Memories of Jennifer and Grandma

One of my earliest wholesale customers was Jennifer, from Florida. Although we initially hit a few bumps in the road to our friendship while we were trying to smooth out the ordering process (which we laughed about later), we became good friends. Jennifer designed a beautiful Pink Ribbon fragrance lamp to signify her battle with breast cancer, which unfortunately was lost last April. I still communicate with her mother, Marcia, frequently and was delighted to learn that she will be visiting us soon while staying in San Antonio to meet Jennifer’s new granddaughter, Sofie. This lamp was designed at Marcia’s request and I was thrilled that February’s flower of the month was the violet which was also one of my grandmother’s favorites. So our new violets fragrance lamp has special meaning in more ways than one.

By any other name…

Seems like there are certain designs that are always popular, and the rose is certainly one of them. I like this simple illustration I found last weekend on ClipArt.com and think it makes a really pretty lamp… even makes me want to burn some Fresh Cut Roses!

Filling an opaque fragrance lamp

My first fragrance lamp was a beautiful black ceramic Lampe Berger that we picked up while vacationing in Galveston about seven years ago. At the time we were living in an old Craftsman-style bungalow and the lamp went perfectly with the styling of the house, with simple Mission-inspired lines. I loved that house, and the lamp will always remind me of the happy times we spent there. Since it was opaque, I wanted to find a way to efficiently and easily keep from overfilling it. The system I came up with is certainly not rocket science, but since I get lots of questions about it, I thought I’d post it here.

I recommend doing this over the kitchen sink to avoid a mess. Fill your empty fragrance lamp with fragrance lamp oil until you can see it almost to the top of the neck opening of the lamp (yes, you’re overfilling it at this point). Now pour the fragrance lamp oil from the lamp into an empty glass measuring cup (Pyrex, Anchor Hocking). If your lamp is a large one, you will probably want to use a 2-cup measuring cup to make sure you have enough room for all the fragrance lamp oil. Make note of how much you’ve emptied into the measuring cup and pour 1/3 of that amount back into the fragrance lamp oil bottle. The remainder, 2/3 of what was emptied from the lamp, is your ‘target’ amount for filling that particular fragrance lamp. If you’re really organized, write this amount on a little label or piece of tape that you can stick to the bottom of the lamp for reference. If you don’t want to use fragrance lamp oil to make this calculation, water will do the trick… just make sure let the inside of your lamp dry out before using it again.

Sweet Dreams

I probably wake up at least a half dozen times during the night for one reason or another… usually because one of the pups has decided that there’s something really exciting going on that needs investigating. Getting back to sleep is a challenge for me. Once I’m awake, I can’t seem to shut off my brain again and sometimes lie in bed for an hour or more before I finally give up and get up for a while. The way I figure it, as long as I’m awake I may as well work on the website or a blog or whatever. When I do that, the next night I can usually count on sleeping a little better only because I’m so tired.

Our last home, in the tiny community of Holman, TX, was down the road from some busy gravel pits. ‘Busy’ as in the trucks started running about 3:30 a.m. every week day morning, so you’d go from dead silence to the sound of semi’s thundering up and down the road to the gravel pit, making sleep nearly impossible once they started running. I found a great little bedroom device (get your mind out of the gutter!) that did the trick – a white noise machine. It’s not high tech, but it works by making soothing background noise. We’ve since moved from that house to another that is way out in the sticks… and even quieter at night. Well, except for the dogs. So the white noise machine still helps.

But another favorite sleep aide for me is my fragrance lamp. Burning it at night, while we sleep, is one of my favorite times to use it. When I wake for whatever reason, sleep always seems to come back a little quicker when the lamp has a soothing, clean scent going. Now if I could only figure out what scent would keep the dogs quiet!

StentStix – Reed diffusers on steroids

My two new favorite products are both from the folks at Stonewick. I’ve written recently about the Platinum Wick for fragrance lamps, and today I’m excited to discuss ScentStix – Stonewick’s answer to reed diffusers.

I’m kind of weird about reed diffusers. We see them in advertisements in beautifully decorated, immaculately clean homes. I’m here to tell you that my home is not like that. We actually live in it and dirt and dust and dog hair (especially) abound. When using a standard reed diffuser, I never add more than a couple ounces of oil to the diffuser vase because I can’t stand the thought of dust settling in the oil. And it does! We live in the country and the dust that settles inside the house amazes me… I can write my name in it every couple days. So you know that a fair share of dust has to land inside the reed diffuser vase. I flip the reeds periodically (well, once in a while). I have always wished they throw scent a little stronger and stay a little cleaner.

The scent that is used in reed diffusers is blended with various ingredients depending on the manufacturer, but must be blended in order for the reeds to be able to wick up the scent and to allow the scent to evaporate without just sitting in the reeds. Enter ScentStix, made from a unique absorbent stone material that sucks up fragrance like you wouldn’t believe. Only with ScentStix, you use pure fragrance and add tap or distilled water (I use distilled… I like the idea of keeping everything pure). The directions recommend that you add approximately 1/4 oz. of the oil included (Linen is my favorite – powerfully clean smelling) to the reed diffuser vase, add 4-6 oz. water, and insert the reeds. The fragrance is evident within about 15 minutes and is strong and long lasting. As the water evaporates, you can add more water, more fragrance, or both.

In talking with my friend from Stonewick, I’ve learned that they can now recommend another method for using the ScentStix that seems to give even better results. Instead of adding water to the pure fragrance, you let the ScentStix absorb the fragrance first and then add the water. This method really appeals to me because the fragrance oil is absorbed in the ScentStix and less likely to float around in the water. The water is also absorbed into the ScentStix and as it evaporates, the scent is dispersed, in a much more efficient manner than with standard reed diffusers. The best thing about ScentStix? You can wash them and change fragrances. To do this, you just lay them in a shallow pan (an 8′x8′ glass baking dish would work great) and soak them in rubbing alcohol. They’ll last forever as long as you don’t let your rather large dog bump into the table and send them falling onto your stained concrete floor (thank you, Girlie Dog).  I have my ScentStix in some of our engraved reed diffuser bottles and they look (and smell) great. ScentStix are currently available in six scents: Linen, Orange Spice, Stargazer Lily, Apple Cinnamon, Ocean, and Slices. We’re now offering some of our own fragrances for use with ScentStix as well.

Your favorite fragrance… better with the Platinum Wick

There are lots of reasons to love Stonewick’s new Platinum Wick for fragrance lamps and we tend to focus mainly on how easy it is to light. After all, that’s the biggest challenge to using and enjoying fragrance lamps. But did you know that the Platinum Wick can actually make your favorite fragrance lamp oil even better? Here’s how…

Stone wicks have a cotton wicking material that is inserted into the stone. When the stone wick is burning, the high heat it produces comes in direct contact with the cotton wick and the fragrance lamp oil it has absorbed. In order for the scent to be released, it needs to survive the high heat of the catalytic process and the results aren’t always what we’d hoped for. With the Platinum Wick, the catalytic screen is what burns the fragrance lamp oil and it does not come in direct contact with the wick or the fragrance lamp oil in order to do so. The result? A really strong, pure version that is closer than ever to the way the scent was intended to be enjoyed. And since you don’t need to worry about clogging with the Platinum Wick, even the strongest fragrance lamp oils burn cleanly and completely.

A new signature

Back in the early 70′s, when I was a teenager, I recall shopping the perfume counter at Walgreen’s for my ‘signature’ scent. It would change periodically, but probably started with Love’s Baby Soft or Heaven Scent. For some reason the most memorable one I chose was a tiny 69¢ bottle of musk oil that lasted forever and had that deep, sensual scent that you either love or hate. I loved it. I can even remember the bottle vividly… tiny ‘pleats’ of glass arranged in a circle with the label in the center. That scent changed the way I felt about myself. Suddenly, I was mysterious and worldly (at least in my mind!). The oil was heavy in both scent and consistency, and lasted forever.

The magical contents of that bottle was really an ‘attar’ rather than a perfume, which is scented oil without any alcohol. We’ve probably all been around someone so drenched in perfume or cologne that the scent is positively cloying, and that always ruins a scent for me even if it’s one I originally liked. And I’m sure I’ve been guilty of overindulging in favorite perfumes myself. I think it’s probably easy to do because when we initially start using a scent, it’s all we can smell on ourselves. When our nose has become accustomed to the same scent for a long time, we can no longer smell it as strongly, or even at all, and tend to compensate by using more. The alcohol in perfumes sends this overabundance of scent wafting everywhere. With attars, the scent stays within your personal space.

So through the years I’ve continued to search for a scent that made me feel different about myself in the way that wonderful musk oil did. Last year my friend Juli, who is that earthy, hip kind of cool I admire so much, shared with me a bottle of the scent she has been hand blending for years. She originally made it just for herself, but was asked so often “What are you wearing?” that she began to blend it to share with others. The bottle itself is a tiny little gem and I just knew the contents were going to be special. I instantly fell in love with the combination of Tunisian frankincense, patchouli and other essences that combined perfectly to make what I knew was my true signature scent, Abba Jireh. What could be better? When the hubs told me I smelled ‘intoxicating’. Yeah. That’ll work.

Get out of the ‘stone age’ with Stonewick’s Platinum Wick for fragrance lamps

Fragrance lamps have been around for more than a hundred years, thanks to Maurice Berger’s invention designed to clean the air in hospitals and mortuaries. These unique effusion devices have evolved to their current status of collectible, functional home and office decor. The most important component of the fragrance lamp is the stone wick, which can be finicky to successfully light, even for experienced fragrance lamp users. But relief is finally in sight thanks to the folks at Stonewick and their newest product, the Platinum Wick. We were thrilled to be selected by Stonewick to be the first online store to handle the Platinum Wick and ‘kick the tires,’ and that’s exactly what we’ve been doing for the past several weeks.

The Platinum Wick has a cotton cord or ‘wick’ like it’s stone wick cousin, but that’s where the similarity ends. The business end of the Platinum Wick is all metal, with a high-tech screen that glows when heated instead of a stone. Interesting! But how well would it work? I was excited to find out.

I’m generally an impatient kind of person, so instead of letting the wick soak with the snuffer cap on, I dunked it in wick cleaner while I was filling my fragrance lamp. Within just a minute or two I had filled the lamp and inserted the saturated wick, noticing how nicely the Platinum Wick seats on the metal lamp tier (where the stone wick usually wobbles a bit and doesn’t really ‘seat’). Using a BBQ lighter, I held the flame to the metal screen and within seconds it was glowing and I blew out the flame. The lamp was filled with 4 oz. of fragrance lamp oil and I started it at about 8:30 a.m. At 5:00 p.m., it was still burning! The scent throw was very nice, and I was definitely impressed with how much longer the fuel burned with the Platinum Wick, being used to a stone wick burning the same amount in about 4 hours.

Subsequent use of the Platinum Wick also gave great results, although I realized how important it is to follow the instructions a little closer than I had. For instance, the instructions indicate that the lamp should be burned 15-30 minutes and then capped with the snuffer. I’ve always been in the habit of burning out my stone wicks and expected to do the same with the Platinum Wick each time, but there’s a good reason NOT to. When a fragrance lamp is burned out, the wick tends to burn much hotter as it runs out of fragrance. This can really ‘stress’ the cotton wick and cause it to prematurely char, after which it can’t effectively absorb the fragrance lamp oil needed to burn. So I’ve learned to snuff my Platinum Wick when it still has an ounce or so of fragrance lamp oil remaining and before it starts burning hotter. Also, the type of lighter can make a difference. Cigar or ‘torch’ type lighters, with a small, focused flame, are great for heating the mesh screen without burning up the cotton wick inside. Don’t have a cigar-type lighter? Use your BBQ lighter and hold the side of the flame against the screen (so it’s not flaming into the inside of the metal chamber and charring the cotton), and blow the flame out quickly.

I think these wicks are great, and definitely worth taking a few minutes to learn how to use correctly. Please feel free to comment with your own Platinum Wick experience or questions. I’m in almost daily contact with the manufacturer and will definitely pass along questions that I can’t answer myself.

Donna’s Sparrows

My mother loved birds. Of every size and shape… all were precious to her. We had several parakeets while I was still living at home, and later she *graduated* to a cockatiel. I remember helping her name him. I was flipping through her cockatiel care book and the first sentence read something like, “Cockatiels are lively, sprightly birds…”. “Why don’t you name him Sprightly?”, I asked her? That’s all it took. She adored that bird and he adored her, but for some reason he and I just didn’t hit it off. Each time I’d visit, he’d buzz my head as close as he could get, and would never let me hold him like my mother did. When Mama had her stroke and was living in a nursing home the last 5-1/2 years of her life, I was entrusted with Sprightly’s care. I couldn’t have him out of his cage because I could never get him back in without undue stress to us both, and I reminded him frequently that at age 22, he had well outlived his expected longevity! The family of one of my mother’s roommates at the nursing home fell in love with Sprightly, and he ended up living happily with them for the rest of his days.

But back to my mother’s love of birds… On my desk in front of my monitor sit a pair of little porcelain sparrows that belonged to my mother. Sparrows are so unassuming… little brown birds that don’t command a lot of attention, but make our world a better place with their simple beauty. When I ran across the design for our Donna’s Sparrows fragrance lamp and reed diffuser, it reminded me of the love my mother had for every single creature on this earth. Wednesday was the 5 year anniversary of her death, and at times it feels like it just happened yesterday.