Burning Cream & Sugar brought me fond memories of late night stops at Blenz after a night out, and enjoying a cup of vanilla steamed milk - just to wind down before heading back home. I'd also take this warm comfort libation for walks by the seawall after work, to hold me over till dinner time while watching the little bit of sun just before it goes down for a lengthening night. More often then never, I'd also top it off with a sprinkle of cinnamon. And that's exactly how Cream & Sugar candle smells like!

I received a mini travel size (a mere 3oz will burn for 12-15 hours) as a holiday gift from Nikki and I'm again amazed by it's tenacity - filling the entire room with the comforting aroma of steamed milk. It's a small wonder!

Gabriel's Aunt beautiful, all-natural soywax candles are available from her online boutique and Etsy shop.

8hrs 6min 59sec of daylight in Vancouver today. And after that, the days will gradually increase - a few seconds at a time at first, gradually improving.

I'm celebrating with candles, eggnog and a winter solstice bath scented with refreshing yuzu to welcome the return of the sun after the longest night of the year (the eggnog knocked me down early so I didn't get around to it till the morning hehe).

Scented candle of the day: Hugs & Kisses by Gabriel's Aunt. Classic combination of cloves, cinnamon and orange with a bit of cardamom for a little exotic twist. Nothing like spices to warm you up on a cold winter day :-)

Happy Winter Solstice!

Today I had a very special visitor at the studio: Nikki Sherritt of Gabriel's Aunt, who made a special delivery of my new travel-tin candles for the holidays!

And she came bearing gifts - not of frankincense and myrrh, but of lovely soywax candles that she recently created (which I will tell you about tomorrow), and her tried and true "Under the Tree" scent, which smells like candy cane-decorated Christmas tree. And like everything that Nikki does, it hardly smells cliche at all, and is loveable and diffuses the air nicely and gently with peppermint, pine, and woodsy warm notes of cinnamon and cedar. It's not nearly as tooth-achingly sweet or boring as it could have been. And I suspect it will chase out the pancake and latkes smells that have been really getting on my nerves recently, with my teenage daughter's relentless ventures into my kitchen ;-)