Hello Everyone!
It's been a while since I promised a site update, but here it is! It's not incredibly big, but you know what? That's ok! As my body grows in tandem with the little child I have inside me, I get slower, more introspective. I find that my energy is turned inward. I'm less physically energetic; I find myself to be more dreamy, more receptive. I daydream in the bathtub and listen to music and feel a whole new range of complex emotions well up in me.
At the same time, business continually gets busier and that's great! My husband has been a great support in helping me keep up! Unfortunately, my morning sickness included an aversion to scents! (Oh no!) but it only bothers me slightly now. So I do apologize if things seem slower, but I'm running at a slower pace, trying to balance exhaustion, nausea and an ever-growing body! (Not to mention jacked-up printers and software! GRR!) I humbly thank you for your patience!
But enough of this sappy crap! On to the GOOD STUFF!!!
SALE!
Cyber Monday Sale - Buy 2 get 1 free! All lines (Except Limited Editions!)
Buy 2 bottles or pip sets and receive the third of equal or lesser value FREE!
The Cyber Monday orders for the sale will be accepted until Midnight Pacific Wednesday!
To order, just put the two bottles you would like in your cart and just add the third along in the comments or in an email! Easy peasy!
SHIPPING TAT FOR HOLIDAY GOODIES!
In order for you to receive your orders on time for the holidays, please order no later than December 14. I have re-enlisted my elves from last year to ensure we can get your packages out lickety-split!
SITE UPDATE!
Ghosts of Holidays Past - Yule 2009
The Winners of the Conjure Oils Holiday Contest are:
Samantha Sadler Texas , USA
Jennifer Teixeira California, USA
Lisa Chavez , New Mexico USA
Cassandra Messer Tennessee , USA\
Gail Talbot-Olson Massachusetts, USA
Please contact me to receive your Major Award! (A 5ml of your scent and a $50 credit at ConjureOils.com!)
And onto the site update...
Ghosts of Holidays Past
Yule 2009
It is only fitting that the holidays that celebrate the birth and return of light should be celebrated when the world is at its darkest (at least here in the Northern Hemisphere!) These scents celebrate that special liminal place where light and dark merge into a world created solely for those who exist on the other side.
A Spectral Ball
Encapsulating the holiday spirit of the spirits!
milky sap of poinsettias and yew lining the entrance to the ballroom, the ethereal breath of cardamom and cognac from the Yule punch, swirls of gossamer linen brushing the gleaming teak floors as the ghostly couples share a waltz from beyond the grave.
contributed by
Samantha Sadler Texas , USA
Belo Abismo
"Battle not with Monsters, lest you become a monster, and if you gaze into the Abyss, the abyss gazes into you." -Nietzche
sea lavender, bladderwrack, sea salt, lime and wanton tales dredged up from the myrrh-ky depths.
contributed by
Jennifer Teixeira California, USA
Haunted Gingerbread House
Eat this house before this house eats you!
ghoulish ginger, anguished allspice, vitiate vanilla, and craven cloves are seared into unholy brown cake walls topped with sweet cream concealing a dark heart of mayhem: bittersweet chocolate and chile.
contributed byLisa Chavez , New Mexico USA
Korochun
A Slavic holiday celebrated on the longest night of the year, December 21st. Hors, the old sun, becomes smaller as the days become shorter in the Northern Hemisphere and dies on the Solstice, defeated by the dark powers of Chernobog. On December 23rd Hors is resurrected and becomes the new sun, Koleda.
On this day Western Slavs lit fires at cemeteries to keep their loved ones warm, and organized feasts to honour the dead and keep them fed. They also lit wooden logs at local crossroads.
smoke carried on frosty air and promises of warm wheat bread, juicy figs, spiced cookies and buttered rum.
contributed by
Cassandra Messer Tennessee , USA
Winter Shroud
The cold loneliness of a mid-Winter night. Knee-deep snow below you, the silent forest around, and a clear never-ending darkness above. The only sound is the soft crunching of paws breaking through the drifts searching for prey. Everything sleeps, covered in a mantle of stillness.
smoldering oak carried to the nose on a bitter wind, frozen apples left to wither on the bough, decaying leaves amid ice tipped cedars lifted by the heat of dragon's blood and juicy pomegranate.
contributed by
Gail Talbot-Olson Massachusetts, USA
The Anti-Claus 2009
Santa's evil twin who, come New Year, delivers the consequences of too much holiday cheer!
Peppermint schnapps, coal dust, cigar smoke, and wooden switches
contributed by
Karen Shibuya, Virginia USA 2008
It's pleasure and pain.
Tangy pomegranate and juicy black cherry submit to the decadent will of dark chocolate
Ded Moroz 2009
Ded Moroz, or Father Frost, is a character akin to Santa Claus in the Ukraine and other parts of Eastern Europe. He delivers gifts in person to children with his granddaughter Snegurochka,"Snow Maiden", donning his heel-length, crimson fur lined coat, hat and valenki boots. Celebrate a true Ukrainian Christmas with perennially popular Eastern European cookies baked special for Ded Moroz and Snegurochka! Cut into rounds, stars, or crescents, they are often hung on the lower branches of the Yule tree as treats for the younger children
notes in this delectable offering are warm and dry ginger, golden peach honey, orange peel and toasted almonds with a just a hint of spice and a delicate dusting of powdered sugar on top
contributed by
Jennifer Tonapi, Ohio, USA 2007
Festival of Lights 2009
Hanukkah, the Hebrew word sometimes translated as "dedication" or "consecration", is celebrated on the 25th day in the month of Kislev, falling anywhere between late November to late December. It is marked by lighting candles each night on the Menorah just after dusk to invite miracles, wonders and to express gratitude.
a scent for Hanukkah, warm and inviting: fresh baked loaves of Challah, golden tendrils of honey, sweet beeswax candles, frankincense, saffron, and clove
Contributed by
Shawna Morse, Georgia, USA 2007
Come light the Menorah
Let's have a party
We'll all dance the Horah
Gather round the table
We'll give you a treat
S'vivon to play
And levivot to eat
All the sweet treats of Hannukah!
Strawberry-filled sufganiyot, a dusting of powdered sugar, honey-crusted sesame seed candies and milk chocolate gelt
Contributed by
Nikki Imai & Michelle Parker
Irvine, CA/Ottawa, ON 2008
Little Match Girl 2009
The Little Match Girl
By Hans Christian Andersen
first published in 1845
"Most terribly cold it was; it snowed, and was nearly quite dark, and evening-- the last evening of the year. In this cold and darkness there went along the street a poor little girl, bareheaded, and with naked feet. When she left home she had slippers on, it is true; but what was the good of that? They were very large slippers, which her mother had hitherto worn; so large were they; and the poor little thing lost them as she scuffled away across the street, because of two carriages that rolled by dreadfully fast.
"One slipper was nowhere to be found; the other had been laid hold of by an urchin, and off he ran with it; he thought it would do capitally for a cradle when he some day or other should have children himself. So the little maiden walked on with her tiny naked feet, that were quite red and blue from cold. She carried a quantity of matches in an old apron, and she held a bundle of them in her hand. Nobody had bought anything of her the whole livelong day; no one had given her a single farthing.
"She crept along trembling with cold and hunger--a very picture of sorrow, the poor little thing!
"The flakes of snow covered her long fair hair, which fell in beautiful curls around her neck; but of that, of course, she never once now thought. From all the windows the candles were gleaming, and it smelt so deliciously of roast goose, for you know it was New Year's Eve; yes, of that she thought.
"In a corner formed by two houses, of which one advanced more than the other, she seated herself down and cowered together. Her little feet she had drawn close up to her, but she grew colder and colder, and to go home she did not venture, for she had not sold any matches and could not bring a farthing of money: from her father she would certainly get blows, and at home it was cold too, for above her she had only the roof, through which the wind whistled, even though the largest cracks were stopped up with straw and rags.
"Her little hands were almost numbed with cold. Oh! a match might afford her a world of comfort, if she only dared take a single one out of the bundle, draw it against the wall, and warm her fingers by it. She drew one out. "Rischt!" how it blazed, how it burnt! It was a warm, bright flame, like a candle, as she held her hands over it: it was a wonderful light. It seemed really to the little maiden as though she were sitting before a large iron stove, with burnished brass feet and a brass ornament at top. The fire burned with such blessed influence; it warmed so delightfully. The little girl had already stretched out her feet to warm them too; but--the small flame went out, the stove vanished: she had only the remains of the burnt-out match in her hand.
"She rubbed another against the wall: it burned brightly, and where the light fell on the wall, there the wall became transparent like a veil, so that she could see into the room. On the table was spread a snow-white tablecloth; upon it was a splendid porcelain service, and the roast goose was steaming famously with its stuffing of apple and dried plums. And what was still more capital to behold was, the goose hopped down from the dish, reeled about on the floor with knife and fork in its breast, till it came up to the poor little girl; when--the match went out and nothing but the thick, cold, damp wall was left behind. She lighted another match. Now there she was sitting under the most magnificent Christmas tree: it was still larger, and more decorated than the one which she had seen through the glass door in the rich merchant's house.
"Thousands of lights were burning on the green branches, and gaily-colored pictures, such as she had seen in the shop-windows, looked down upon her. The little maiden stretched out her hands towards them when--the match went out. The lights of the Christmas tree rose higher and higher, she saw them now as stars in heaven; one fell down and formed a long trail of fire.
"Someone is just dead!" said the little girl; for her old grandmother, the only person who had loved her, and who was now no more, had told her, that when a star falls, a soul ascends to God.
"She drew another match against the wall: it was again light, and in the luster there stood the old grandmother, so bright and radiant, so mild, and with such an expression of love.
"Grandmother!" cried the little one. "Oh, take me with you! You go away when the match burns out; you vanish like the warm stove, like the delicious roast goose, and like the magnificent Christmas tree!" And she rubbed the whole bundle of matches quickly against the wall, for she wanted to be quite sure of keeping her grandmother near her. And the matches gave such a brilliant light that it was brighter than at noon-day: never formerly had the grandmother been so beautiful and so tall. She took the little maiden, on her arm, and both flew in brightness and in joy so high, so very high, and then above was neither cold, nor hunger, nor anxiety--they were with God.
"But in the corner, at the cold hour of dawn, sat the poor girl, with rosy cheeks and with a smiling mouth, leaning against the wall--frozen to death on the last evening of the old year. Stiff and stark sat the child there with her matches, of which one bundle had been burnt. "She wanted to warm herself," people said. No one had the slightest suspicion of what beautiful things she had seen; no one even dreamed of the splendor in which, with her grandmother she had entered on the joys of a new year."
Dying matches, splintered wood, bitter snow and the tantalizing visions of apples and dried plums fading from a vision
Contributed by
Atalanta & Fawxe, Texas USA 2008
Misa del Gallo 2009
Misa del Gallo, or "Roosters Mass" is a name used in Latin America for the Catholic Tradition of Midnight Mass. It comes from the belief that the rooster was one of the first creatures to witness and then announce the birth of the infant Jesus.
celebrate midnight mass in an ancient cathedral: dark amber, sweet myrrh, olibanum, candle smoke wafting heavenward, raw chocolate, desert chaparral and sweetgrass
Contributed by
Gary Lodato, North Carolina, USA 2007
"Good girls go to Heaven. Bad girls go everywhere." -Mae West
ginger infused bourbon vanilla, flirtatious bergamot, bold clove and champagne
Nice 2009
Just how good have you been this year?
a perfectly angelic arrangement of spun sugar, white orchid and sweet patchouli
Snegurochka 2009
In Russian folklore, there is a snow maiden named Snegurochka - daughter and helper of Grandfather Frost who has the jolly task of delivering presents to children on Christmas. In one old fairy tale, Snegurochka yearns for the companionship of mortal humans and falls in love with a beautiful shepherd named Lel. Unfortunately, her heart is frozen and unable to know love. Her mother - Mother Spring - takes pity on her dear Snegurochka and gives her heart the capacity to love. However, her heart of snow and deep ice melts in the heat of passion.
Snegurochka, how cold it is!
Vitreous soul
It does not wait my love
It knows all secrets in advance
How difficult it is for me
What more can I say?
And my heart aches
Ice heated
And difficultly selected words
Where is your accordion?
Where is the light of love?
Do you not know?
romantic and withering iced rose warmed with a heart of oud and ignited with spicy ginger
Contributed by
Christine D., OR USA 2008
The sting of black leather on shivering skin; the merging of ice and lust.
Frozen musk topped by worn leather, thawed by sultry sandalwood and a drop of sweetest honey
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These scents will be available until the New Year!
Happy holidays and all the best!
Vajra
