Tag: Bath & Body Works
Inside a Hoarder’s Purse
So I switched purses the other day…I didn’t quite realize the extent of the lipgloss hoarding situation that was going on inside of my purse…they were all stashed in a zipper pocket on the front of my old purse, but my new purse didn’t have the same pocket…what do I do?
WHAT DO I DO?
Surprisingly, I couldn’t find a makeup bag at home that would work – they were all either too big or too small. (My mom was addicted to Clinique and Estee Lauder “Gift with Purchase” – but she would end up giving half of the shit to my sister and I.) Then I remembered a mini Estee Lauder bag that I had stashed at work. I had been using it as an emergency vaginal care kit, but hey – what’s more important? Lipgloss or panty liners?
I was planning on listing the names of all the lipglosses in my purse, but the names wore off long ago. Boo. Most are Liplicious from Bath & Body Works, so just use your imagination and think of a name yourself.
It Puts the Lotion in the Basket…
…or else it gets the hose again.
I’m still giggling.
I bought this basket at Target today. Maybe it’s because I am rereading Red Dragon and about to reread Silence of the Lambs, but the first thing that came to my mind once I had all my lotions in the basket was Buffalo Bill.
The contents of my basket…B&BW Triple Moisture Cream in “White Citrus” (2), “Black Raspberry Vanilla”, “Mad About You”, “Carried Away” and “Pure Paradise”. B&BW Lotion in “Paris in Bloom”, “Butterfly Flower”, “Velvet Tuberose” and “Into the Wild”. Pacifica “Tuscan Blood Orange” Hand Cream and the best for last…Julep “Rock Star” Hand Cream.
This isn’t even all of my lotion, just what fits in that basket. In other words, enough lotion to make half a dozen girl suits.
Lunchtime Shopping 2: Electric Boogaloo
I got the email this morning…”Buy 3, Get 3 Free.” Plus, I still have the 20% off coupons to use within the next week or two.
Even thought it was 37 degrees and drizzling, I hopped in my car during lunch and picked up a full set of “Mad About You” – Body Spray, Body Cream and 2 Shower Gels. I also picked up extra “White Citrus” and “Carried Away” Shower Gels for back-up.
I noticed that the recent Shower Gel bottle redesign came with hefty price increase. Previously $11.50, the Shower Gel is now $12.50 – the same price as the Body Cream! Does that even make sense?
Into the Mouth of Madness
I’ve put it off long enough.
Although I’m sure many of you enjoy reading my posts about manicures and eye liner, I know what you really want to see…you want to see my shit-ton of hoarded beauty products. More products than a single person or even a whole family could use in a year or five.
That’s 28 bottles of Bath & Body Works Antibacterial Handsoap underneath my bathroom sink. I have 6 sinks stocked at any given time (2 in the master, kids’ bathroom, kitchen, powder room and upstairs guest bathroom). Each soap lasts an average of 3 months, so I go through 24 or so bottles a year. So that means I have just over a year’s supply of handsoap underneath my sink…
Now that I do the math, that’s a perfectly reasonable amount of handsoap…especially since it was all bought on sale – half price or less (7 for $20 is usually the best deal, especially when paired with a coupon).
I actually thought I might have a problem there…phew!
Lunchtime Shopping
There’s a saying about “money burning a hole in your pocket”…is it possible to have a coupon burning a hole in your pocket?
Amy and I both had Bath & Body Works coupons burning holes in our pockets, so after a quick lunch at Panera (which we chose because it was in the same shopping center as Bath & Body Works, of course), we stopped by to use our “Free Travel Size” coupons.
Amy chose a “Carried Away” purse spray, but I picked their newest scent, “Mad About You.” The scent is described as black currant, peony and vanilla. Since “Peony” was discontinued years ago, I’ve been looking for a good replacement. “Black Raspberry Vanilla” was retired as well, and the more I smell “Mad About You”, the more I wonder if it is possible that it’s a combo of two of my favorite discontinued scents?
After I try out the purse spray, I may be going back to get a full set. After all, I have 3 20% off coupons still burning a hole in my pocket…
Happy Birthday to meeee, Part I
My kids know me so well…they forced their scent-averse father to take them to Bath & Body Works to pick out a birthday present for me.
They picked out White Citrus – they did so good! It’s not the type of scent that I would normally pick for myself, but I like it a lot. It actually reminds me of my mother. She preferred citrus scents. Her favorite was Love’s Baby Soft Lemon. (Did that just bring you back to the 80s or what?) If she was still alive, this is the scent she would be wearing…
My husband’s present to me is winding its way through the postal system…I can’t wait to share it!
I also received this handpainted Garden Gnome from Dr. Delta. Notice the anatomically accurate lumpectomy scar. I shall christen him him “Lumpy.”
The Bath & Body Works Golden Ratio
Bath & Body Works is the ubiquitous center of my beauty routine. Shower gel, body spray and body cream is the holy trinity of my morning and evening ritual. At any given time in the past 20-25 years, I’d have between 3 and 15 different scents going through a rotation, with 90% of those coming from Bath & Body Works. Why?
Sadly, it boils down to quantity over quality. Sure, Bath & Body Works provides good quality product, but its quality would only be mediocre if we were paying full price for it. Has anyone reading this ever paid full price for a product from Bath & Body Works? I may have bought one bottle of lotion as a gift at full price within the last decade. Like many retailers, Bath & Body Works is built upon a model in which the sale price (usually ‘Buy 3, Get 3 Free’) is the putative price. Once a quarter, the store has a big blow-out sale to clear inventory, which is how we hoarders get hooked, often on discontinued scents, the heartbreak of which I’ll discuss in a later post.
After decades of filling my vanity table, drawers and cabinets with as many Bath & Body Works products as I can fit, I’ve discovered the Golden Ratio. 1 Body Spray = 2 Lotions or Body Creams = 4 Shower Gels. It’s that simple. If you are as OCD as I am and want your body products to run out at about the same time, it’s 1 – 2 – 4. The tricky part is price. If you’re trying a new scent, it doesn’t make sense to buy all 6 products in the same scent. (I almost bought 6 Forever Red products until I had the foresight to spray myself first – I had a headache before I could get the bottles in my bag.) I like to buy a spray, body cream and shower gel in a new scent and “stockpile” proven scents for the other 3 products. This can sometimes be annoying when you find a discontinued scent that you like – Paris in Bloom for example. The scent is no longer available and I’m almost out of shower gel…but I have plenty of body spray.
The Golden Ratio also works for Victoria’s Secret products, but I don’t buy those as often. The scents are over-ripe and the product quality is lower.
Future posts will cover some of my favorite scents…leave YOUR favorite scents in the comments!