#SCENTsational Saturdays- Through the Years- Skin Musk by Bonne Bell

Skin Musk is clean, fresh and sexy! Let the soft aroma of floral, sandalwood and musk embrace you. A touch is all it takes to turn on the romance.

Ah...another perfume that, surprise surprise, has sandalwood in it! LOL Even without picking it intentionally, it's another fragrance I veer toward when picking perfumes. This perfume is actually still sold in stores and can commonly be found at Wal-Mart. I don't have any at the moment, but I've been tempted to buy a new bottle of it, just to see if I still like the smell as much as I did in my youth. Life has changed and I wonder if this one would be much like Exclamation, which might throw me into a fit of migraine attacks.

But having said that, I do remember fondly wearing this until I emptied the bottle and had to buy a new one and I seem to recall doing that a lot, so this must have had quite a few qualities I liked, one of which I do remember specifically. It has staying power. You don't have to apply a lot and the fragrance would stay with you from morning till night.

What I remember about it was that it was a "louder" scent than most perfumes that young girls wore, it was more sensual and to me represented being older, perhaps more sophisticated and feminine, which as some point, all young girls want to be.

When I think if this perfume, a few oldies but goodies from my youth come to mind musically, so I'll share a few videos today-

Have a SCENTsational SATURDAY!

#MemoryLane Mondays- #Musically Inclined #childhood #music

I've always been musically inclined. Even as a child, my love of music has defined moments in my life. I can hear a song and be transported back to when I was 5, 10, 15, 20, etc. I think its in my blood—

My grandmothers on both sides of my family were truly musically inclined. My dad's mother played piano, my mom's mom played the organ, guitar and French harp (otherwise known as a harmonica.) My grandma on my mom's side taught me a little about the organ, but I never really took it up more than to pick at the keys and play a little tune by ear.

What I remember though is begging her to sing Tom Dooley and How Far is Heaven and play the guitar. I dragged a small radio with me everywhere, an old metal clothes hanger for an antenna, crying over The Devil Went Down to Georgia. I listened to Sha-Na-Na on 8-track and borrowed 8-tracks and records from my uncle of Juice Newton, Blondie, Barry Manilow and Anne Murray.

Many times my mom could be found washing dishes or cooking a meal and singing along to the radio or records of Alabama, Air Supply, Charlie Rich and John Conlee. My dad, working on some woodcraft project in the basement, usually listened to Garrison Keillor on public radio or Bob Seger & the Silver Bullet Band or James Taylor.

Because of the eclectic variety of music I grew up on and the birth of Mtv and music videos when I was 6, my taste in music runs wild and deep. I remember sitting in front of my mom's record player listening to music that pre-dated me- Herman's Hermits, Paul Revere & the Raiders, The Lovin' Spoonful, Lou Christie, the Beatles.

As soon as I got a cassette recording boombox with a radio, I'd stay up on the weekends recording The Crystals, Bobby Darin, Little Eva, The Supremes, The Jackson 5 on the oldies stations as well as Michael Jackson, Madonna, Expose, New Kids on the Block and Debbie Gibson on the Weekly Top 40.

I wore out my Olivia Newton-John Greatest Hits Vol. 2 on 33 1/3 and the Thriller album. I danced all over my room to She's So Unusual record of Cyndi Lauper and loved Rick Springfield's Hard to Hold soundtrack.

The 1st CD I bought was actually Eddie Money's The Sound of Money, which I still have and love.

Even now, I find my tastes vary and one day I can be totally immersed in A Perfect Circle or chillin' to Ben Taylor's gentle folksy vocals that remind me so much of his father- James Taylor.

My most current musical inclinations-
Payphone- Maroon 5
Call Me Maybe- Carly Rae Jepsen
Beekeeper's Daughter- The All-American Rejects
Brokenhearted- Karmin
Not Over You- Gavin DeGraw
Drive By- Train

Does music tie you to your memories- what are some of your favorites?

#SCENTsational Saturdays- Through The Years- #Exclamation

Introduced in 1988, Exclamation has hints of peach, apricot, amber and sandalwood and it definitely leaves an impression.

When I smell this fragrance nowadays, I find it hard to believe I ever wore it when I was a quiet, shy chubby teenage girl. This was not, is not, a scent for the timid. This perfume shouted from the rooftops that you had arrived, you were there! EXCLAMATION! No ifs, ands or buts about it. Others would know you were coming before you entered the room.

The funniest thing, it gave me a busting headache and yet, I wore it. My mom HATED it- thought it the most loud odor she'd ever had the misfortune to gift to me at the holidays and dreaded every spritz of my bottle. I'm sure there were times she hoped that I'd finally hit the bottom of that little white bottle, but then, if I had allowance money, I'd head straight to the store to buy more.

Now I can do without the overpowering scent, but the thing I cherish most about it- the imagery and memories it conjures up- music and time, divided by decades, but one whiff of Exclamation and I'm there all over again- Take a musical journey with me-

Do you remember any of these songs?
What were some of your favorites late 80's/early 90's?

Man, I wish LL had the official video for this. LOVED that video SO much. He was such a cutie! Still is!

Have a SCENTsational Saturday!

Snow Queen by @lindawisdom #Romance (#Fave #Book #Spotlight)

SHE WAS A WOMAN WITH A REPUTATION.

Men called her the Snow

Queen; she was unapproachable,
untouchable. But inside
Samantha Danvers was as vulnerable
as anyone, and Mike Trent was
the man who had made her that way.

The handsome novelist had once
broken Samantha's heart and
she had vowed never to love again.
That vow had been easy to
keep—until the day he came back,
determined to crack her shell
of ice. Only one question terrified
Samantha then: Which would
break first, her shell...or her heart?
****

This book is one that I have cherished since the first time I ever read it. Published in 1983, I'm honestly not sure when I read it, but what I do know is that the original copy I owned is not the one in my possession now. Somehow my copy got misplaced (I think my mom might have found it later, tucked away in my sister's closet) but the one I own now came to me in the strange and wonderful way things sometimes do.

I moved to where I now live in 2001, got married, had a baby and for a long time, taking care of an infant made reading nearly impossible. It made doing most anything outside of motherhood impossible because I stayed tired between taking care of my 4-5 year old stepson and our infant to toddling daughter, life stayed hectic... but around 2003 I found I had more time again to enjoy things like movies and reading, so I searched through my bookcase for some of my favorite time-tested books and I couldn't find Snow Queen anywhere. This absolutely broke my heart.

I called my mom, but she didn't know if I'd left it behind either and said she'd have to look for it because there were some books tucked in a closet. In the meantime, I had started checking around online, trying to find it, thinking perhaps I could find a used copy to buy. That search didn't really find much, but searching for Linda Wisdom did. I found her email address, or at least I hoped it was hers, and wrote to ask if she was the author of a book by that title.

Sure enough, I heard back from her and she was and she couldn't believe I remembered that book. We emailed a few times and I told her I'd lost my copy and was just trying to find one I could possibly buy. Instead, she found a copy she still had on her bookshelf, autographed it and mailed it to me. That was a big SQUEE moment for me. It's silly I know, but I still get teary about it. As soon as I received it, I carefully opened it and read the inscription-

"8/28/03 For Holly, Who truly has a long memory for a book. Thank you! Linda Wisdom"

I read the book within a day of receiving it and relived one of my favorite stories all over again. I felt inspired again, felt like I found a piece of me I had lost somewhere along the way to becoming a grown woman, a wife, a mother. And in the process, I started finding my way as an author myself. It was still 3 years before I started taking myself seriously as a writer, but making that connection with Linda was like finding the first tiny jewel of a treasure and it reminded me that I had stories I wanted to tell, too. Stories hidden away that I needed to dig up and share.

Nowadays Linda Wisdom writes very sexy, hexy witches and demons and she's recently re-released some of her old titles with fresh new covers. Check out her books on her website. You might just find something enchanting to cast a spell on you!