Stop & Chat: May 25-30 - Ikea, Insa-dong, Hiking, & More!

Are you ready for a long post? Because I'm sure not! :) I don't know if I will get this post completely typed up and posted in one sitting as I'm currently dogsitting and the pups are having a hard time missing their Momma. :) (Spoiler: I wasn't able to. I originally sat down for this post on Thursday. It's Tuesday morning right now)

Sassy Girl Aroma - Candy Fluff Type

Scent Description: Bubblegum, sugary cotton candy, sweet apples and pears.

Date Received: February 26, 2016

Weight Melted: 0.7 oz

Location of Warmer: Living room, in tealight warmer

Cold Sniff: 5/5 I'm a sucker for Candy Fluff dupes.

Warm Sniff: 5/5 Same once warmed.

Scent Strength: 2/3

Scent Throw: >3/3 This filled the living room, hallway, master bedroom, and kitchen/dining area.

Melting Power: 4/5 I got about 7 hours of scent from one tart.

Repurchase: Definitely a yes! I have to say... SGA has been a complete hit for me. I'm glad I made the plunge back in February!

Stop & Chat: May 21-24

Don't mind me... just taming a Rex...

My weekend was rather uneventful. I played video games, cleaned, and did some more research on what I plan to get from Ikea. I've measured out how big the wardrobe is and decided where I want to put it in the entryway and started moving stuff in my office to make room for the new drawer systems. M and I bought Garry's Mod and played some games through that. It was fun.

Vintage Chic Scents - Dracula

Scent Description: Pecan caramel swirl, sugar cookie dough, marshmallow.

Date Poured: February 8, 2016

Weight Melted: 0.7 oz

Location of Warmer: Kitchen, in tealight warmer

Cold Sniff: 4/5 Nutty caramel slathered in sweet marshmallows.

Warm Sniff: 4/5 An added bakery note from the cookie dough is added, while the nuttiness tones down a bit.

Scent Strength: 1/3

Scent Throw: 3/3 This filled the entire kitchen/dining area, hallway, and office.

Melting Power: 3/5 5 hours of scent from 1/4 of a tart.

Repurchase: Yes! I quite enjoyed the little blast of bakery that this was.

Stop & Chat: May 20

Yesterday we bought a freezer from a fellow service member who is getting ready to PCS. What I did not realize was how absolutely large this freezer was. It's about 5 feet tall and twice as big as I was expecting. The good news is we will not have a shortage of freezer storage for meats and any other frozen goods we want to keep. This will actually work well for meal planning. Both M and I have trouble with cooking our meals and tend to opt for quick fix-me-ups and eating out. There's no reason we can't make our own food ahead of time. Thus - a super large freezer!

Stop & Chat: May Catch Up

I'm getting some serious nostalgia while leveling some characters on World of Warcraft with my dad. WoW is one of those games that I can go to each zone/expansion pack's world and revisit memories of time periods of my life. Ultima Online is the same way. So is The Sims... all 4 iterations and associated expansion packs. I've always said that if I get a tattoo it will be something gaming related, and I have some ideas that have been swimming in my head for years... but I'm still wary of making that sort of decision when it's so permanent.

Sassy Girl Aroma - Blackberry Watermelon Cotton Candy

Scent Description: None available.

Date Received: February 26, 2016

Weight Melted: 0.7 oz

Location of Warmer: Kitchen, in tealight warmer

Cold Sniff: 5/5 Sweet and fruity goodness.

Warm Sniff: 5/5 No surprises while melted. I got an even mix of blackberry, watermelon, and cotton candy.

Scent Strength: 2/3

Scent Throw: >3/3 This filled the entire house. The only room it didn't reach was the guest room, which had its door closed.

Melting Power: 5/5 I got about 8 hours of scent from this tart!

Repurchase: Yes! Great scent, fantastic performance... what more could I want?

The Bathing Garden - Circus Cake

Scent Description: Blue raspberry shaved ice, powdered sugar and white vanilla velvet cake.

Weight Melted: 1.1 oz

Location of Warmer: Kitchen, in tealight warmer

Cold Sniff: 4/5 A nice, sweet and cakey mixture. I had high hopes for this!

Warm Sniff: 3/5 Ah, velvet cake, why do you vex me so? I have an issue with velvet cake blends where the fragrance bombs and I'm left with a fake generic sweet smelling tart. I could still snatch hints of the blue raspberry shaved ice, though, so that saved this tart.

Scent Strength: 1/3

Scent Throw: 1.5/3 This filled the kitchen/dining area and part of the hallway.

Melting Power: 3/5 I got about 4 hours of scent from this tart.

Purchase: Probably not, just because it didn't perform very well. It was a gorgeous tart with a very sparkly wax pool, though. :)

Haul: Sniff My Tarts March 2016 Loaf Sale

Does this picture look familiar? It should, because it was recently featured on the Sniff My Tarts Facebook group page. I had a mini heart attack again when Donna & Amy contacted me, asking if they could use my picture for their group header. They've used one of my pictures before, but this time they asked for my blog so they could give me credit and link to my blog. Cue my freak out as my little corner of the internet experienced an increase in hits, searches, and comments.

Now that the increase has died down, I have enough presence of mind to finally post my loaf sale haul!

On March 11th Donna & Amy held a loaf sale, limit four loaves. There were two loaf sizes to choose from: 16 oz loaves for $16.20, and 24+ oz loaves for $23.80. I, of course, went completely overboard and bought four super ultra deluxe sized loaves. I placed my order on March 11th and it shipped on April 14th. What did I get? Why, let me show you!!

Candles From the Keeping Room - Red Saffron

Scent Description: Warm and spicy cardamom, pink pepper, grapefruit, mandarin, bergamot, sandalwood and musk.

Date Received: February 2016

Weight Melted: 1.2 oz

Location of Warmer: Kitchen, in tealight warmer

Cold Sniff: 4/5 Wonderfully earthy, ever so slightly sweet incense.

Warm Sniff: 4/5 That sweet note died off and was replaced with a heavy bergamot. All of the other notes are there, albeit they blend together in an almost indistinguishable way. I still enjoyed this very much, but it almost felt like each note was choking the other out.

Scent Strength: 2/3

Scent Throw: >3/3 This filled the entire house, minus the guest room and master bedroom which both had their doors closed. While I enjoyed this, M was a very unhappy camper. I don't think he was a fan of this melt. LOL

Melting Power: 3/5 I got about 4 and a half hours of scent from this melt.

Repurchase: Yes! I quite enjoyed this earthy muskiness and it was a nice break from the bakery & sweet fruity scents I've been melting. I do wish that these sorts of scents translated better to wax, though. It's a lot of hit and misses for me, finding a scent that I liked in perfume form and finding a wax version that smells just as awesome.

Candles From the Keeping Room - Strawberry Dew

Scent Description: A lemon/lime fizzy pop that we have taken to a new level and laced in sweet strawberries.

Date Received: February 2016

Weight Melted: 1.0 oz

Location of Warmer: Living room, in tealight warmer

Cold Sniff: 3/5 Very, very fizzy mountain dew poured over sweet strawberries.

Warm Sniff: 2/5 Oh, my goodness. Fizz overload. The strawberries died off and I was left with a very very fuzzy & sweet drink that permeated the house.

Scent Strength: 2.5/3

Scent Throw: >3/3 This filled the kitchen/dining area, master bedroom, office, hallway, entryway, and living room. Then, while I was out of the house I could still smell it on my clothes.

Melting Power: >3/5 I left the house around the 4 hour mark and by the time I got back 8 hours had passed and the scent had pretty much disappeared.

Repurchase: No. That was entirely too strong for me. I may melt the rest of this bag in 1/2 or 1/4 tart bits when I crave a little fizz or to add some fizz to another scent, but I don't think I'll be repurchasing this on its own.

Candes From the Keeping Room - Pink Strawberry Chiffon

Scent Description:  Strawberry mixed with a hint of pink sugar and pink chiffon.

Date Received: February 2016

Weight Melted: 1.0 oz

Location of Warmer: Kitchen, in tealight warmer

Cold Sniff: 4/5 50/50 Pink chiffon/strawberry. No pink sugar on cold sniff!

Warm Sniff: 4/5 The pink sugar came out a lot more and pink chiffon dropped to the side. All 3 were noticeable, though.

Scent Strength: 1/3

Scent Throw: 1.5/3 This filled the kitchen/dining area, some of the hallway, and some of the office.

Melting Power: 3/5 I got about 5 hours of scent from one tart.

Repurchase: Probably not. It didn't throw as far as I was hoping, was incredibly light in strength, and didn't last very long. Bummer, too, because I loved this scent and how it smelled!

Olde Primitive Treasures - Best Friends

Scent Description: A wonderful blend of boysenberries, elderberries, strawberries, guava and pomegranate with a down of soft vanilla.

Date Received: March 1, 2016

Weight Melted: 1.2 oz

Location of Warmer: Kitchen, in tealight warmer

Cold Sniff: 5/5 A very sweet berry blend. Not quite like anything I've melted from other vendors.

Warm Sniff: 5/5

Scent Strength: 1/3

Scent Throw: 3/3 This filled the entire kitchen/dining area, hallway, and office.

Melting Power: 4/5 I got about 7 hours of scent from one tart.

Repurchase: Yes! I was pleasantly surprised when looking at the wax pool and saw a swirling mix of glitter and shimmery awesomeness. It entranced me for a while. The smell and performance was exactly what I wanted, too! What's there not to like about this?

Band of Bloggers - Vol. 5/May 2016

You know what they say, April shower and all that jazz! Happy May, and welcome to the Band of Bloggers! We hope this post finds you well, and we hope the first half of your 2016 has been treating you right. Please join us in this month's conversation below, we love hearing feedback from our readers!

I don't know about the rest of you, but where I live, it's warm almost all the time. We barely have a fall season, and it hardly ever rains. I hate the heat, so in essence, I am forced to live with something I don't particularly like! 

My Band Of Bloggers question for May is: if you had to choose 1 or 2 scents you absolutely dread and you had to melt and smell them only for the rest of your life, what would they be and why? And also, why do you dislike them in the first place?

After a lot of thought, I have come to the conclusion that my two scents would be coconut and zucchini bread. Both of these scents I heavily dislike on their own. When blended right, however, I don't mind them as much. Coconut is easy for me to melt when it's blended with anything. Zucchini bread isn't something that I can stomach as easily. The blend has to be absolutely perfect for me to like it, and I've only come across one or two ZB blends that I've enjoyed in the three and a half years I've been melting. Coconut I dislike because of a bad experience with coconut rum. Zucchini bread I dislike because it smells like tortilla chips and sweaty dog feet more often than not. Yuck!

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Please visit these Band of Bloggers blogs
and help support the blogger community!

Deb, at It's Always Something.

Julie, at The Redolent Mermaid.

Lauren, at Lolo Loves Scents.

Liz, at Furianne. 

Michelle, at Waxing About.

Sunnee, at Fragrance Obsessed.

Sniff My Tarts - Ice Cream Cake Batter/Cotton Candy/Pomegranate

I'm doing a horrid job of making sure I have a picture of the wax I'm melting. I apologize. It's the pie on the left. <3

Scent Description: Luscious, creamy vanilla, almond, sugar cane, cake batter/fresh strawberry, sugar, sweet vanilla/none available.

Date Received: March 7, 2016

Weight Melted: 0.6 oz

Location of Warmer: Kitchen, in tealight warmer

Cold Sniff: 4/5 Lots of sweet cotton candy and cake batter. No pomegranate on cold sniff. Nonetheless, I very much liked what I smelled.

Warm Sniff: 5/5 Yummy! Sweet and light pomegranate made its way out and the end result was a sweet pomegranate & cotton candy cake. Probably too sweet for some. Divine for my nose.

Scent Strength: 2/3

Scent Throw: 3/3 This filled the entire kitchen/dining area, hallway, and office.

Melting Power: 4/5 I got about 6 and a half hours of scent from this tart.

Repurchase: Yes yes a million times yes! I loved this blend and have melted it several times since I first melted it. That and my ice cream cake batter/FPS blend are my go to scent right now.

Stop & Chat: April 29-May 4 - Yatop, Spring Festival, & Misc!

I took tons of pictures this weekend. Unfortunately none of them are ones that I can share publicly. I probably could, but I'd rather err on the side of caution. The picture above is all that I can show you with a clear conscience.

What does that mean? That means you shall be receiving a wall of text. If you choose to continue, you have been prepared.