Christmasween

[doomsday_disco]

The scent of ghost stories told beside a crackling fireplace, with garlands of evergreen hanging beside October’s carved pumpkins. Hearthlight and jack o’lanterns cast shadows on cobwebbed corners. Candied orange peel, mulled cider, smoked myrrh twirling through a cranberry garland, balsam resin and amber-drizzled pumpkin, smoldering hearthwood, and the soft honeyed glow of dripping beeswax.

[Geminirubyshoes]

This is the Christmas sister of my darling, beloved precious Fearful Pleasure from the 2008 Sleepy Hollow series. 

 

To save you from looking that one up, Fearful Pleasure is “Dried orange peels floating in simmering cider, roasted apples, smoldering firewood, chimney smoke, sassafras beer, warm hawthorn wood, and oakmoss.” Christmasween has a similar vibe with the candied orange peel, smoked myrrh, hearthwood and mulled cider but it’s sweeter and glowy-er (glowier?). The balsam resin & warm beeswax notes are not super forward but they can be detected on the drydown. This is absolutely fuckin’ MAGICAL and I am smitten. Put on a flannel nightgown, slather on  some Christmasween and sit in front of your yule tree while drinking a hot beverage a burning a halloween candle in the room. 

[Follow My Nose]

Christmasween is quite fruity right away, like the wassail I made for the holidays: mulled cider, cranberries and oranges. As it dries, smoky and sweet notes smooth it out; soon, the spices come out and the resins make this even more rich and complex. Later I can pick up a hint of the creamy pumpkin, some subtle balsam fir branches, and warm sweet beeswax. 

 

This is exactly what I imagined and hoped for when I saw this scent, a perfect blend of Halloween and Christmas memories, joyful and bright! I absolutely love it!
 

[ghoulnextdoor]

A lost Wes Anderson screenplay wherein Little Red carries the remnants of her Halloween candy to grandmother's house for Christmas. The contents: six tangerine-orange circus peanuts (slightly stale), twelve lemon sherbets wrapped in yellow cellophane, three jammy strawberry boiled sweets the color of fresh arterial blood, and one spiced pumpkin confection shaped like a small gourd. She encounters the wolf at precisely 2:47 PM, seventeen meters past the old balsam grove where the snow is deepest and wettest and most tactically advantageous.

 

Act I: The Decoy. The basket drops in slow motion. Candy scatters across white snow in a perfect radius—citrus orange, sherbet yellow, strawberry red, pumpkin amber. The wolf's pupils dilate, furry nostrils flare. He has, Red notes with satisfaction, a documented weakness for sugar. This was always part of the plan.

 

Chapter Two: Infrastructure and Positioning. While he inhales the scent of lemon sherbet (his favorite), Red moves through the balsam with the efficiency of someone who attended Camp Hemlock, Summer 2019, Wilderness Survival Track. Her supplies: three beeswax candles (ivory, hand-dipped), one ball of cranberry garland (crimson, 6.5 meters), hearthwood kindling, and a small tin of smoked myrrh resin she's been saving for exactly this scenario. The tripwire is string between two symmetrical trees. The kindling arranges itself into a small, controlled pyre.

 

Part III: The Immolation. The wolf collects circus peanuts in his mouth like a child. He doesn't notice the garland at ankle height, stretched taut and gleaming. The fall is spectacular—all four legs, perfect cartoon arc. He lands directly in Red's carefully constructed fire pit, which ignites on impact. The smoked myrrh makes it ceremonial. The beeswax makes it beautiful. The spiced pumpkin treat, crushed beneath him, makes it smell like Halloween and Christmas happened simultaneously in the same terrible instant.

 

Grandmother receives her Christmas candles at 4:32 PM. Most of them, anyway. Red keeps one as a souvenir, amber-drizzled and slightly singed.