ONCE UPON A DREAM; Autumn Scents, Home Comforts

My candle addiction! I love filling my home with Yankee scents.

Photo from; www.yankeedirect.com

Yesterday I went candle shopping in the local shopping center.  I had so much fun, just sniffing everything like a little puppy, getting excited by the new autumn and winter fragrances.  Shopping for home fragrance goodies is one of my  annual autumn rituals; every September I stock pile spicy candles and scented tea-lights, festive oils and woody incense sticks...all the warm scents that evoke the spirits of autumn and winter.
It is one of the ways in which I welcome in the new season.  I have done it for years, even when I was strapped for cash I would still make sure I bought a couple of packs of incense sticks in fine autumnal scents such as cinnamon and spiced apple.  Incense is certainly one of the least expensive ways to invest in the scents of autumn if you are feeling the pinch.

Yesterday I enjoyed the thrill of a Yankee candle shopping spree.  I bought all my favorite autumn fragrances; Cinnamon Sticks, Sparkling Cinnamon, Kitchen Spice, Black Cherry and Honey & Spice from their new collection. I also picked up a Mandarin Cranberry wall plug-in and a couple of Cinnamon Sticks refills as this is my favorite autumn/winter scent.  I have the plug-in on now and it is filling the house with a beautiful fragrance.

I got a new oil burner too; I had been looking for one for a long time as I wanted a burner with a separate well, rather than a single fixed unit. I also do not like the burner's with a shallow glass dish balanced precariously on top - they crack and break far too easily.  The burner I bought is Yankee's Petal Bowl Burner in pink, with an ironwork stand and a pottery bowl.  This is for my bedroom, as I already have a lovely mermaid burner in my kitchen and a fairy one in the living room.  I then bought a range of burner oils from Marks & Spencer's in fabulous scents such as Frosted Christmas, Mandarin, Cinnamon & Clove, Apple & Elder-flower etc.  I love their oils as they are inexpensive and they do last for ages.  Again if you are strapped for cash and want to fill your home with the scents of autumn and winter, these oils are a wonderful way to do so without breaking the bank.  M&S room sprays are also beautiful; my current favorite being Mandarin, Cinnamon and Clove.

Yankee products can be a bit on the pricey side, but they are designed to be a treat, an everyday indulgence; and the tarts and scented tea-lights are at the cheaper end of the price range so there is something everyone can afford.  It certainly felt like an indulgence to me yesterday walking out of the shopping center with a couple of bags of Yankee goodies, the fragrances wafting around me as I walked to my car.  When I got home I had more fun just sniffing and trying the new oils and so on.

Today it's back to the grindstone and I have been tucked away in my library working on some editorial copy that I need to get in to one of my editors early next week.  I love being in my own little study, surrounded by the home comfort of my books - I missed it so much when I was away in the Highlands.  Pyewackett is curled up asleep in his basket beneath the escritoire; the wind-chime is tinkling softly in the breeze from the open window; the sun is shining through the faceted crystal hung in the window, casting sunlight and rainbows upon the spines of the books.  I am burning one of my new candles Honey & Spice.  It smells warm and comforting, mingling in with the scent that drifts from the mug of Options Turkish Delight hot chocolate, with marshmallows, that sits on a Bruce coaster beside me. It is the scent of a home-coming.  I gaze around the study in wonder...this is my job...I am working right now...I know how very fortunate I am... but I also know how hard I worked to get here.  There is no such creature as an over-night success.