gwynethr

I'm not getting much, or any, blackberry, which is a bummer. I've been looking for something with blackberry and a hint of floral to replace my beloved and long-gone Glasgow, but this is mostly just lilac. Every so often, I'll get a faint hint of blackberry, but it's gone instantly. The lilac is very powdery, to me, but I'll probably keep this and hope maybe it settles down a bit. Definitely not what I'd hoped for.

I keep forgetting that the fig means fig leaf, not fig meat, and I really hate the scent of fig leaves--my arms itch just thinking about it, because I have such an intense bad reaction every time I have to cut back my fig tree, which is often. I end up miserable and scratching for days. Fig meat, on the other hand, is a fave like in Treat #2. So the sharp green fig leaf in this is really unpleasant, just as a note and mentally. Fortunately, it goes away fairly quickly on this, so I'll probably keep it because the coconut and vanilla are warm enough to balance out that unpleasant green note. It doesn't last long, though, which I wish the smoked vanilla and coconut parts would.

I thought for sure this would be a slam-dunk for me, but it's not at all. Something's off for my nose in the bottle, wet, and for quite a while on dry down. I'll let it sit and age for a bit, but I'm really wishing I'd used my limited funds on a different Trois instead.

I hoarded my decant for years, which had gone from a scent I liked to one I adored with age, so I wasn't entirely sure what to expect. But I was so excited to see it again after finally using up the last of my decant. It isn't quite the same as I remember it, I'm not picking up the rice pudding or really anything specific at all except some sharp spices, but it's definitely not as jarring and disappointing a change as my beloved Hanerot Halalu was this year, and I'm reasonably certain this will age back into that scent I like. I think it's there underneath the sharpness. On me it has a lot of throw, and I think it lasts about as long as the original version. I'm really looking forward to seeing how it ages, and if the sharpness mellows out to become that wonderful sort of kitchen at Christmas, winter hearth scent I remember.

I had a bottle of one of the original iterations (back in the cobalt bottle) that I paid a ridiculous sum for because it was HTF, but when I got into BPAL it blew me away so much in the sniffie someone gave me, I had to have it. It was worth it--I adored it, and then perimenopause hit; I'd never smelled anything but snow and that faint hint of florals, so to finally understand what people meant by "plastic" was so devastating. I finally swapped my bottle away, broken-hearted. After a while, I'd see it show up on the Yules each year, and think about trying it again, but menopause has changed my chemistry so much it didn't seem worth it. With two fragrances making a reappearance this year I wanted, I figured I'd try again, and I'm so glad I did. In the bottle, it's the snow and flowers I remember. When I put it on, I thought oh no, plastic again. That was stupid to try. And then on dry-down, it morphs into the coconut smell, which I'd never smelled before. And then about 15 minutes later, it's settled into snow. I'm so, so happy. It has an intense throw to me that my original bottle didn't, and it lasts all day on my skin, even longer on my clothing where it touches. In fact, I still have yesterday's on my cuffs and collar! As much as I miss the beautiful cobalt bottle, I'm so glad to have almost the same Snow White as the first one I fell in love with, and that I can wear it once more. This is such a beautiful scent.

Oh, this is just devastating. I've been out of the buying/posting loop for a long time due to finances and such, but I got so excited when I saw two favorites were on this year's list after so many years, and Hanerot Halalu is one of my top 3 scents. But this version smells awful to me. It's soapy and way too perfumey and there's no smoke or beeswax at all. The original version is so wonderfully smokey and beeswaxy, and there was this almost orange-like note in it (I remember someone else looking for the first batch of HH, too, at the same time I was, because we both coveted that faintly orangey smell, and the later batches didn't seem to have it). Ugh, it's just staying soapy on me no matter how long I let it go. There's just no candle-smoke smell at all. It does have the throw and seems to last as long as the original, I'll say that. I feel like I threw money away, and now my hoarded bottle will run out without a real replacement.

Something here is going powdery here on me. Of all the four scents I got from my fab fairy, this was the closest to actually working on me and not going weird with my out of control chemistry. But that powdery note bothers me. I'm not sure if it'll go away with aging the bottle, or aging me, and I probably should hang on to it, but it seems like someone else might want it more. It's a sexy, exotic scent. Rosewood is just such a fantastic note, I hope maybe there will be more scents in the future with it.

This one actually made me cry. All four of the scents that my lovely fairy got for me didn't work, but of all of them, this was the one I wanted most. Every. Single. Note. is something I love, and I thought for sure all of them together would be heaven. It's nice, and I could almost see using it in something that might not touch skin so that my crazy menopausal chemistry wouldn't affect it, but since it's so popular I feel like someone who loves it should be able to enjoy it.

Out of the four Bat's Days that my lovely fairy got for me, this was the worst, even though all the notes would usually be perfect for me. But it smells, wet, like perm solution (seriously, I was instantly transported back to the early '80s when I used to get perms) and that is not a good thing. I thought it would go away when it dried, but it stayed like that the whole time. I tell you, menopause sucks. It ruins all the favorite notes!

My wonderful fairy got me four of the Bat's Day bottles, all of which I was certain would be perfect for me, and none were. This was one of the closest, but there's something underneath it that's not working with my absurd menopausal chemistry. It's metallic, almost, but not a good metallic. So sad that I'm going to have to rehome them.

Dammit. I bought a bottle of this unsmelled from someone, thinking it would be a perfect scent for me, but it's kicking up the rose so much, and there's something powdery in here. At first it smelled just like old-school Jergens hand lotion, but then it becomes very rosey powdery. I can smell the rosewood but it's buried under the powder. Not sure what to do with this one now.

Dark vintage musk enrobed in a velvet black swirl of plum, precious resins, opium tar, sweet incense, and Nepalese amber. Rats. Nothing but nasty powder and old lady soap on me. I thought this would be my holy grail, given the notes. Menopause sucks, I tell you. Stuff that should work doesn't, stuff I would never want to wear smells good, and then it changes around the next day. Stupid chemistry.

I was really surprised by how much I liked this, and wishing I had bought more. I actually don't know what I smell here -- I can't say I am able to pick out any one note, or even identify the melange of smells I get, but I like it! I wish now that I'd got more decants -- I was iffy about a lot of them, and they've all turned out well, so now I wish I'd experimented a bit more. This one is the front-runner, though.

Got this as a frimp, and didn't know what the notes were: one sniff and MELON. There's a bit of mint in there, and the faintest whiff of citrus, but they're way behind the melon. Usually that's a smell that makes me queasy in scent, but it seems to work fine with the other notes to ground it, I guess. What a nice surprise!

Always wanted to try this, and was glad the resurrected came up, but wow, this is not my kind of scent. It almost makes me kind of queasy. I seem to have weird foodie scent relationships.