kawaiiferreto

I decided to wear Ichabod Crane for Thanksgiving. I thought it was an appropriately warm and comforting scent for the holiday.

Wet this was warm, spicy, and earthy, very strong galangal and sweet dirt. As it dried it got even better. The galangal calmed down a little bit, and the cedar warmed up. This is comforting warm earthy woody spice. I like it.

Lightly peachy floral. It's nice, but it also doesn't stand out enough to me for me to remember to wear it out of my other BPAL smellies.

Wet this is pretty overwhelmingly powdery and sweet. When it's dried a little bit, it gets both richer and sweeter — I assume that's the cherry tobacco and maybe the tonka. There is a certain bitter/spicy note that tickles my nose when I smell this and keeps the sweetness in check (hops I assume.) I like this, but I couldn't see me wearing it. It would make a lovely and fascinating room scent if it smelled like the drydown and not the wet stage!

This starts out with the other notes being there, but ends up all red musk on me. As to be expected since ALL red musks do that. It is lovely, both at first when everything is there and when it's just the red musk, but for the end effect of red musk I am better off sticking with a cheaper GC! Edited for spelling fail!

Death by sweetness! This is very very sweet to start, with a little bit of smokey depth. After about three hours this is faintly musty sugar, which I like, but before that it's just too sweet for my non-foody self.

This is one of those scents that I love, but is totally not me at all. It is a robust and heavy scent. I get a very rich, sophisticated smokey clove (when I first put it on it was ALL clove, but after about 5 minutes everything else perked up.) The other notes add complexity and balance, but are blended well enough to make it hard to pick out individually. If you love clove I would definitely try this!

This is a lot stronger than I was expecting. What I get from this is strong and dry. I wonder if I am amping the black chypre and maybe the mosses? It also has salty floral to it. However, of the florals I do not get any gardenia. It is very dark and heady on me. Deep dark resins and florals, and quite a bit "perfumey." It's lovely, but so not anything I would ever wear.

From the description alone on this one I was seriously tempted to order a 5 ML untested. I'm glad I didn't. It's pretty, and if I didn't already have a cotton-candy-carnation blend in Pink Moon 07 I might like it more. I really wanted that pink pepper note, but it doesn't show up on me. If anything it was a little sweeter and powdery than Pink Moon. I'm going to let it settle for a month in hopes that the pepper comes out, but otherwise I have other scents I like more that fill the same niche. Edited to fix redundancy

I've lost count of the number of times I've tried this one in attempt to come up with a better description of it, but I just can't. It is misty, elusive, and vaguelly sweet. It's pleasant, but I couldn't tell you why. It is evocative of murky and mysterious places, but is still airy, and a little fresh. I will keep my decant and continue to be befuddled.

Here goes, Wet/early drydown: Lemony pine? But not in a cleaner way . . . weird. A dead ringer for the smell they pump out at you on Soarin at California Adventure (and possibly at the version at Disneyworld; I've never been.) Dry: Still get the lemony pine smell from earlier, but it smells a bit drier. I get a hint of what I think is patchouli (which reminds me of peppery mashed potatoes on my skin — don't ask.) I also get a faint faint faint hint of musk. I was afraid I would love this one, which would suck as my sister-in-law is deathly allergic to anything involving pine. Lucky me that it doesn't smell amazing with my chemistry!

My review is of the 2006 version. Wet: Cakey! The incense is chilling in the background lending just a hint of smoke. Dry: Unfortunately the cake totally disappears for the first few hours I have this on. It's pure smokey incense. It's nice, but not as complex or sweet as I would like it to be. Long dry down (2-3 hours in): Incense and that berry cake smell from Eat Me. The scent I wanted this to be. If it were like that the whole time I might keep it, but alas.

Wet this was quite bitter but I couldn't really pick out any individual notes. Dry this is still pretty bitter, maybe a little smokey. It's also a little tart - maybe the black currant? Overall, it isn't a very "me" scent.

All of the grossness of Dorian, with none of the awesome of Snake Oil. As with Dorian, this goes quite nasty on me, and I'm not sure what's doing it, but I'm going to go wash this off. I get no vanilla or spicy delicious, just oddly cloying nastiness. If the Snake Oil shows up in 3 hours as it sometimes does with the Snake Pit blends, it would be saved a bit, but not enough for me to ever wear it (I'll just wear actual Snake Oil in that case!)

I really have wanted to love this. I've tried it again and again since 2006, and there's still something about it that throws off my nose and is quite unpleasant. It's not the tea, sugar, or vanilla. I have a feelings it's one or more of the musks, or maybe the fougere since musks usually behave on me. Whatever it is it is strangely cloying, but not necessarily in a dessert-y overly sweet sort of way, sickly, and just generally yucky. Oh well! Give me my White Rabbit over this any day!

Wet this is a watery cheery floral - very light and refreshing. When it dries it smells less... wet. I know that sounds redundant, but you know what I mean! The florals are light and sweet and lovely. Not an amazing scent, but very nice. I could see wearing this if I wanted to feel light and airy - like a serene fairy princess wandering through a garden or some such.

Like most red musk scents on me - nice, but smells purely of red musk. I like red musk, but I wish I could smell the other notes. Smut, Scherezade, Lady Lilith etc all smell the same on me. Alas . . . at least I don't need to hoard!

One of the first imps I ever bought was Eat Me. I never could decide if I liked it enough to keep it and ended up frimping it to someone for enabling purposes. I got a lab frimp and decided to give it another go! I know this is supposed to be currant and cake, but on my skin this is reminiscent of fresh baked blueberry muffins from one of those powder mixes. I love the way those smell, so I can't really complain. When it's wet and in the early drying stages it's almost too sweet for me, but luckily it isn't as crazy buttery and sweet as say Cockaigne or Knave of Hearts, which I just could not handle. I swear I get a little bit of Red Musk at the beginning, but then again that usually amps like crazy on me and in this it doesn't. Much like the first time I tried this, I still can't decide if I love this or not.

I can't believe it took me so long to get around to trying this one! My review is of a fresh from the lab imp. Yummy yummy mandarin! It has quickly become one of my favorite notes since I started branching out my tastes. This is lovely bright mandarin when wet, and as it dries the fig adds a mellow and sweet grounding note (although I never outright smell fig.) Unfortunately the throw is light and this fades very fast, but it's beautiful while it stays. I will have to let my imp age a bit to see if it stabilizes.

This is a review of the 2007 version. When this first goes on it smells strongly of coconut - which is odd given the description, but it's quite lovely. It's a light not overly strong coconut, which is a nice change from the super sweet buttery smell I get from most of the lab's coconut notes. As this dries down I get coconut and pine. I don't get any florals, which makes me sad because I love the "soft floral + something interesting" sort of scents. Overall, it's nice, and unique, but not something I'd wear. (Not to mention my sister-in-law who I live with is deathly allergic to pine!)

With my American McGee's Alice costume I will be wearing Alice layered with either Brom Bones or Hand of Glory - I can't decide. (I debated Antique Lace with either of those... and tested it with the Brom Bones - AMAZING, but I think I want some carnation awesomeness.)

I'm actually not sure what I have that is dark and or sharp as those don't tend to be my favorites. I have a massively huge pile of gc imps and random decants in my "to test" box though. I wonder how Brom Bones and Antique Lace and/or Alice would work. I'll try out the Three Witches+ those also to see which I like more. Looking through my "enable the men in my life" pile, I have: Hastur, Crowley, Brom Bones, Highwayman, Western Diamondback . . . Think any of those would work? I'm trying to recall if I have any sharp citrus blends but all that's coming to mind is Te Po, which wouldn't really work. If I still have Schrodinger's Cat that was CIIIITRUS on me, so it could be worth a try. I'll have to dig through my "to try" pile some more. Oh.. I still have Hand of Glory, which isn't sharp, but is kind of creepy, and might complement Alice or Antique Lace. . . Any more ideas?

If I do dress up for Halloween I'll hopefully be going as American McGee's Alice. Does anyone have any good ideas for a scent to go with her? I need something that's sweet little girl gone horribly wrong - I'm thinking Alice layered with something creepy/sinister might work? But I don't know what a good creepy scent would be. . . If I could wear blood notes that'd be a great idea, but blood notes tend to be cloyingly sweet on me. Any brilliant ideas?

How is it that I don't get any fruit from this? Wet there was a little bit of sweetness, but dry this is just super smokey and almost - dare I say - peppery? I like pepper in combination with lighter fruitier blends to add a bit of attitude, but I'm not feeling the smoked pepper. The longer it dries the more I get pepper. It actually reminds me a lot of Anne Bonny on me, which smelled like mashed potatoes and peppery gravy! To the swap box for this one I think.

Oh the caramel. Wet and in the decant this is ALL caramel. Sickly sweet and buttery. It gets a weaker as it wears, but none of the other notes come out enough for me. I don't like caramel as the base of a blend and it's the main feature the whole way for me. So sad, as all of the other notes sound awesome.