favorite smells

What are your favorite smells?

I'm sitting here by the open window and the neighbor is mowing his grass and the laundry vent is near the window and the scent of Downy April Fresh is wafting through the air... but I also love the smell of marigolds, and petunias in the evening... and peanut butter will make me hungry no matter what. How about tomatoes warm from the sunshine, fresh off the vine? Or honeysuckle?

What smells make you feel good, or take you back to a happy time in childhood, or make you feel at home, or delight you?

Janiejopy, I have thought about asking the same question also...

some of mine are:

scent of tomato plant leaves when they are wet from being watered.

the scent of rain on the way.

pelargonium leaves

driving by the bread factory and smelling the yeasty scent of bread baking

barbecue smoke

perfume of a beautiful ripe peach just off the tree

vanilla (sunny how it smells like perfume but tastes bitter)

jasmine blossoms ona warm humid night when you are making out with your boyfriend.

lavender essence

Aramis on a man

the heady perfume of a citrus orchard in full bloom


these are only a FEW that come to mind at the moement.

Love, Lavanda

I love the smell of lilacs in the spring. I agree with Lavanda about the smell of bread baking. My very favorite smell is Spanish Chicken and Rice cooking. The saffron gives it an aroma that I can't describe. Besides being one of my favorite foods it probably takes me back to great times with my Grandmother who always made it.

Ok, now, Elsie, you know you will now have to share the recipe ?

Great question. At the moment my favorites are:

top of the list: gardenia - heavenly stuff

my mom's pasta sauce cooking - nuff said :)

magnolia - I just love everything about the great huge southern magnolia

Freshly mowed grass, after a rain, especially if I'm the one who cut it just before the rain - Satisfaction!

clean baby- either you get it or you don't, I can't explain it.

from this point on, it's all food smells . . . apple pie, stuffed artichoke, fresh baked bread, crawfish boiling ... hey, I'm from South Louisiana, what can I say? Food is life. Good food is good life. :)

Cheri'

Here's the link to the recipe. It's great the next day fried in olive oil.
http://davesgarden.com/t/334499/saffron

Sundry how could I have forgotten gardenia - it's the only perfume I own - heavenly.

From childhood:

fresh cut hay
silage spread about for the cows to eat
the barn on a cold winter night
Christmas candles at my Grandmother's house
cookies baking
the ozone after a T-storm
a clean flannel shirt still warm from the dryer

more recently

salt spray at the beach on Sanibel Island
the jasmine at The Toucan Trail place
the AIR at the top of Blue Mountain in the Adirondacks
The sweet peas wafting in through the open door of this little room right now

for a few

Oh, and fresh mint when it has been mowed or weed-et!

Daddy's gumbo cookin on the first cold front day of the fall/winter.

Fresh-cut or living Christmas trees - fake ones just wont do it!

the smell of my granddaughter after a bath, I sniff her hair for hours, doesn't matter which shampoo, it's always a delight

brugmansia, if you've never smelled one, it's a heavenly flower

fresh bread

smoke from a bbq pit

Have to be
The clean baby smell 1st
Fresh bread(which I am lucky enough to live close to a bread bakery and I can go out at just about anytime of the day and smell fesh bread cooking! YUM!)
Downey fabric softener
I am with Lavanda on the man smell...gotta be Aramis!

Edited.



This message was edited May 21, 2005 9:50 AM

Sigh... Y'all make me wish I had a better sense of smell. I lost most of it many years ago, and now it takes a stronger smell for me to get it, like getting in an elevator with a woman wearing too much perfume.

I do remember as a young adult driving through town where Bustello had a coffee factory, and smelling the roasting coffee beans. Also, driving around the Cuban neighborhoods at Christmas where they roasted whole pigs marinated in garlic and sour orange.

I had a wonderful "good smells" day yesterday, fresh mown grass, my beloved sweet peas, and all afternoon the air was filled with strawberry jam scent (I live by a smuckers plant so the whole neighborhood was filled with the yummy smell of the berries cooking!).

darius, I am such a "smell person" my heart goes out to you! how wonderful though, that God allows us memories of such things to keep us going!

ahhh if only Carena lived closer to each other we could stand out in our yards and have fresh baked bread and yummy strawberry jam just by smelling!! No calories in that !!

Morning coffee when camping, homemade cinnamon rolls and apple pie fresh from the oven. I also like the smell of wild honeysuckle when it is in someone else's yard! lol

I should have added that I use to love waking up to the smell of bacon cooking on the campfire while laying in the tent!

wood fires burning
a burnt marshmallow
fall air
before the rain
during a rain
after a rain
grass being mowed
vanilla
cinnamon
stargazer lilies
Happy Child austin rose
sourdough bread baking
before the first snow
ocean air
fresh tomatoes -smell like earth
earth
and a new one for me - the HO Oats company in Buffalo NY
smells like oatmeal cookies baking in downtown Buffalo

Gosh, most of my favorites have been posted...
Fresh sheets that have hung on the line
Bread baking
Morning coffee
Bacon cooking over a fire when camping
Rain
A newborn baby
Tomatoes and their leaves
Burning leaves in autumn
Taking a walk on a cold day and smelling wood smoke
Any fragrance of roses, lavender, or vanilla

I know what you mean about before the first snow! I wonder exactly what it is we are smelling??

About all of mine are taken too....In no particular order, I love all of these....
The Ocean...the salt air
sheets/towels hung on the line
Petunia's
This rose I have, un named, but is heavenly smelling
Baby breath (about the first week, then it's gone)
My perfume.... Eternity
a summer night... nothing in particular, just all the smells blending together.
Rain... but I think I like the sound of rain better than the smell.
Melissa

I ashould say, the scent of ANYONE cooking for me (as opposed to me cooking for everyone) although I love cooking for others.

Gingerbread baking in the oven.

Lavender scented clean bedsheets ( you will sleep like a babeeeeee)

baby powder scent.

This message was edited Saturday, Jul 12th 9:32 PM

Fresh cut greens at Christmas,
gardenias,
lilacs,
no smell,but pussy willows, cut grass..even if it does make me sneeze! honey suckle..my kids and grandkids..hot and sweaty no matter...it's "my smell"

Most of my favorite smells have been listed. I especially like the smell of home made bread and cinnamon rolls. One odor I have been enjoying for the past couple of weeks is from my Silver Linden , Tilia tomentosa. It is just past full bloom. I don't know how to describe the almost overpowering sweet smell, wafting in through my bedroom window. Donna

Lilacs, gardenias are my fav flower aromas.

Fresh popped popcorn.

Bacon frying.

"Knowing" perfume.

Janiejoy, are you sure you don't have my nose? I love fresh cut grass, Downy, petunias, honeysuckle and fresh-cut fresh maters!

Add to that list these: nicotiana, cookies baking in an oven, and a hay mow full of sweet hay. Mmmmmmmmm. I love the smell of horse barns, too, manure and all.

Hmm.
New car's smell inside is great, Night Scented stock, air after rain, 'Scent' Pelargonium....Tomato leaves.

This message was edited Tuesday, Jul 15th 4:06 AM

closing eyes and reflecting

hyacinths - the word I'd use is "pretty"
lilacs - I used to grab armloads and carry them around as a child
almond extract - can't cook without taking a whiff
a fresh peach
fresh baked bread
the heavy air just before a rainstorm
puppy breath - this DOES differ from dog breath :-)
fresh warm laundry
freshly baking bread
coffee
bacon


Interesting how many of us love similar smells - after doing my list, I read everyone else's more closely! Thanks for starting this thread...

This message was edited Tuesday, Jul 15th 6:37 AM

Burning leaves
Burning wood
The air in Autumn
The air in Spring
Fresh cut grass or hay
Fresh cut wood
The house on Thanksgiving day
Any flowers my daughter picks for me

Puppy breath!

O DaleP6, I forgot about that one!! I like it too! I think it smells like turnip greens hee hee

DaleP6, I was going to add that but forgot!!! One of my FAVORITE smells!!!!!

Paco Rabanne original cologne and Lagerfeld, also the original, and Old Spice, those are irresistible on a man.

My various perfumes, all sitting on the dresser and blending together in the bedroom air.

Honeysuckle, chinaberry, roses, rosemary, mint, pine, my old purple iris, passiflora, lantana leaves, garlic, espresso coffee just brewed, fresh milk and the smells in the milking room, turnip greens, baking cornbread, bell peppers, fresh picked corn

I'm not closing the list, I know there are more. I am extremely sensitive to smells. Love them or hate them.

strawberry bush blossoms, crushed in my hand and hidden in my coat pocket

I don't know, Mollybee, sometimes I think I plump up just from the smell of bread!

hee hee and folks wonder why I am soooo plump! LOL

Freshly-laundered sheets, especially if lightly bleached. Mmmmmm.

Thymus mastichina

Oh, so right!

You can't have too much thyme on your hands.

Most of my favorites have already been claimed, but here's my top of the line most loved scents:

Crawling into a bed that has freshly sun dried sheets

The first lilacs of the season

Cappachino (I don't think I spelled that right, but I'm too lazy to look it up)

The smell of a storm a brewing. Don't know if it's the rain, ozone or what. Yankee candles makes a candle that smells exactly like that and they call it Storm Watch. I absolutely will kill for that candle. :) Gotta have one all the time.

"Obsession" aftershave (not saying anymore about that one :)

Opps! Had to edit because I can't believe I forgot this one. DH and I both loved the smell of the brug blooms we had last fall. Not sure what the names of the Brugs were, but they were in full bloom when it started frosting at night so we would bring them in and they would frangrance the whole house. Hope this happens again this year. Truly a memorable experience.



This message was edited Wednesday, Jul 16th 2:05 AM