Saving the Walking Sausage: Lord Howe Island Stick Insect

July 31, 2015 / australianperfumejunkiescom / 6 Comments

Hey Hey APJ,

Recently Azar sent me this. It’s filled with so many things I love.

When we were kids we went for a holiday to Lord Howe Island with the family. It has long lived in my memory as my favourite family holiday and one on which I caught a stripy tuna which in my memory was bigger than I was at the time at around seven or eight years old. On this holiday we went of a fabulous journey by boat to see Balls Pyramid and it was breathtaking.

Photo Stolen Wikipedia

The island was the perfect place to take children. We were given bikes and told to come home at sunset each day. It was also the first time we had ever been into a Kids Club, where the parents drop off the kids in the morning and you are doing nature walks, riding bikes to beaches where you can hand feed the fish, painting pictures of your adventures and learning so much about the wonderful place we were in. We had the most wonderful young woman for Kids Club, she was soft, dark haired and smelled so good, she smiled a lot and was lavish in her hugs. I was so smitten that when we left I cried and cried. Mum and Dad spent most of their holiday time swimming and reading, eating and chatting with the very few other guests. Back then we stayed at Pine Trees, the only hotel on the island, and I think there were only about 20 rooms. In my memory it was a wonderful, sunlit, blissful adventure. It was also the place that I first discovered Gerald Durrell, the author, and his books have been a constant source of wonder, laughter and delight ever since.

Anyway, here is an incredible story of a creature brought back from the jaws of extinction. FABULOUS!
Portia xx

Dab or Spray? Life

June 23, 2015 / australianperfumejunkiescom / 41 Comments

Post by Val the Cookie Queen

When I mentioned to Portia a few weeks ago that it was sometimes tough to come up with something to write about, he said to write whatever I´d been up to and include the perfume I had been wearing. That would do it. Let´s test it out.

DAB OR SPRAY?

Murmurings from the Uninspired.
Featuring fragrances I have added to my small collection.

THINGS THAT I HAVE BEEN UP TO

Read an undisputedly utterly brilliant book. All The Light We Cannot See. Anthony Doerr.
Set up a date with APJs Azar in September. We´ll be having tea in Seattle very soon.
Gave up Red Bull and Monster and started to drink water.
Helped my son move into his apartment.
Completed my .vero.profumo. collection with the Rozy Extrait and the Onda Voile d´Extrait.
Located a bottle of Cuir de Lancôme. Purchased it.

LONDON VISIT

Finalised a pefume tour party blogger lunch and cake feast not forgetting the epic ice-cream, kind of thing. In London. Getting to hangout with Volatile Fiction, Olfactoria´s Travels, Perfume Candy Boy, Nick Gilbert and more. Amongst other groovy things we are going to visit Penhaligon`s, the new Bloom, the Chanel Store and the new Malle Store. I am of course taking my daughter the BlondesWunder with me and she will report back as to her second experience of hanging out with a bunch of old perfume freaks.

(Yes Portia and Michael, my heart aches that you won´t be there.)

DAB OR SPRAY?

Wearing a lot of extraits, and only dab them. I love the sensuality of using a glass stopper to apply the perfume. I do like to spray the back of my neck though. However, spraying everywhere gives me a grand mal seizure, and since my kids do that to me anyway, I prefer to keep them to the minimum. I reckon I might be in the minority though. This is a much discussed subject but what do you APJ readers do? What interesting application techniques do you use? I stand in front of a mirror and conduct my perfuming ritual. I do not like perfume on my clothing at all and make sure I get nothing on it from the application of the fragrance. Clothing goes on after the perfume.

Am about to start a new book. A Brief History of Seven Killings. Marlon James. “It´s like a Tarantino remake of The Harder They Come but with a soundtrack by Bob Marley and a script by Oliver Stone and William Faulkner ……..” New York Times. And a lot of it is written in Jamaican Patois. I spent some time in Kingston but that is another fragrant story. 😉

Photo Stolen Fragrantica

Fragrantica gives these featured accords:
Top: Blood orange
Heart: Iris pallida, rose
Base: Incense, patchouli

Have been wearing Maria Candida Gentile´s Burlesque for the last two days. Alluring. Gorgeous. Ordered.

Irie Bussis
Peace and love
CQ

Boring Stuff that Smells AMAZING!

April 20, 2015 / australianperfumejunkiescom / 8 Comments

Hey there crew,

Every day, or every couple of days, I do a whole bunch of things. They are my routine. I clean down the kitchen benches, shower, wash clothes, cook, drive, drink tea and coffee and a whole shemozzle of stuff. Problem is, I am a sensualist. What I’m looking for is a ride, a story, moment or a fantasy. An experience. One of the best ways I know how to make the hum drum routine zing is with scent, here are a few of my faves.

Boring Stuff that Smells AMAZING!

AVON Footworks Cracked Heel Cream: My feet are the pits underneath. Years of sport, dance, clubbing, high heels and neglect meant that by the time I was 25 my feet were cracked and bleeding on the underside. Thick soles, cracks and calluses had become agony and I thought it was my lot in life to be continuously grating dry skin from under my feet. Till someone sold me some AVON Footworks. Yes, I had used others but the positive effect was negligible, something in Footworks really works. The smell is smooth and balmy with a hint of chemical flowers and musks. I put it on religiously after every bath and shower and wander around in little cotton socks. The difference is unbelievable.

L’OCCITANE Aromachologie Volumizing Shampoo for Fine and Normal Hair: So you know, I pay full price $35/500ml for this baby. It’s made with and smells like 5 essential oils; artemisia, petitgrain, sweet orange, rosemary, palmarosa. Yes it leaves my fine, sparse hair shiny and squeaky clean but the smell? The scent is freaking terrific. I lather up and leave it on for about a minute while doing other stuff so I can keep smelling the super green citrus burst, both calming and energising.

Aramis Soap On A Rope: If you want to remember what old school Aramis smelled like then the Aramis Body Shampoo On A Rope is your friend. The smell is absolutely and utterly divine. That amber leather floral filled to the brim with gorgeous greenery and spices dancing around the center. It also hold a million memories because this was the first grown up bottle of scent my Mum bought for me. It makes a fabulous base for any of your leather or green fragrances, amping the herbs and woods. So beautiful.

White Vinegar: I really don’t like the smell of most household cleaning products, I want my house to BE clean. Smelling clean is not important, and I also dislike left over cleaning smells that affect the way I smell the fragrance I wear and the ambient fragrances I choose to use. White Vinegar, boiling water and a dash of disinfectant takes away all the nasty smells and leaves everything squeaky clean. It’s better for the environment and doesn’t eat away your bathroom or kitchen. We also use it instead of fabric softener.

Kasumi Tea Anastasia: Recently the tin has been made over by Jean Paul Gaultier in very typical JPG nautical stripe & tattoo style. The current tin we have open on the kitchen bench is less modern in design but the orange zest and sweet fruit notes in this black tea are a real winner. It’s one of Kasumi’s oldest and most popular blends, fragrant and delicious. Perfect to lift lifes sometimes monotone days into sparkling rainbow brights.

So what are your Boring Stuff that Smells AMAZING? What do you use to make the daily grind smell better?
Portia xx

BUSY…………….

January 25, 2015 / australianperfumejunkiescom / 25 Comments

Heya Fabulous APJ Family,

Shit is real around here, real BUSY. I am spraying new stuff a bit. Today I wore a new Australian house

Magnolia ’13 by Cult of Scent
WOW!! Creamy, furry, citrus with a pithy undertone and a lovely sillage that lasts well into the second hour, even into the fourth hour I can softly smell a musk/vanilla/white flower/citrus wash. I am going to use my very small amount up this weekend, FABULOUS!

Photo Stolen Fragrantica

Kokorico by Jean Paul Gaultier
Also a divinely delicious scent Kokorico is smooth, woody and sweet. I was surprised that vanilla was not in the notes. Why was this not a huge hit, I only have a decant but I freaking LOVE it. I smell really good. MMMM

Now, please do yourself a favour. Just for an hour. Log off, get up and walk around, make a coffee and sit in a room you rarely sit in, go to the corner store, go pat your dog, go pull up some weeds. Spritz yourself with fragrance and get going. You will feel better about almost everything if you do.

See you back here later.

Portia xx

Painting The Truth

November 21, 2014 / australianperfumejunkiescom / 4 Comments

Hi there APJ!

Here is a very simplistic ideal. We know it but often it gets lost in the “I Want”, “They Have”, “If Only” windmill of our minds.

Photo Stolen NeelaVermeireCreations

While I’m writing to you from my new digs in Redfern, Sydney I am bathed in a gorgeous thick, rich haze of Mohur by Neela Vermeire Creations. Just following the advice in the painting below. BLISS!

Whatever you are doing this is pretty good advice, and so pretty too

Cyber hugging you from here

Portia xxx

Photo Stolen Facebook

Week Without Perfume

October 22, 2014 / australianperfumejunkiescom / 4 Comments

Post by ElizaD

For some reason I have not worn perfume for the last 14 days. It’s not that my collection is lacking—I have more than enough vials, bottles and pots in my vanity luring me in—it’s just that I wanted to recalibrate my nose completely. Perhaps it’s because of my upcoming trip to the Perfume House (Portland, Oregon, USA) or perhaps because it’s fall, a time for me of fresh starts, but whatever the reason, I just wanted to be free of added fragrances. I wanted to eschew all scents, but that is harder than you think without going out and buying all new everything. Even the foundation I wear, which is supposed to be fragrance-free, has the slightest powdery scent to it, and raises the question whether we can ever live in a smell-free place. Yes, we can try as much as possible not to add smells to our surroundings, but I have come to the conclusion that the air around us always smells of something.

Week Without Perfume

So, during the week as I ran my usual route along the trails in and around my town, I tried to be conscious of the scents I encountered and what they evoked: bio-diesel—French fries; cedar wood smoke—a cabin in the snow and skis outside the door.

Photo Stolen WikiCommons

Eggs, bacon and coffee—I am a child again at my grandmother’s house in Cincinnati, Ohio; pine needles—a trail high in the mountains in the summer; the salty sweat of my partner—I am comforted and everything in the world is okay; dog poo—why don’t people clean up after their dogs; a wonderful perfume on a lovely coiffed woman—yes it was and yes she was; the faintest smell of patchouli—I am sitting in the meadow at our local counter culture fair; and stale cigarettes and dryer sheets—long-term residence.

Photo Stolen Wikipedia

But the most lovely smell, and a welcome one after months of unusually dry weather, was the odor of cool rain on wet plants, of dirt still warm from summer as it was drenched with the first moisture of the fall. This is the smell of clean to me, of the earth being washed and renewed. And as I run, the fragrance washes over me, reminding me that everything natural has a beginning, middle and an end and that each of those phases of the cycle has a different aroma. The plant that smelled fresh and light as it began to grow, and took on a heady aroma as it matured, fades to a mellow earthiness as it dies. It’s no wonder that we have been trying to capture and bottle these fragrances since the beginning of time.

Photo Stolen Pixabay

And now my senses are refreshed, not just my nose, but the part of my brain that translates what I smell into something I can understand. I am ready for the pleasure of visiting the Perfume House, one of the best hand-selected collections of perfumes anywhere near where I live. I plan to make up for my weeks of asceticism by sniffing to my heart’s content.

I’ll have much to report on when I return.

What do you love to smell in your daily life?
ElizaD

Australian Perfume Junkies

Olfactory Opinions from Oz

Life

Saving the Walking Sausage: Lord Howe Island Stick Insect

Boring Stuff that Smells AMAZING!

Boring Stuff that Smells AMAZING!

BUSY…………….

Painting The Truth

Week Without Perfume

Week Without Perfume