years). Check out divacup.com if you're interested. And ibuprofen works well for my cramps. My doctor said it was okay to take 3 or 4 ibuprofen at a time once in a while for really bad cramps, so if it comes to that, it's safe to do. When I do it though, I like to be sure to drink a lot of water and green tea, to help my body deal. Also, a heating pad or hot pack, especially one big enough to wrap around from back to front, sometimes works wonders.

This is my very first review - whoo hoo! I made my first orders recently, but won't be seeing those for a while, so I bought a couple of things from the swap boards to tide me over. This imp was generously included as a freebie (thank you!). In the imp: my initial impression was that this oil is *really* strong and kind of overwhelming. It smelled really sweet and the orange (a scent I'm not really fond of) was pretty sharp. I'm fairly sensitive to smells, and certain ones give me a headache - I worried that this would be one of those, but I decided to give it a try and see how it went. Wet - already better, the scent warmed up a lot and the orange died down a bit. Still a bit strong, but we'll see how it goes as it dries. After a while - I really like the warmth of this scent, and I like the way it ended up sweetness-wise - still sweet, but not sickening, softer and comforting. It's also a little bit spicey, which is nice. The sweet spiceyness is my favorite aspect of this scent. I'm afraid it's just too strong for me though, and I 'm still not crazy about the orange, which is still a bit sharp on my skin even though it's died down a lot. I think I'll give this one more try, but I may end up swapping it. I do like it, and I can certainly see great qualities in it, but I don't love it and I think it's probably better suited for someone else.