For Valentine's Day, Jessica inherited my perfume collection when I was a teenager. My mom had saved them all these years and recently shipped them up to us. I gave the shelves a fresh coat of white paint (Jessi's choice).
The look on Jessica's face was priceless when she started opening the boxes that these all came in (there was so many... AND there was bubble wrap! Fun!).
I immediately aquired a rock-star-like status in her eyes (it was fleeting, but still it was there!). She thought it was so cool that I had all of those and she start talking about the shapes, colors, and smells of each one. She asked if I had any other secrets that she should know about! She wondered why I didn't use them (answer: I loved the designs of the bottles and liked only one scent to wear: Obsession, which I eventually ditched for the smell of vanilla oil. For the record, I adore Shalimar too, but that's because it's my mom's signature scent. It's not worn by anyone else I know and one day a year or two ago a woman passed me in the grocery store and that unmistakable scent passed through the air that made me catch my breath and turn all around to see if my mom was somewhere nearby. Yeah, like as if she would surprise me by not telling me she was coming and then sneak up behind me as I was grabbing a chocolate croissant for Mike at the bakery. But still I looked around all the same because... well, that SMELL!).
So back to Jessi, she took such care going through each bottle. Arranging and rearranging each bottle until it just so.
To best highlight her favorite bottles.
Even adding her own Justice perfume to the collection (this is not pictured here as it's on the other shelf).
Mike hung the two shelves beautifully in her room and now my perfume collection - the same bottles, the same shelves - that I had in my childhood room, that were privy to many sleepovers, whispered secrets between friends, laughs, and the ups and downs of tw/een life has now been passed down to my daughter, who will likely share many sleepovers, secrets, laughs, and ups and downs of her own. O, if these bottles could talk!
I've encouraged Jessi to use every last drop of any perfume that she wants... after all it's hers now and life is too short to save the good stuff for later.
