Usagi

What about Sugar Skull?--Vibrant with the joy and sweetness of life in death! A blend of five sugars, lightly dusted with candied fruits.

I know it doesn't mention incense, but it has that vibe, and it is definitely sweet.

 

Or maybe Devil's Night--This is the scent of autumn night, fires in the distance, with a touch of boozy swoon, playful sugar and thuggish musk.

 

From the GC, you might like Sybaris--Bright violet with sweet clove, Mediterranean incense notes and tonka bean.

From what I know Cielamara is at camp, so likely she won't have time to head an ATC swap until the summer is over.

Thanks, Angelamaria!

 

Shall we make an unofficial ATC swap for July then?

 

And any ideas for themes you'd like to do? Some previous themes were fairy tales, dreams, mystery words, & favorite BPAL. We could also do a themeless free-for-all art extravaganza.

 

Yea, ATC swap!

I was searching for the ATC swap thread to bump it - but I guess it's been archived, and I was sent here!

I hope it hasn't fallen by the wayside? (I'll PM Cielemara too.)

 

And let me add that the other ideas floated sound fun too. I might not be able to afford to participate but I fully support them happening!

 

I PMed her on the 11th, but I think she hasn't been on in a while. Hopefully, because she is having an awesome summer vacation.

 

I'd be happy to organize an ATC swap-- or count me in as a participant, if anyone else starts one.

 

Sadly...I would need help with a theme. But the dollar limit would be between $10 and $20. You can do alot of damage with that kind of cash from the Dollar store.

 

 

So true. Sounds great! I'm in, if you do it. For theme, you could do... zombie apocalypse

 

bath salts! :-X

 

I laughed so hard, thank you! I actually seriously considered checking out several of our local convenience stores to see if that was true.

 

Sadly...I would need help with a theme. But the dollar limit would be between $10 and $20. You can do alot of damage with that kind of cash from the Dollar store.

 

 

So true. Sounds great! I'm in, if you do it. For theme, you could do... zombie apocalypse Or, more realistically, a vacation themed one,or picnic, fair, summer blockbuster?

Mojomomma had suggested a flipflop swap a ways back, so a 'day at the beach' theme could incorporate that?

I don't know... But woo, Dollar Swap!

Aww, Aphrodite, I don't think any of us were discounting you idea of perfume only swap. I'm sorry if it came off that way. I think we were just trying to help, and maybe suggest things that would apply to a wider audience?

 

I think if you are longing to do a perfume only swap, you should 100% only go for it. You have a great concept, and I think people could really have fun with it.

 

About the person who has the murderer as their swappee: I think if you had the order of mingling, IGI, guessing, the victim would still be able to guess; they might even have a leg up on the guessing, because they'd know who the murderer was. They would still need to guess the other factors correctly, though.

 

Proposing another Dollar Store swap. Would anyone be interested in this?

 

Dark Alice, I'd definitely be interested in a Dollar Store swap. What would the spending limit be, and would there be a theme?

*respectful snip*

After that, we'd have an initial post in the swap thread to set the scene for our "party." Only after that, the swap leader(s) send out partners (swappers and swappees). But instead of receiving the questions and replies of their person, a swapper only gets a little story about their persona. To find out what to send them, they have to follow the thread. So, every persona would have to post as their imaginary person, of course, and give hints about themselves. That means that you know that your swap partner is The Bearded Lady (and you somewhat know that she has some furry companions and loves to snack on candy), but you don't know what user is the Bearded Lady. Or, you could know what user you have to send something to (could make more sense since you can sometimes figure out a user by their address) but you have to follow the thread to find out what persona they post as. That way, interaction is enforced so everyone posts as often as possible so a swapper can read up on their "victim."

...

 

I *love* this setup. It would be part roleplaying game, part swap, part scavenger hunt I'd add to that, that everyone who is getting their character profile also gets a set of clues(like a weapon, a location, and possibly another character you know didn't do it[or some dirt on them *mwa haha*]), and they can choose to keep those to themselves, or share one or all of them with their swappee. We could give it a week to have everyone "mingle" a week to try and reveal clues(and 'Mr. Body' could leave some information), and then send a package to your swappee(you could be sending information to the murderer!)-- oh my gosh, if your swappee is the murderer, once things are sent, an announcement could be post in thread that you were killed also, giving more clues to the rest of the players. Then, everyone can make one post that they received their packages, and one post as characters, with their guess as to the murderer, location, and weapon.

Whoever gets it right gets a little prize from the gm.

I think clue had six possible characters. The Clue movie had those six, plus a butler, a maid, and a cook (and a small assortment of other characters who served extremely specific purposes in the film, and thus would be weird to be included).

Do we want to try to run this with six/nine players??? I'm up for being Mr. Body and knowing who did it.

 

Currently seeing about the ATC swap. I'll keep you posted.

 

Also, how many people would actually do a Zombie Apocalypse discount store swap? I'm thinking the questionnaire would set up specific categories people needed to shop for; like food, drink, tools, reading material, light source, way to inebriate yourself(jk), potentially a weapon(it is disturbing how many things in dollar stores have the potential to do serious harm:eek:)-- we could even add a craft component and have the swapper manufacture a schematic for a zombie trap, or a survival manual.

Well, another option is that the swap leaders could actually assign characters, following the Clue analogy(but with some fluffing so that there could be--say-- 15 players at least?), and their mystery person could send them a scent based on their vocation, and an object from that vocation(one that could be used as a weapon would be bonus), an item of apparel or accessory(even a signature scent), and some other category that I'm blanking on.

 

Then swap leaders could send everyone a PM with a location, a weapon, and possibly an alibi-- except for the murderer. Unless we want to follow Clue. It was always really special when you figured out that you were the murderer yourself. Clearly, your character suffered from violent blackouts...

 

It probably wouldn't be that hard to do, if you had a copy of clue to hand for reference. But I think it would need to be worked that people could send and receive something they might actually use. A lot of the swaps I've been in, people request not to receive knickknacks.

 

The only difficulty I see with a scents-only version would be that it might exclude newbies to the forum-- or make them feel they have to go out and buy/trade for scents post haste-- and possibly be difficult to match people who've been on the forum a long time/have tested a lot of imps. But, I could be wrong.

 

You know, though, another option for a scents only version could be a circular swap?

So, the box would start out with three character profiles-- four imps based on four different categories(vocation, location, preferred method of killing, signature scent[?]for example), and it could be sent out in order to the participants. you take one character out for yourself(and PM the swap leader), you put a character you designed in, and the box continues, until it returns to the swapleader. Then everyone is sent a roster of characters selected, and maybe each person gets a clue, a weapon, and a location. Then you go at it in the swap thread, and everyone gets a guess. First person to guess all three correctly wins one of the remaining character packs?

 

It could work?

 

I think I will go make some inquiries about resurrecting the ATC swap.

I guess from my side that jewelry swap won't happen! I would want this to be perfect and well-planned.. and I'm afraid that I cannot live up to my own expectations.

I started giving free jewelry to people with swaps and sales, and this has already reduced the amount of booty I had in my drawer.

 

 

What's the/an ATC swap?

 

Murder Mystery.. that sounds exciting!

The only issue this could cause is this: how do I create a persona for myself that speaks for my likes in perfume? For instance, if I were to create a black cat person or a thief, maybe I'd get musk, licorice and leather scents.. non of which work on me. So how would we go about interpreting things in the same way?

I'll give this secret swap some more thought.. I really like the idea!

 

well I think you could go by both notes and names. so for a black cat you could have those notes but also Bastet, Halloweenies, etc. and for thief you could have those notes along with pirate scents, appropriate RPG scents, characters that are thieves, etc. and each person could post in the swap's thread saying a few notes that they absolutely never like and a few they love, and that could be taken into account when assigning personas as well as viewable by all users so you could make sure you're not sending your person something they specifically asked not to get.

 

 

LOL, perfect is overrated. But, if you are still interested in doing the jewelry swap, we could co-run it? I think I probably made it seem more complicated than it has to be, and I think that your initial plans were great. There was enough interest to do one small run of it-- and, should it prove popular, we could revamp and do an even more awesome version?

 

An ATC swap is for artist trading cards. Basically, a 2.5"x3.5" piece of cardstock, cardboard, plastic, etc on which you make a piece of your own art-- in all kinds of mediums-- and then you send them to someone or multiple someones, and you get someone else's art in return. So, it's like trading cards, only each trading card is an individual, original work by someone. I think you can find good examples of the variety on the internet/Etsy by searching 'ACEO' or 'ATC'. It's really fun, it isn't expensive, and you get an amazing swatch of the different creative impulses of a bunch of lovely forumites.

Cielamara used to run the original swap, so I'd want to ask her before starting it up again(because she is an amazing ATC swap goddess). But I think it would be a really fast and fun swap to bring back.

 

Aphrodite, if you want to brainstorm making a mystery party swap, I'd be up for helping out with it. I've only run one swap myself, but I've *been* in a lot of them...

 

I think you and Honey have great ideas. For a scent to the character, you could both make sure that you wrote your character to reflect a bit of your scent personality(even if you want to be an axe murderer, but are in love with light girly scents, your profile could state 'deceptively innocent appearance, she goes at hacking people up with the abandon of a wild woman', and then you'd probably get Maenad [which is an awesome scent]). Or, from a more practical perspective, there could be a question in the sign up about which scents/notes you absolutely don't want.

 

For some reason this also makes me think that a great swap would be a Dollar store swap with the theme "How to Survive a Zombie Apocalyps(flame thrower not included)". I haven't had enough sleep, I think.

Aphrodite, that sounds like it would need to be really intricate. But I agree that is has the potential to be very awesome. The only thing I can think is that the swapleader would need to be more like a GM. But you could have "guests" create a profile, and have their swapper send to them anonymously, according to that profile certain things that would be in specific categories.

For example, the profile would state weapon of choice: for a poisoner, you might send coffee to mask the taste of arsenic, for an arsonist you'd send something like BBQ sauce (this would be the food category).

and you could have a trademark section(you know, how certain thieves/murderers leave calling cards?) where you would send monogrammed business cards, or a lucky charm or something like that.

You'd probably want at least two more categories-- maybe attire, and something based off of where the character they created hails from(or their secret vice, a la Clue).

 

Then, for the GM's eyes only, you could have a section that asked each player whether they would be willing to be the murderer, a blackmailer, a victim, etc.

 

You could let each player know what part they were playing when you sent out the swap assignments, and-- as leader-- either give each player a cryptic clue or some sort of secret fact about another player(red herring or not), and leave clues periodically in the thread, so that everyone had a chance to figure out who was who, and perhaps who their swapper was as well.

I think it would be a lot of work(and a lot of organization/storytelling), but it could also be super awesome.

 

I'd be up for a jewelry swap, Honey-- but I would want to buy/find things from a place other than my hoard for my swapper. Much like a dragon, once the shiny is mine-- generally speaking-- you are going to need to pry it from my cold, scaly hands. I love shiny things.

But I do agree with everyone else. If you specify that each person will trade three things-- say, one costume/tacky jewelry, one more vintage/handmade piece, and one piece with semi-precious stones/silver-- and make a price range, it should be a fairly smooth swap. Plus, if you put a part in the questionnaire about what sorts of jewelry people have to offer, and what they would like. It might be easier to match people up. for example, I don't have pierced ears, and have been gifted really nice sets. So I have nice earrings left over (which I usually mail to friends who can rock fabulous earrings). Or, for a free-for-all, maybe specify three earrings is equal to two bracelets is equal to one necklace in a given medium (eg silver).

 

Okay, I also have a couple of ideas for swaps.

First, I've been thinking about the ATC swap, and would really like to resurrect it. It was one of my favorite BPAL.org swaps, and I would love to do it again. It's fast, generally inexpensive, fun, and internationals should have no problems joining.

 

Second, a box swap(because you can never have too much BPAL storage, right?). Now, I'm thinking either it would be a purchase swap with a specific size and cost margin, where you found a gorgeous BPAL box for your swapper based on their answers in a questionnaire(fav. colors, textures, home decor, etc). Or, a crafting swap, where size and materials were specified(eg: 6x9", wood), and you created/painted a box for your person.

 

Any interest?

Bottle: incense over lush tropical flowers

Wet: The incense is still there; richer, deeper. But it is now joined by cool flowers and wet leaves. These are the kind of flowers that grow in deep shade, their damp, velvet petals almost glowing in the half-light.

Dry: This scent last for a good while(4+ hours). On me it is almost as when wet, only the incense becomes a bit warmer and richer.

This scent really brings to mind standing beneath a rain forest canopy, staring into a clearing where the sun illuminates an ancient temple, and-- on the breeze-- the scent of incense from hidden rituals clinging to the surrounding rocks and vegetation.

P.S. It's the Norman Invasion! Okay, just my 1066th post, but it could be...somewhere.

I haven't tried it myself, but there's Inganok Jewelers from the 2010 Lupers ("Gleaming stone and silver") Based on the reviews, it sounds like this blend is really chemistry-dependent, but many people have reported a stony or mineral-like note.

 

I've tried it and I will second this. Inganok Jewelers smells like marble slabs, in a vault, underground--at least on me.

 

I think 'stone' in a description can range from evocative of an element to downright duplicating what that element smells like.

 

One of the literary vampires gave the exact impression of cold stone, but didn't really smell like it. I don't remember which one.

 

Aww, calivianya, I was waffling on that one! now you've made it sound more awesome!

Both the Beauty box sample rehoming and the spring cleaning swaps sound like a lot of fun. I'd be interested in joining.

Vanilla 323, if it's sticky sweet plum you're looking for, my vote would be for Bensiabel. It could just be me, but on the skin, it's almost syrupy, and has a pretty heady throw(and good wear time).

Those are adorable!

I've been looking forward to trying this scent for a while. It just sounded so interesting.

 

Imp: citrus, green things, marzipan

Wet: creamy, delicious citrus spritzer

Dry: citrus perfume; a light floral with just a hint of powderiness.

 

This is very nice. It's fun, and girly/feminine. It will probably be even better once the weather really heats up. Light throw, fairly long staying power on me(5+ hours).

 

It reminds me a bit of Sea of Glass. If you like that, this is definitely worth a try.

Imp: red musk, spices, and the unmistakable necrotic burning rubber smell of patchouli.

Wet:flowery red musk, cinnamon, and patchouli backing it.

Dry: when the patchouli finally dies down, it's a nice, spiced red musk. But I don't enjoy waiting for that drydown.

 

Conclusion

I love "Carmilla", but patchouli hates me. If patchouli is your friend, this blend could be that throbbing, sultry scent you've been longing for.

I'm unsure whether I have the original or the Resurrected version, as my bottle was a a wonderful gift.

 

Bottle: cinnamon and clove.

Wet: sweet cinnamon-clove; kind of like an herbal tea. Throw is also pretty strong.

Dry: delicious chai latte. It's just sweet, creamy, and amazing.

 

I absolutely adore all stages of this scent, and am very thankful to have some of my own. It also lasts a good while on(5+ hours).

 

If you like cinnamon, cloves, or chai, this would likely be a scent for you.

This talk of Hope reminded me...

 

Are there any GCs similar to Faith? Violet Ray was my sugared-violet scent, but, well.. She's gone now.

 

 

Are there any GCs similar to Faith?

 

Faith: Faith is sugared violet.

 

I would love to find a scent very similar to Faith. I like Hope, but love Faith. Any suggestions from GC?

 

Have you tried Veil? I was just wearing it today, and it's all sweet, lovely violets on my skin. It might be worth a shot, anyway.

 

Veil~

A quiet scent, soft, calm and enigmatic. A perfume of mystery, of whispers, and of secrets behind secrets. White sandalwood, lilac, gardenia, violet, orris, lavender and ylang ylang.

Imp: cologne; slightly sweet, with an underlying smokiness. There's also a wood scent, reminiscent of eucalyptus chips. I get barely a hint of spiced fruit and greenery.

 

Wet: smoky vetiver manliness, and spice.

 

Dry: sweet, green vetiver, a little bit of clean musk, and some spice in the way back.

 

This is delicious, and very relaxing.

If you like vetiver, give this a shot.

After about five minutes, Kubla Khan smells like a lighter throw version of Green Tree Viper on my skin. Perhaps it's the icy spices.

Kumiho's fresh ginger cousin.

 

It smells like fresh grated ginger, ever so slightly softened with something creamy. When comparing this to Kumiho, it is a stronger scent on me-- and Kumiho makes this smell like ginger ale. But really, this is just gingery ginger. I wonder if wearing this would have the same effect on car sickness as ginger chews?

Sudha Segara is a bright, clean, gingery unisex scent to beat the summer heat(and possibly carsickness). Very nice.

Imp: rose and sandalwood

 

Wet: rose and something fizzy; slightly powdery. Is that jasmine?

 

Dry: jasmine and rose, but in a wearable way-- with just a hint of sandalwood in the background.

 

This is a little too regal for me. Nonetheless, Obsidian Widow is a lovely scent.

Enchanted Wood Florist starts off as a really sharp, perfumey floral-- slightly green, but not in a real things way. As it dries, it becomes softer, and I swear there's some kind of bubblegum/tropical hard candy scent underneath.

 

Very much later-- around eight hours-- it's gone extremely faint, but if I huff my wrists, I smell a soft musk very reminiscent of the Girl. It has a slightly warmer feel than the Girl.

 

This has a lot of staying power on me. Throw for the better part of wear is medium. I find it very nice, leaning towards a more traditional perfume scent.

 

My only qualm is the sharpness at the outset. I'm hoping that calms down a bit with aging, since this bottle is only a month old.

In the bottle and on wet, for me, this is OAKMOSS honey. A very sweet honey, tinged with the bitterish sap smell of oakmoss. Interesting.

Once it dries, I still huff oakmoss on my skin, but the throw is straight, light golden, sparkling honey in the summer. It reminds me of the honey in Honey Moon or Hetairae. The throw is pretty strong(I amp honey, though), but not in any way offensive or cloying. I think I like Honey Moon better, because the thyme scent in that just seems to complement the honey more, but I'm looking forward to see how Ronin ages.

 

So, basically, if you were out in the summer, under a mighty oak where bees had built a hive, looking up and getting drizzled in sunwarmed honey.

 

If you love honey, this is definitely something to give a shot. It's not really gender particular, and, I would say, subtly sexy.