They say a scented candle can really brighten up a room and whilst I do believe that, I'm not into scented candles as such. I do, however, think wax tarts are great! I love to crumble them up together and mix the scents. Yankee Candle calls it "mixology" or something, but I only found that out a few days ago and I've been mixing my wax tarts for years. But anyway, here are my go-to spring/summer scents that really do brighten up my bedroom, especially when this long awaited "spring weather" decides to take a few days off.
Cherry Vanilla - this is a bit of a new purchase in terms of my Yankee Candle obsession. It basically smells like sour cherries, and it's really strongly scented. It smells delicious and although it's a newbie for me I love it. This one is far too strong for me to burn alone - I tried it and it gave me a headache - but when I mix it with Vanilla Frosting, or any other vanilla scented wax tart I have to hand, Vanilla Cupcake, for example, it smells glorious.
Pink Sands - another new addition to my collection but the smells divine as well. I'm not exactly sure what the notes are as I can't find a cohesive list of scent notes for Yankee Candle anywhere - if you know of one please let me know - but to me this smells fresh in a watermelon/cucumber kind of way, with a sweetness that could come from a sweet vanilla. On the website, Yankee Candle describes "bright citrus, sweet florals and spicy vanilla" and personally I don't detect any citrus or anything spicy about the vanilla, but your nose could pick up something different. Even though this already has a detectable vanilla scent, if I don't mix this with another vanilla tart it smells really strongly of strangely sweet cucumber whilst it's burning.
Summer Scoop - This one is really overpowering on its own, but I adore it when I mix it with Vanilla Frosting, or again any other vanilla tart I have to hand. This one smells like strawberry ice cream, you know the posh stuff with real strawberries, and I get a whiff of raspberry too, but it kind of smells artificial as well. Not my favourite of the bunch but when I add vanilla to it, the additional creaminess from the vanilla counterbalances the cloying plastic-y scent and it instantly shoots to the top of my list.
Vanilla Frosting - I love this scent so much that this is the second time I've repurchased it and I'm going to bust this one open as soon as I've finished typing this up! It smells like a lighter, less sweet, version of the beloved Christmas Cookie. It's great on its own as it is a wonderfully sweet and creamy vanilla scent, and I also love to mix this with heavier, or stronger scents, to lighten or sweeten them up a little, as I've explained with the previous scents.
TIP #1: So don't feel pressured to use a whole tart, or half, at once and feel free to squeeze and crumble as much or as little as you like. As you can see in the pictures, there's only little bits of each tart missing and that's because I squeeze and crumble little bits at a time into the burner, and once I've finished mixing that usually equates to about a quarter of a tart, which literally just squeezes into my tiny oil burner.The burn time does become shorter obviously because the quantity of scented oil to burn off is lower, but the great thing - or not so great, depending on how you look at it - about Yankee Candles is that the scents linger for a while after the candle has gone out, or the oils have all been burnt.
TIP #2: When purchasing your wax tarts, or the small votive candles, always, and I mean always, pick up one of the jar candles, yank the lid off and take a good sniff. That's the best way I've found to get an accurate representation of what you're buying. Although you can smell the wax tarts and the votive candles, the scent is a lot stronger when it's not restricted by the plastic wrapper, and has been trapped in the candle jar for hours.
TIP #3: I've also noticed that sometimes, these scented candles and wax tarts smell slightly different when the wax is melted to how it does when the wax in solid form. A fine example of this is with the Red Velvet candle. In the jar it smells amazing, but when it's burning all I could smell was peaches. So bare that in mind, too.
TIP #4: And lastly, when you'd like to change a fragrance, when your wax has cooled down and formed a solid in your burner, light an unscented tea light as normal and wait a few seconds for the base of the wax to heat up a little bit. If you press down on one side of the still solid wax, the disc of wax should slide right out. If it doesn't it's because there's not enough wax to do this. I don't know how that works scientifically but in this case abort mission, as the hot wax will spurt all over the place. Trust me, I've been there.
This post was a lot longer that I expected it to be! But of you're still with me, thank you! I hope you will find this useful and/or inspiring.
Thanks for reading! xo.
Pink Sands - another new addition to my collection but the smells divine as well. I'm not exactly sure what the notes are as I can't find a cohesive list of scent notes for Yankee Candle anywhere - if you know of one please let me know - but to me this smells fresh in a watermelon/cucumber kind of way, with a sweetness that could come from a sweet vanilla. On the website, Yankee Candle describes "bright citrus, sweet florals and spicy vanilla" and personally I don't detect any citrus or anything spicy about the vanilla, but your nose could pick up something different. Even though this already has a detectable vanilla scent, if I don't mix this with another vanilla tart it smells really strongly of strangely sweet cucumber whilst it's burning.
Summer Scoop - This one is really overpowering on its own, but I adore it when I mix it with Vanilla Frosting, or again any other vanilla tart I have to hand. This one smells like strawberry ice cream, you know the posh stuff with real strawberries, and I get a whiff of raspberry too, but it kind of smells artificial as well. Not my favourite of the bunch but when I add vanilla to it, the additional creaminess from the vanilla counterbalances the cloying plastic-y scent and it instantly shoots to the top of my list.
Vanilla Frosting - I love this scent so much that this is the second time I've repurchased it and I'm going to bust this one open as soon as I've finished typing this up! It smells like a lighter, less sweet, version of the beloved Christmas Cookie. It's great on its own as it is a wonderfully sweet and creamy vanilla scent, and I also love to mix this with heavier, or stronger scents, to lighten or sweeten them up a little, as I've explained with the previous scents.
TIP #1: So don't feel pressured to use a whole tart, or half, at once and feel free to squeeze and crumble as much or as little as you like. As you can see in the pictures, there's only little bits of each tart missing and that's because I squeeze and crumble little bits at a time into the burner, and once I've finished mixing that usually equates to about a quarter of a tart, which literally just squeezes into my tiny oil burner.The burn time does become shorter obviously because the quantity of scented oil to burn off is lower, but the great thing - or not so great, depending on how you look at it - about Yankee Candles is that the scents linger for a while after the candle has gone out, or the oils have all been burnt.
TIP #2: When purchasing your wax tarts, or the small votive candles, always, and I mean always, pick up one of the jar candles, yank the lid off and take a good sniff. That's the best way I've found to get an accurate representation of what you're buying. Although you can smell the wax tarts and the votive candles, the scent is a lot stronger when it's not restricted by the plastic wrapper, and has been trapped in the candle jar for hours.
TIP #3: I've also noticed that sometimes, these scented candles and wax tarts smell slightly different when the wax is melted to how it does when the wax in solid form. A fine example of this is with the Red Velvet candle. In the jar it smells amazing, but when it's burning all I could smell was peaches. So bare that in mind, too.
TIP #4: And lastly, when you'd like to change a fragrance, when your wax has cooled down and formed a solid in your burner, light an unscented tea light as normal and wait a few seconds for the base of the wax to heat up a little bit. If you press down on one side of the still solid wax, the disc of wax should slide right out. If it doesn't it's because there's not enough wax to do this. I don't know how that works scientifically but in this case abort mission, as the hot wax will spurt all over the place. Trust me, I've been there.
This post was a lot longer that I expected it to be! But of you're still with me, thank you! I hope you will find this useful and/or inspiring.
Thanks for reading! xo.
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