Iceblink

Have you ever been sitting outside on a sunny day, enjoying the lovely scent of dandelions and thinking about how fresh and green it smells, and then some jerk drives by and throws an empty beer can out the windows and it lands in your dandelions and then all you can smell is stale beer? I hate it when that happens.

Wow this is woody. REALLY woody. The vanilla and tobacco are mmm lovely in it but the woods are making it feel really...raw? This needs some aging; it's going to smell amazing given a little time. Manly, yes, but I like it too.

One day I wore Upa Upa and kept thinking "Mmm, Sed Non Satiata sure smells good today" and then remembering that wasn't what I had on. Which is weird because the notes are completely different. I can't explain it.

The vodka made me nervous, but I couldn't smell it, so Te Po is a hit. The almond reminds me of almond biscotti, and the cherry is a very pink frou-frou maraschino. The citrus notes keep it from being too sweet. This smells more like a virgin cocktail than something with actual alcohol in it. I'm quite pleased that most of the Tikis are so fruity and fresh without making me smell like a bar! My only bitch about Te Po is that my wrists look a little irritated this morning from where I put it on last night--the cherry, perhaps? I'll have to be careful with it in future.

Tiki Queen starts off as tropical flowers (think Hi'iaka). Nice enough, but the tropical flowers usually don't work on me, so I was ready to write the Queen off when she suddenly morphed into the Sweet Tarts/Smarties candy blend so many are getting. Wow! It's a womanly candy, though, not a little-girl one, and the florals are still backing it up to give it some depth. Sexy and sweet. I love it, and it also lingered on my skin a bit after showering. Long live the queen!

Upa Upa smells more like a cake than a drink--the rum is there but in a very baked-good sort of way, and the pineapple! Oh, the pineapple is to DIE for! It ends up as a slightly spicy, slightly boozy, very fruity pineapple dessert and it's so good I want a slice of whatever it is right now. Long-lasting and strong.

I got no gin from Golden Wave, just tart guava and passion fruit. (I'm not complaining, mind!) This is a great tropical fruit cocktail, but it's got zero throw on me and didn't last. A shame, because it's really pretty and I can't think of any other BPALs like it off the top of my head.

YUM. I love blueberries and I knew I'd love this. It's boozy with the gin in there but the blueberries are prominent and so wonderfully fruity! I was only sort of eh on 21 but this is a great blend. It's not too sweet like some fruity oils are and is very refreshing. Good staying power too. I hope we'll see more blueberry blends down the road.

The surprise hit of the Tikis for me. This smells like X-rated suntan lotion...dark, dry coconut, a hint of lemony zing, and oh my god, that black musk is absolutely filthy and I need to try more blends featuring it. This has amazing staying power--I showered (with soap!) and could still smell it on my arm afterwards! Gorgeous. I didn't get an overly manly vibe from this. Will be wonderful on hot summer days!

I was prepared to love this most of all the Tikis (raspberry!!) but BPAL is always full of surprises. The top note/wet stage of Rangoon Riptide was so off-putting on me. It smelled like burnt...*something*...something not good. After about 5 minutes it became a delicious raspberry candy. Now that's more like it! It faded really fast, though, and my skin was a little itchy where I'd dabbed it, so...glad I tried it, but I think I'll stick with Lady Macbeth for my raspberry fix.

Sparkly grapefruit punch! I have mixed luck with grapefruit; it sometimes really irritates my skin. But I wanted to try this just because it sounded so nice. Since it's nearly pure grapefruit on me I'm steering clear of a whole bottle, but it is very nice and tart and sunny. Not much throw and fades quickly.

Maiden is a very pretty, very basic milky pink. It's polish for when you don't want to look like you're wearing polish. If I knew a little girl who wanted to paint her nails I'd give her this! It also has a sorf of Sixties mod look to it, which I like. Very nice!

Oooh, spicy tea! This is making my skin tingle though which is not a good sign. Smells very cozy and warm, though. I'm about to go work out and I've been quite sluggish for the last couple of days so maybe this'll energize me.

Wrath is all sweet dragon's blood and cinnamon on me. Maybe a hint of the clove in the background. I'm terrified to dab any more on because of the cinnamon and pepper, but if you're not sensitive to those it does smell great.

Clean, manly soap. Would smell great in the shower, if you were...um...sharing that shower.

Lemony green tea. Like Embalming Fluid, there's something in here that makes my head feel funny if I sniff it too much--but it is very light and refreshing. I may need this when the mercury hits 100.

This smells exactly like the notes--salty, leathery, woody...but why's the rum gone?? Very masculine and not something I'd ever wear, but what a great concept for an oil and how wonderfully executed it is!

Mmm. I smell lemon, tangerine, and rose, but this isn't a sweet scent. Perhaps the parsley is giving it a little kick of green that's keeping it from going all fruity? It's light and summery and will probably be lovely on a hot day, because it's not overpowering at all. Hard to describe, really, but nice! Edited after wearing this all day: this has GREAT staying power. Rose and lemon both tend to fade quickly on me but this blend lasted all day long. Really beautiful!

There's a strong plastic note to this when wet (Hey! So that's what everyone means when they say a blend smells like plastic!), underneath a soft, sugary sweetness. The plastic disappeared after about 20 minutes (hooray!) and I was left with just the sugar...it's like fluffy powdered sugar something, very very sweet and light. Not much throw but it's staying around for a decent amount of time.

I was starting to think I was nuts, getting such a perfumey, musky note in this instead of pure custard as I expected. Looks like, from other reviews, that I'm not alone. This is gorgeous! It is eggy at first, but not boozy like Egg Nog is--more of a creamy eggy sweetness. But on the drydown that muskiness comes out and...well, it ends up smelling a LOT like Possets Madame X on me. This is quite surprising to say the least. It has great staying power and quite a bit of throw, which, again, I wasn't expecting based on Egg Nog. I think this would sell like crazy if it ever comes back in any form.

Mint with that sharp fresh Snake Pit base underneath...more of an herbal mint than the candy mint of the Lick It oils. No matter what the mint it disappears on me faster than you can say "What's that smell?", though. An hour later and this has a faint drydown of sweet green tea. It'd be nice if it stuck around longer.

I needed to fill out an imp pack, and since Embalming Fluid gets mentioned a lot as a perfect hot weather scent and I live in the south, I thought I'd give it a whirl. Wet, it's lemony cleaning fluid. Dry, it's a sharp, very very very green green tea (the aloe must be what's giving it that extra green kick). This does feel like it would be just what you need on a hot hot day, although it's so sharp right now I can feel it in my sinuses!! I think I'll put this imp away until the first 100 degree scorcher and by then it should be aged a bit and just what I need!

Sharp, green orange blossom, with something sweet in the background and some other floral notes in. This must be the jonquil and white rose. This smells a lot greener than I expected. Very refined and spring-like--this may be just what I need in a few weeks once we're past winter for good this year!

You think you've tried every rose blend that might work on you, and then the lab lobs a frimp of Seance at you. All righty, I'll try it. In the imp Seance smells just like freshly cut roses and it is very pretty. As it dried I got thick, sweet note coming in--the hazel? Whatever it is it smells absolutely yummy with the rose. I don't get woods from this until it's been dry for a while and then it's still very faint. The rose isn't going soapy, either--yay! Really like this so far and I never would have considered trying it, so thanks, Lab!

In the bottle/wet on skin: musky sugar, lighter than Sugar Skull but in the same family. As it dries: I can see why this was compared to Midnight on the Midway by some at Will Call. I'd also put Fairy Market in the same sugary/sweet floral category. Sugar Moon, however, has that lovely cool blue musk in it instead of that green note in Fairy Market. I can pick out the orchid, but the other notes have yet to make themselves known. Overall, though, Sugar Moon is very pretty and delicate in a way that other BPAL sugar blends aren't. It's a lovely way to segue from the heavier blends of winter into something lighter and more airy for spring. Beautiful! Edited: this morning, the strawberry and violet are blooming a bit more. I think this blend is going to be out of sight with some age behind it.