My cousin's wedding was on 19th May, and I was badly wanting these photos ever since. I must have asked my cousin so many times whether the pictures had arrived, and he only answered negatively. Finally, I got them and my happiness knew no bounds. Since I was the karavali/sister of the groom, the photographer clicked me too. I knew I had at least five good solo pictures of me. I liked the one that's above the most, and it's my Facebook DP currently. This is the only DP that has got 466 likes.
So anyway, here's sharing few of the best pictures from my cousin's wedding album.
Yesterday I had shared a post on period travel hacks. In it, I'd mentioned about carrying a period emergency kit when you leave your hotel or are on a road trip. I have rounded up a few period essentials so that you're always prepared when on the go:
EXTRA PAD(S)
Depending on the day and your flow, carry extra pads. If you always have heavy flow, then carry two pads; if the flow's not too heavy, carry only one extra pad.
EXTRA UNDERPANTS
In case there's a spill, you can change into a new pair of underwears.
PLASTIC BAGS
For throwing away used pads, you'll need plastic bags.
POUCH
Invest in a large pouch to stash all your kit essentials.
JUICE
Juice is must for instant energy! Carry water along for hydration.
ROSE WATER SPRAY
In summers, if you feel dehydrated externally, then spray some rose water on your face.
MAGAZINE PAPERS
Wrap your used pads in them and then put them in plastic bags and throw in bin.
EXTRA LEGGINGS OR SCARF
In case there's a stain, you can quickly change into a new pair of leggings or just tie a scarf/hoodie/jacket on your waist.
HAIR TIES
During period, everything seems annoying, even our tresses. Tie hair up in case they misbehave.
PAIN RELIEF TABLETS
When there's a severe pain, consume a doctor prescribed pain relief tablet.
PAIN RELIEF BALM
You can carry a pain relief balm if you don't want to consume any tablet.
FEMININE WIPES
Lastly, carry feminine wipes to wipe off any spills on your body plus to clean your vagina while you change pad especially on long train/flight journeys. What are your period emergency kit essentials? xoxo
Almost 6 out of 10 times I'm travelling, I have my period. Because of that, I have become an expert in handling period when on the go. From coping up with the pain to perfectly packing waste, this post covers it all.
PERIOD TRACKER APP
In order to check due dates, I highly recommend having an app/calendar with predicted dates. This will help you plan your trips. I use the Period Tracker app. Learn how to use it in this post.
PAIN RELIEF TABLETS
I literally always hoped I was dead on the first day of period; the pain is so bad. But, since a year now, I haven't come across such brutal pain. If you're someone who has severe pain, visit your gynaec. My gynaec had prescribed Dynapar Spas tablets; he asked me to consume one whenever I had severe pain. So when you travel, make sure you have some sort of pain relief tablets.
PAIN RELIEF BALM
Carry a pain relief balm. I use Amrutanjan as it works wonders for me. You can try applying balm if you don't want to consume pills. If you can, carry hot water bag too!
LONG SANITARY NAPKINS
Invest in long pads. When we're travelling, especially with strangers, we always are worried about stains. Best is to use long pads. Longer the pad, the better you feel. If you can't find long pads, just ask your mom to make a cloth-pad for you! Just place that long and thick cloth-pad on your underpants and then on top of that, put your regular pad. By this, even if there are stains, they'll go on the cloth directly and not on your pants.
EXTRA UNDERPANTS & PADS
Underpants are so light and won't take up lot of luggage space. If you're going on a one day trip then carrying only one extra pair of underpants is okay. However, if you're on a five-day long vacation, carry as many underpants as possible. Also, more number of pads, the better.
HYGIENE WASH, HYGIENE POWDER, HYGIENE WIPES
These are the three travel essentials nobody tells you about. When you're travelling, irrespective of period, carry a hygiene wash and powder. If you're on period, carry wipes along with them. You don't need to carry large size bottles; just use little containers for carrying. Read this post to know why you should carry all this.
NEWSPAPERS & PLASTIC BAGS
For wrapping used pads, you need these two items. Just wrap the used pad in a newspaper sheet and then in a plastic bag. Know more about properly disposing pads right in this post.
PANTY LINERS
If your period hasn't started yet, but the due date is during your trip, wearing panty liners is a safe option. These liners are mini pads and if at all you start menstruating on a road trip, where there's no washroom nearby, then panty liners will save you. They're also great to use during fourth and fifth days of period as the flow is less.
DRINKING JUICES/WATER
Period sucks all your energy and the best way to not only get energy, but staying hydrated, is by drinking juices and water constantly. Also, eat food that is rich in providing energy but is not too heavy for your stomach.
CHECK IF THE PLACE HAS WASHROOM
If you're on trip and have made plans of going to a museum/park, check where the washrooms are. Also, before going on any ride, check the status of your pad.
CARRYING A PERIOD EMERGENCY KIT
Lastly, when you're on trip and have to leave your hotel for sight-seeing, carry an emergency kit. The kit should have extra pad, extra underpants, extra leggings (in case of stains), pain relief tablets, juice, wet wipes, water spray or rose water spray, and hair ties. I'll write an elaborate post on the period emergency kit soon, so stay tuned.
Long time back, I had shared a picture of my classmate's pen drive charm. We were all happy to learn the trick of using charms. It was simple and clever. The size of the pen drives is so small that the chances of it losing are too high. A good option is to attach something personal to it so that it doesn't lose plus you can easily tell which is your pen drive by just looking at the charm.
This was my dad's office pen drive and I had to carry it to college for my dissertation work. Last time when I'd used it, I'd forgotten it at the photocopy shop, but thankfully got it back. I didn't want anything of that sort to happen again, so I had to do some trick.
I thought of making a charm and I'll share the simple procedure with you.
THINGS YOU'LL NEED
Pen Drive
U Pin
Lace/Ribbon
STEPS
Put the u-pin through the hole of the pen drive.
Pass a lace/ribbon through the u-pin and tie it at the end.
I have this obsession with essential oils. There are days when I feel like pampering myself with all the goodness of the world. I use scrubs, packs, cleansers, and most importantly, essential oils. The plus point about these oils is that they are pure. Ryaal's essential oils are 100% pure and what more do we need in today's era of adulteration? So with that crucial introduction, let's dive into their eucalyptus oil.
PACKAGING
The oil comes in a cardboard box to protect the bottle. You can keep the box if you want to take this oil with you. The bottle is of glass and the lid is plastic. They have provided with a separate dropper, which is leak proof. So even if you want to throw away the plastic lid, the dropper will act as a good lid itself. The bottle is wrapped with a sticker that has the brand's name and other details.
APPLICATION
You simply have to put in the dropper and use wherever you want. You get drop-size quantity. However, if you want to pour more oil, just take out the dropper and pour! The application is easy.
FRAGRANCE
The fragrance is refreshing and there's something soothing about the aroma of eucalyptus. The fragrance is strong, but not too strong, which is perfect.
BENEFITS
I have not researched a lot, but as much as I've read, eucalyptus has many benefits like fighting dandruff, relieving muscular pain, shooing away mosquitoes and other insects, fighting cold and flu, releasing heavenly aroma, relaxing the body, and countless other uses. It's really a magical oil.
PROS
- Leak proof
- 100% pure
- Easily available
- Not highly expensive
CONS
- Branding could be better
- Bottle is of glass, hence not travel friendly
CONCLUSION
If you're looking for 100% pure essential oils, this is the brand you should go to.
EXTRA DETAILS
WEIGHT: 15 ml
VARIANT: Eucalyptus
PRICE: Rs. 165
FROM: Amazon.in
I wanted to give out my steps for uploading pictures on Instagram. You think it's a piece of cake, but bloggers go through many steps before uploading. I'll share my process and if you're a budding blogger, it might help you.
COLLECTING PICTURES
I had written a long post yesterday on the sources from which you can collect pictures. As soon as you come across an upload-worthy picture, save it in a new folder.
PUTTING FILTERS
You need to have theme on your Instagram account for aesthetics. The theme can either involve using a particular colour in every picture or simply using a particular filter/effect on all the photos. My account follows the latter type of theme. I use only one filter. A good filter can enhance a dull picture to a good, classy picture.
CROPPING
Crop your images in square so that you know exactly how it would look like. In case you don't find a picture good after cropping, just dismiss the picture. If a picture does not fit in the square frame, be creative. Either keep the top half of your picture or the bottom half. You can also tilt picture and make it look abstract.
STORING
This step is the sole reason for writing today's post. Where do you store so many pictures? Isn't transferring pictures from laptop to cellphone a tedious task? Yes, it is. The best way is to upload pictures on Google Drive (or any other cloud storage you must be using). Create a new folder on drive, and upload all the edited pictures in it. Whenever you want to upload a picture on Instagram, go through all the pictures on your Drive app. It's like a catalogue!
CHOOSING PICTURE
Choose a picture that would suit other pictures on your Instagram account. Upload a picture without caption, see if it suits, delete immediately. According to whether it suits or not, use the picture. If it doesn't suit, go through you Drive catalogue again!
DRAFTING CAPTION
Next, draft a nice, heartfelt caption. If your captions are going to be dull like "How's your day going?" or "Throwback to this trip to Malaysia", then it's not gonna be cherished by your followers. Therefore, beforehand, whenever you're free, draft the caption and save on notes.
PUTTING TOGETHER HASHTAGS
There are various apps on mobile stores that help in generating hashtags. Choose the best app and gather related hashtags. Instagram allows you to add 30 maximum, so don't go beyond.
UPLOADING
Research on the time when people are most active and upload pictures accordingly. Try to upload one picture minimum per day.
What's your procedure for uploading pictures on Instagram?
You have such phases in your social media life where you just run out of pictures to upload. You wanna stay active and be up-to-date all the time, but there's nothing exciting to upload. Even if you have pictures, they're not upload-worthy. You wait for better pictures, and then simply don't update your account for days together. I always had such phases. I literally used to go through my cellphone photos and upload something. But, ever since I thought of being determined about making my Instagram account a huge success, I have started following a method to always have pictures in stock. The key is to gather photos from as many sources as possible:
PICTURES FROM YOUR CELLPHONE
The first thing for having pictures to upload is really having a huge album of photos. For this, you'll need to dig in old photos in your cellphone. Even if you have many selfies from one moment, that's fine too. Search for all upload-worthy pictures and save them.
QUOTES FROM GOOGLE/PINTEREST
There are million quotes online. Pick all those that suit your theme and save them. You can take from Pinterest too. Use quotes as fillers. I usually use them on Mondays.
COPYRIGHT-FREE PICTURES FROM SITES
There are several sites that offer high quality pictures that are copyright-free. You can use them anywhere you want. Just search for such sites and then look for terms like "coffee", "laptop", "summer", etc. Use them as fillers. I do not promote uploading pictures taken from someone else, but only if you don't have anything to upload, you can use these. Also, for example, I have been to UK, so I had taken a top picture of Big Ben from one of such sites. It's all right, because I have really seen Big Ben and have clicked similar pictures myself. Don't fake, but you can definitely use these pictures.
PICTURES SENT BY FRIENDS OR FAMILY
So if your friends/family had sent you pictures from their Mauritius or Seychelles trip, save those too. While uploading, you can just write the caption as, "My best friend had shared this picture from her honeymoon to Seychelles; what a beautiful place! Definitely on my bucket list!" You don't even need pictures from foreign destinations. A simple aloo paratha shared by your dad from his work trip works wonders too.
PICTURES FROM FACEBOOK (TAGGED OF YOURS + UPLOADED BY YOU)
We always upload our best pictures on Facebook. We have around five albums minimum, plus there are many tagged photos too. Dig through all of those and find good ones.
PICTURES FROM YOUR BLOG POSTS
Your blog posts have many delicious pictures of recipes, you looking stunning in outfits and makeup, and other breathtaking pictures from your trip. Use all of those! Even if in certain pictures your face doesn't look good, crop and use your body for an outfit-exclusive picture.
PICTURES FROM HARD DISKS
All of us save pictures on external disks like a pen drive, hard disk, or a CD. Check out all those pictures and you might come across something upload-worthy.
I had literally sat through many days and searched all of the above sources in order to collect pictures. Now I have around 100 pictures ready to be uploaded and the count is only increasing.
The title might make you feel that it's a sponsored post, but it is not. I've been using this particular Period Tracker app since 2015, and have never deleted ever since. Even if I change phone, I download it and then restore the backup. It tracks my due dates surprisingly well.
The circled icon is the icon of Period Tracker app. I know there are dozens of period tracking apps out there, but this is the one I use. So if you are new to this whole period tracking thing and are confused which app to download among the dozens available, I would say, go for this one. It'll be a nice tutorial for you girls.
This app is available for Android as well as iOS phones.
The best thing about this app is that it enables password protection. All your intimate details are protected. You can add protection using Settings > Security > Passcode.
After you put in the passcode, this is the first screen you get. You can easily tap on the pink button to say "period started". I had already done that, so here on the screen you can see "period ended!". With just one button you can either enter your period's starting date or ending date.
You can even see how in big letters it is written "Period Day 1". Here, if you're late by eight days, the letters will say, "8 Days Late". And if 8 days are left for your period to start, it'll say "8 Days Left".
This calendar gives you an overview of the entire month.
If you want to keep a track of your intimate activities, then there's an option in this app. Just select the date you indulged in sexual activities and add a note. Just select "Intimate Today" in the options and then if it was protected or unprotected.
A cute little red heart becomes visible on that date and in the notes section you can easily tell if it was protected or unprotected.
You can also see the fertility (indicated by green circles) and ovulation (indicated by a flower) on your calendar. Everything from the due dates to fertility is calculated either automatically (depending on the older data of your period) or can be set manually.
In Settings > General, one can set the "Period Length", "Cycle Length", and "Ovulation". Your next period will be calculated accordingly.
There's also a feature where you can keep a track of the pills you consume. So the "Pain Relief" is the one I actually consume when in severe pain, so I've added that in the list of pills. You can also see I've added "I" there in the list. I've done that to show you guys we can add multiple pills like that.
By this feature, you exactly know the frequency of the tablets' consumption. (By the way, the "I" stands for iPill; it's a contraceptive pill commonly adverted in India. I'm sorry but I haven't come across any other name hence had to use this one for example!)
This is my favourite feature of the app and probably why I started using this app over other apps. You can select symptoms and moods for each day and just look at how cute the graphics are!
Finally, there's this "Pregnancy Mode" too. Obviously I haven't used it yet. I haven't even tried it out of curiosity because I don't want to lose any kind of data! If you're pregnant, this mode will help you track your delivery date! How very nice!
So that's it. This was my tutorial on how I stay organized using the Period Tracker app. It's free and fun to use. Let me know in the comments below which app you use to track your period.
This makeup look was changed from the morning's makeup look on my cousin's wedding day. So, whatever I had done for the morning's makeup look will remain the same. I used a couple of makeup removing wipes on my eye lids and lips. The rest of the look remained the same. All those marked with a star are steps from the morning's makeup look. Check the look and its tutorial here.
LIPS*
- Before starting, I applied Maybelline's Baby Lips lip balm to moisturizer my lips.
FACE*
- Without any moisturizer or a primer, I went directly to my foundation by Max Factor. I spread it using my fingertips under my eyes, on the eyelids, cheeks, and wherever I saw there was a need. Whenever I apply any face product, I never apply it on my whole face; it is always in little amounts, wherever there are marks.
EYES
- After wiping off morning's eye makeup, I used Givenchy's eyeshadow palette. I started off with applying the dark blue-black shade on the outer corners of my eyes. Later, I took the golden shade and applied it from the centre towards the inner corners.
- For the eyeliner, I used my favourite MAC gold eyeliner on the golden side of my eyes.
- To finish the black side, I used Streetwear kohl, and drew a thick line.
- I lightly dabbed the golden eyeliner (when it was wet) so that it blends with the shade of eyeshadow.
EYEBROWS*
- I have an eyebrow pencil, which is from a local beauty shop. I drew it on my brows, thus being careful of not over drawing it.
- To finish off my eyebrows, I applied Bobbi Brown's eyebrow gel with a thin, angular brush.
CHEEKS*
- I applied light pink blush on the apple of my cheeks from Focallure's highlighting palette (I'll write a review on this soon) using a fat blush brush.
- From the same palette, I applied highlighter using a foundation brush on the cheekbones and nose.
LIPS
- After wiping morning's lipstick, I used Focallure nude lipstick on my lips.
FACE
- I retouched the marks and spots using Max Factor foundation.
- I put a final seal and puffed Maybelline compact powder.