Omorka's Lair

Made an order from Nature's Garden for some mixed perfume oils; most of their blends are meant for candle-making, but they mark which ones are safe for stuff like soaps, personal scent blends, body lotions, etc. Unusually for me, none of these are single-note scents, but there are some things (like the ozonic scents) where those just aren't available for home perfumery.

( I talk about some of them behind the cut )

Anyway, it's amusing that they've decided to take advantage of . . . the election year. No, seriously, they have three signature scents made up specifically for the Presidential election. It will surprise no one that 'Democrat' is the green scent (although I was wrong, it doesn't list patchouli as a note), and 'Republican' is the one with an apple note? (And why do they all have citrus top notes?) I wonder what their Green and Libertarian scents would be like?

Got in another batch of essential and perfume oils:

( List behind the cut )

All in all, a pretty good batch. Sometime in the next couple of weeks I'm going to mix up some sampler batches. Anyone have any requests? I know I promised lady_valkyrie a leather-and-rose scent; anyone else?

A few weeks ago, starcat_jewel reviewed BPAL's Phantom Calliope scent (one of their Carnival Diabolique scents), noting that on her it ended up smelling like cherry cough syrup. From what I've seen from a few reviews posted around the web, that seems to be a fairly common reaction. I wanted to try it, because fruit scents tend to fade quickly on me, while the base note, patchouli, is one of my favorites, and verbena usually "pops" on me nicely. I thought I might get a richer, less fruity drydown from it. So I borrowed it from her, and I tried it on after getting out of the shower today.

In the bottle: Very cherry, with undertones of something woody, and . . . cinnamon. There's no cinnamon in the ingredients list! How odd.

First on: The cherry goes subdued as soon as it hits skin, which I thought it might. This is a very 'hot' scent. Partly that's the cardamom, which is the top note right now, very spicy. Right underneath it is something woody, possibly cedarwood, and then underneath that is pure cinnamon. There has got to be a typo in the ingredients, here, because I don't smell blackcurrant at all - they must have meant "cassia" (aka Vietnamese cinnamon) rather than "cassis" (aka French blackcurrant).

Ten minutes later: The cassia is the top note now, with the cardamom wafting above it like smoke. There's no cherry left now, no fruit note that I can smell at all, and the verbena is present but overpowered. There's that woody note again, and now I can smell the pachouli underneath it all. Very spicy, very heavy. I think my skin is starting to tingle.

Fifteen minutes after application: Holy cRaP I'M ON FIRE GODSDAMN IT!

At this point I had to wash it off; there were huge angry red splotches on my skin everywhere I'd applied it. I'm now guessing that the 'woody' note is cassia bark, although there still might be an unlisted wood as well. I'm rather disappointed, because I've never had a BPAL blend do that on me, and because it was actually smelling pretty good, if insanely spicy, before the 'Diabolique' aspect decided to go all fire and brimstone. I'm pretty sure that was the cassia, too - skin irritation is a known issue with me and cinnamon oil, although it's not usually that bad. (There are still large pink circles in the bends of both my elbows where it was, and I washed it off over half an hour ago.)

So, yeah. That's two of us this blend doesn't work on, for distinctly different reasons.

I think I finally found out what "red musk" is. Seeing it in so many BPAL descriptions confused me. But it appears to be another name for civet musk (as opposed to deer musk). Naturally, most perfumers use a synthetic version now.

The other possible option is that it's the essential oil from the musk rose, but I think they'd probably call that rose musk, wouldn't they?

(Note to self: the essential oil you know as "rock rose" is actially called labdanum.)

I'm going to be doing far too much at the last minute tomorrow evening, again. Yech.

Did manage to put together a new oil blend, though. It's vaguely inspired by BPAL's Blood Amber.

1 scant t vanilla-infused jojoba oil (base)
9 drops amber (artificial)
5 drops sandalwood
3 drops dragon's blood (artificial)
3 drops light musk (artificial)
2 drops clove

Shake, apply. !Yow! Essence of Beltane . . . needless to say, I like, although all the artificial elements dissipate on me over about three hours - after that, it's sandalwood and a little bit of clove and vanilla, with just the faintest hint of the dragon's blood.

Off to mix up a batch of my usual patchouli/ylang-ylang/jasmine blend for day wear, then folding a few sarongs, then off to bed - I might actually get more than six hours, for once this week.

Got a chance to play around with a couple of my "inspired by" scents today. For a change of pace, I'm using these tiny little amber glass bottles with these itty bitty corks; makes the whole think look cuter than it really is. (Maybe "chibi" is the word I'm looking for here. Chibi corks. Sounds about right.)

( Phantom Garden )

( Triple Heat )

So, one qualified success and one "It's not working as-is, but maybe I can make something of it." Not too bad, I guess.

So after my last few putterings with the essential oils (and a few perfume oils as well), I gave in and spent about another $100 on perfumery stuff.

The first shipment came in today - myrtle oil and rose absolute.

The myrtle oil is interesting - a very green scent, almost like sap. I'm debating using it and frankincense as a substitute for oakmoss in some of the spring-green scents - not because I don't like oakmoss, but because it's so sticky.

The other, though - normally I'm not that fond of rose, but this is just MMMMMmmmmmmmm. This is clearly the real stuff, and it's goooooood. (It's also very strong; I'm going to have to remember not to put more than three drops of it into anything.)

I have a larger batch coming in hopefully early next week. Nothing quite as interesting (or expensive!), but some new stuff, including some perfume oils. Yeah, yeah, I know, and I agree, but there are some things I really, really can't justify getting as absolutes. I can't sink $40 into something I'm only going to use twice.

I also need to think about getting some cheap silver pendants and semiprecious donut beads from Fire Mountain to make thank-you presents for my Mu Alpha Theta officers. (Don't know what I'm going to get for the boy. Maybe I should take up hemp-knotting and make him one of those trendy little surfer chokers.)

Another one based on one of starcat_jewel's descriptions:

Namaste:
1 t plain jojoba oil for a base
9 drops sandalwood oil
7 drops patchouli oil
5 drops cedarwood oil
7 drops jasmine oil
5 drops lemongrass oil
3 drops rose scent oil (artificial)

My comments: MMMMMMMMmmmmmmm. I've been wearing this off and on for a week, and I'm really enjoying it. Sensual and floral without leaping out and yelling "hey! flowers!". The woods make the undertones almost incensy. The lemongrass is a little overwhelming on first application, but it starts getting along better with the jasmine after the first ten minutes. The rose is so subtle it just sort of burnishes the jasmine; now I really want to try it with proper rose otto!

I may try this with frankincense instead of the patchouli and a dash of clove on the top, too - to see if I can bring out the incensy richness a little more.

I have tomorrow off; I'll try and do something vaguely resembling a real update then.

. . . Well, not really tinctures. Oils. But it alliterated.

Went to the Twain tournament today. We were supposed to take 30 students plus an alternate. 5 (including the alternate) flaked on me, although three of them were at least together enough to let me know ahead of time. This morning, I only had 23 on the bus. Normally, this would mostly be irritating, but the missing ones were our Salutatorian-To-Be (who is also my Mu Alpha Theta President this year), China Doll, and Hyper. The students flipped out their cell phones and began punching numbers. ( Remainder of the day behind the cut )

( Puttering in perfumery )

Two recent creations, one a variation on the other:

Whitehall:
base: 1 scant t vanilla-infused jojoba oil
9 drops patchouli
6 drops jasmine
8 drops gardenia perfume oil
4 drops carnation perfume oil



Temple Heights:
base: 1 scant t vanilla-infused jojoba oil
7 drops patchouli
6 drops sandalwood
5 drops jasmine
7 drops gardenia perfume oil
4 drops carnation perfume oil


Interesting. Whitehall seems to linger on my skin longer; after a while, all I can smell of Temple Heights is the sandalwood, while Whitehall keeps both the patchouli and the carnation, and a little bit of the jasmine, for a long time.

I can't find a wisteria scent oil at all, much less one that I like, so Waverly is going to have to wait. I had found, a long time ago, a magnolia that I liked, and if I can find it again that'll become part of Snowdoun. Rosedale will have to wait until I can afford true rose absolute, as this fake stuff is gettimg me down.

Hmm . . . if I name all my own blends (the perfume ones, not the magickal ones) after antebellum homes, I'm going to have to pick up some Pilgrimage stuff . . .