When some people think of Valentine’s Day, they think of the word “love.” I, on the other hand, think of the word “over.” As in: overbooked restaurants, over-hyped specials, over-the-top gestures — over it. Frankly, I’m of the mind that a bottle of good wine and a bag of sour cream and onion chips (I will settle for salt and vinegar but I WILL NOT be happy about it) makes for a more romantic V-Day than any wildly overpriced outing.
Which is why I feel it’s my duty (yes, duty) to share with you Team SG’s favorite picks to help you make the most of a luxe night spent in.
Whether you’re flying solo or simply failed to find a chill way to ask your new beau to hang on the 14th (“Oh is Friday the 14th? I literally didn’t even realize; that’s so weird!!”), these seven items will make you glad you holed up indoors.
I once read a quote on the wall of a bar bathroom that said, “When you’re on your deathbed, you’ll never say ‘I wish I’d spent more time sleeping.’ and I was like, Pshhhhh, speak for yourself, bar wall!
So humor me for a moment and imagine yourself totally burrito-ed up in a fluffy comforter, mimicking a state of wombed-up bliss, just luxuriating in the absolute joy of unfettered laziness.
...You still awake? Great. Stick with me for a second longer.
If this sounds like the V-Day paradise you seek, check out the eucalyptus comforters from earth-friendly bedding brand, Buffy. Choose from one of their two options: The Cloud — their OG, plastic water bottle-filled and eucalyptus-lined fluff-bomb of a blanket, or The Breeze — their 100% eucalyptus innovation made for the hot sleepers amongst us.
Either way, you’re supporting the planet and your irrefutable right to relax.
Have a friend whose hospitality you repeatedly abuse because their place is just So. Damn. cozy? No?? Cool, me neither.
But there’s just something about homes with essential oil diffusers that make them absolutely impossible to leave. Turns out, you too could enjoy spending time in your own apartment (what a concept) with the help of this game-changing, ambience-boosting essential oil diffuser. I mean, you might as well, considering how much you spend on rent, right?
The good news is these diffusers are super simple to use. Just add water and 8-10 drops of your fav essential oil, and you’re good2go. This one from ASAKUKI also doubles as a humidifier, which sounds like something a responsible adult should probably own anyhow?
There are some moments in a girl’s life that she’ll never forget. For me, they involve the first time I tried truffle butter, the first “u up?” text ever received, and the day I tried Bose noise-canceling headphones.
If, like me, your core coping mechanism consists of pretending you are the sole survivor in an apocalypse movie, these babies will change your life forever. They block out everything. Your upstairs neighbors’ inordinately loud footsteps, the drunken closing time shouts from the bar beneath your apartment, really all unwanted natural and/or manmade interferences. Plus, they make every song sound roughly 40,000 times better (including that new Jonas Brothers bop, just sayin’).
Throw on your favorite jams, watch yourself dance in a full-length mirror, and block out V-Day riff-raff for good.
I’m a sucker for anything experiential, and when a Byredo shop person recently handed me a scent and told me that I could name it myself (!!) I knew I was going to be rambling about it for weeks to come.
Andddd here we are. I’m basically your Co-Star app.
Essentially, Byredo just re-launched its “Unnamed” scent for V-Day 2020. The concept is that we all have our own associations when it comes to smells, so why not let us define the scent in our own words? (SPOILER ALERT: mine involved some combination of fresh grass and musk, but I also spent my childhood shoving scented markers up my nose so...grain of salt).
This Feb 14, spray it around your room and bask in your chosen moment of personal nostalgia. You also get to create your own label for the scent with stick-on letters that come inside your packaging — a major bonus for all of my control freaks out there (I see you!)
Order this online or do like yours truly and spend 45 minutes in the store asking the salesperson to “spritz” you repeatedly while you make up joke names at which nobody laughs. Your call.
I don’t care who you are, it’s 2020 and taking care of your skin is your right and privilege — especially when the products you’re using are clean, good-for-you ingredients.
Blume is a cool new brand that was originally founded for folks going through puberty, but the team quickly realized that most of us still struggle with the very same things we did when we were 13 (me?! no way!) and adjusted accordingly.
Honestly, I don’t know about y’all, but not only do I still have a very tough-to-beat crush on Disney’s Aladdin (the animated one, obvs); I also still suffer from fun acne flare-ups that made their first appearance around the same time as said-crush.
This lil’ kit comes with the brand’s gentle face wash, their insanely good-smelling Meltdown facial oil, and a jade roller. Pro-tip, throw this tiny tool in the freezer an hour before using, and your life might just change forever.
I promised myself I wasn’t going to put chocolate on this list because I am (if nothing else) a millennial clinging to her sense of originality, but...I mean...I effing love chocolate.
Seattle Chocolate just released limited-time truffle bars (yes I said TRUFFLE BARS) for the V-Day holiday, and the flavors sound so annoyingly good that I can’t not recommend.
To be clear, I am not suggesting that you purchase these for someone.
I am suggesting that you purchase these for yourself (yes, heart-packaging and all), ship them to your yourself (preferably to your office) so they arrive ON V-Day, and inhale them single-handedly in one glorious, calorie-ridden sitting.
So, what flavs are we workin’ with here? We’re talking: Sparkling Mimosa (dark chocolate, hints of orange and champagne), Pretzel + Peanut (apparently this has hints of stout which honestly is making me drool on my laptop), and Baby Cakes. Those last ones I presume will be my favofrites: milk choco truff-Bs — that’s what I’m calling truffle bars now — with a red confetti “meltaway” center I mean WHAT.
Let’s be honest — if you’re chillin’ indoors for V-Day, you’re gonna want to have a well-stocked fridge. Normally, I’d be the first to tell you that this means alcohol. But today I’m throwing you a curveball.
I am extremely obsessed with Kin Euphorics’ branding, a total ‘70s fever dream. But what is it? Well, a “euphoric” is meant to affect your neurochemistry by using a mix of nootropics (a combo of both human-made and natural compounds like melatonin, 5-HTP and I-tryptophan that apparently positively affect your brain), adaptogens (things like reishi mushroom, Rhodiola rosea and passion flower) and botanics (ingredients like oak, clove, ginger, cinnamon, chili, hibiscus, licorice, etc.)
Ok. That was a LOT. The point is that, whether it’s a placebo effect or something more scientific, these elixirs can help you zen out or pep up (for that aforementioned front-of-mirror dance party) and won’t come with the side effects of excessive alcohol consumption.
Personally, I love that their gift sets ($55-$111) are equipped with a handy to-go flask (whether or not I ultimately choose to use that to sneak cheap tequila into movie theatres is...another story). Fill up that flask, swathe yourself in your Buffy comforter, throw on those noise-cancelling headphones, inhale your sweet self-named aroma, and I swear you’ll never leave home on February 14th again.