Life Update!

Hello everyone!! It's been over 2 years I haven't written a single piece on this blog. I'm sure most of you already know that I got engaged in July 2020, right after I wrote my last article here, and since then I've been super occupied painting a new chapter in my life!

This was during the first lockdown when I met Vanshaj and chose to get married to him. I prioritised planning my wedding over fashion shoots, blog writing and building brands. To be honest, I didn't have the bandwidth to manage everything simultaneously, so yeah, the PAP blog went on halt.

I finally got married in November 2020, moved my base to Noida and resumed posting on Instagram. I also started setting up my new home, resumed working for a few clients back in Lucknow and while I was trying to balance everything, life had other plans for me. In less than 6 months of me moving away from Lucknow, in March 2021, my grandmother passed away and a month later my father passed away. So it's only my brother who's left in the family and it took me a while to let all of it sink in! With my husband and my in-laws being by my side, I finally gathered some courage to move on with life.

Nevertheless, I've missed writing and I had been thinking of sharing my life update and why I've been absent here. So here's all the information for you that's relevant!

In today's post, I'll be giving you a peek into some important days of my life from 2020 - my engagement and my wedding functions. Let's get started...

Our Engagement - 22.7.2020

I spoke to Vanshaj for the first time in the last week of June, met him in the first week of July and 15 days later we got engaged in the presence our families and friends in Gurugram.

We enjoyed a 4 month courtship and planned our entire wedding by ourselves with minimal help from our families. Our outfits, the venue, the decor, the food, so much! In the middle of the pandemic, when the world had limited resources to offer, we planned our wedding just like we had imagined since always - simple, minimal and just with our closest people being a part. We had 4 functions spread between Lucknow, Delhi & Gurugram.

My Mehendi - 20.11.2020 (in Lucknow)

Our Haldi - 21.11.2020 (in Delhi)

Our Youngsters Night - 21.11.2020 (in Delhi)

Our Wedding - 22.11.2020 (in Gurugram)

watch the complete wedding movie HERE

I would have never imagined a time in my life when nothing would seem more important than getting married to a guy who was an absolute stranger till a few months ago. But as they say, 'love comes in the most unexpected ways', I found mine when the world had stopped! 2020 was indeed one of the most special years of my life, and in all sadness and in health, I found my partner for life. Now, it's a crazy journey that's just begun! PS : This wedding wouldn't have happened if our families didn't show courage to meet and every single person who was behind the preparations to make our special days even more special. Thank you for being by my side through thick and thin then and now! Until next...lots of love.

~xoxo~

Country Girl in Yellow Summer Dress

As the weather changes, we enjoy showing more skin and wearing vibrant lipsticks that bring out our skin tone. Dresses that feature flowers and floral patterns are often our spring and summer staples. I often opt for a flattering A-line dress, a skin-tight bandage dress, or slip into a sexy bodycon piece. I like pulling off sophisticated flare and pick floral patterns to bring out my confident femininity. In today's blog, I'm sharing with you one of the most beautiful floral print dress, that I paired with my choice of country style accessories to alleviate the gloom of winter and fall!

The hot month of June calls for a cute A-line dress in yellow that I picked from Shein.in. It's a 100% rayon fabric and feels amazing on the skin. The fit and flare is what attracted me to this gorgeous piece. The spaghetti straps makes it easier to don in the summer months with a low back cut out and a knot in the front makes it appear fancier.

I styled it with some raw accessories - a fabricated choker, sleek gold cuffs in the wrist, brown suede heels, leopard print sunnies and a hat. Completed my look by adding a multicolored sequin bag, giving strong summer feels. More looking like the country girl, eh? Oh, and always remember if you don't want to flaunt the deep neck, go for a tube top inside - like I did (with a black one).

Dressing for summer and picking the right floral outfit can be a task, but if you know your body structure, Shein.in has the best summer dress collection for you! Do check it out and let me know if it helped. Until next time, love & luck.

dress, sunnies, choker : Shein.in | heels : Steve Madden | hat : Forever21 | cuffs : Daniel Wellington

Photographed by : Shiv Ahuja

~xoxo~

My First Meetup Session - #StyleCircle at Lifestyle Store Lucknow

Hello, my lovely virtual family! Belonging from different cities, states and countries, I still don't know what makes you come back here every single time and shower on me your love and blessings. But one thing I know for sure is, that you guys have been the whole sole support in my journey of blogging since day one, and it is overwhelming to see our family grow. Two days back (28th May, 2017), I completed 3 full years with Picker at Pace, and nothing would have been greater than hosting a personal meet up session, a day before, with my readers communicating with them in person. 

LIFESTYLE, one of country's top fashion brands recently launched their SS'17 collection featuring the new range that draws inspiration from the rich Mayan, Mexican and Oriental civilizations to create a bold yet intricate look, with a casual collection that has a Bohemian vibe with stylish palazzos, maxi skirts and printed dhoti pants. And, it gave me gave me an opportunity to showcase the stock amongst my followers, and interact with them, knowing them better and helping them with essential style tips and imparting knowledge about blogging as a career! 

A few months back, when Lifestyle Stores approached me asking me if I would be interested in co-hosting the Style Circle event at their outlet in Lucknow at One Awadh Center Mall, along with Kritika Khurana aka That Boho Girl from Delhi, I just couldn't refuse it. It was an amazing feeling to have been chosen as the first blogger from town to get associated with a brand this huge and co-host the event with one of country's favorite fashion bloggers at the moment. It was a win-win deal! And well, the day finally arrived and I was mesmerized to see the crowd that had gathered to greet both Kritika and me. Tbh, I never expected I had "fans". Nevertheless, the sensational feeling of being at the centre stage, surrounded by people who look upto you cannot be compensated with anything else!

Me with Kritika

The entire event was set up for 4 hours and I had the best time of my life during that time. Met around 250 different faces, hugged them, received kisses, got to know so much about their field of interest and their aims and aspirations in life! It made me feel super motivated and loved, because the energy was superficial. Most of them complimented me for my styling ideas, fashion and beauty tips and all that I write here on my blog, about travel destinations, restaurant features and even book reviews and the poem snippets. Oh yes, the compassion and kindness each one of them had was astonishing!

At the end, both Kritika and I were surprised to see how modishly the girls had styled themselves in the outfits from Lifestyle Store, as we had earlier asked them to do that, since we were giving out vouchers worth Rs. 2000 to two "best dressed" to shop from the latest collection at the store! I picked Kanika Chowdhary and Kritka chose Nainika Kalita as our personal favorites, and the smile on their faces seemed so bright and lovely!

Kanika, Me, Nainika, Kritika

Lifestyle’s Spring Summer collection has an extensive array of global trends, with striking patterns and glamorous silhouettes for the season. I love the brands Ginger and Code by Lifestyle, personally. In fact, the t-shirt I'm wearing in the pictures above, is from Ginger and I adore it completely! I highly recommend the clothing as they have the best of fabrics, styles and prints to offer.

To conclude, I would like to thank the entire team of Lifestyle Stores for having me at the event and letting me have "my moment". Also, kudos to Kritika for being a pro at the session, and guiding me along. I don't know what would have I done with out her, being all shaky and crazy!

Kritika and me with the team of Lifestyle Store Lucknow

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Thanks for reading! If you have your picture featured in this post, please feel free to download it for personal use, but link it back either to this blog or me on social media (facebook, instagram, twitter). I hope everyone who came to the meet-up had a great time just like I did. Thanks for dropping by, guys. Much love!

Photographed by : Yash Athwani, Saumya Kumar, Ashish Soni  |  Styled by : Lifestyle  |  Makeup by : Divya Vishnani

~xoxo~

Four Ways to Style an Oversized Tee

Hey guys, hope summers are treating you well and you all are having a good time! The heat is killin' me here, really! Anyway, I've got something special for you today, so keep reading.

After going through a lot of mails and messages on my social media accounts, I realized, many of you wanted me to do a collaboration with one of my co-bloggers in my city, Lucknow. And keeping your requests in mind, I teamed up with Poorvi Naithani (from Shades of Jade) to bring you 4 creative ways to wear an over sized tee!

Now, we’re all bound to have one kicking around our wardrobes somewhere : an inexplicably large men’s t-shirt that leaves us looking for ways to throw it upon us. They worm their way into our closets as freebies from your elder brother, or as the complimentary gift commemorating you’ve finished a fun run. Invariably, we simply throw them to the back of a little-used shelf and forget they exist until it’s time to paint the house or wash the dog and then we haul them out to be used as makeshift overalls. Surprisingly, however, this is not necessarily all they’re good for!

Poorvi and I put in a lot of thought to create 4 different styles using our over sized tees, out of which 2 of my favorites are displayed below :

She's wearing - tee, shorts : Lifestyle Store | shoes : Ruby Shoes (Singapore) | socks : Puma | clutch : Bandra (Mumbai)

watch : Daniel Wellington | choker necklace : Amazon.in

I'm wearing - tee, neckchain : Lifestyle Store | co-ords, bag : StalkbuyLove.com | heels : Factoryrush.com

If you remember reading my post about the opening of the first Lifestyle Store in Lucknow last month, you must remember I wrote about showing you guys what I bought from their collections! So, Poorvi and I got an opportunity to pick 2 of our favorites each from any section of the entire Lifestyle Store and after spending almost 2 hours searching for the right pieces, the FREE HUGS T-SHIRT from the Smiley World Collection caught our eye instantly and we picked one each, from the men's section! The sizes of course varied, and appeared larger than the large in the women's section. We both really wanted to get the oversized tees, so we thought of collaborating and doing a post to show you guys the fun ways we wore it!

Poorvi being the fun girl that she is, opted to team up her tee with a pair of white denim shorts from Ginger - another cool brand at Lifestyle, pulling the tee and tying a knot at one side corner to trim it and fit just right above the pockets of her shorts because it looked really cool and creative! She chose to wear her mint color sneakers with matching socks to match the mint green color present in the tee (it looked really cute). To add a pop of color contrasting the whites, she carried her hot pink clutch that added the much need vibrancy and wore a classy wrist watch in her hand and a choker in her neck almost mastering her complete look!

On the other hand, I chose to show more of my feminine side and still keeping it comfy, wore my tee tucked inside my distressed baggy jeans, teaming it up with a denim waist coat that came along with the jeans as a set of co-ordinates from StalkBuyLove! Tucking in is one of the easiest ways to make a large oversized t-shirt wearable. Also, I kinda rolled up the sleeves to make it look edgy, which I realized kept unrolling during the shoot! (Tip : You can sew the sleeves in a rolled position to prevent them from unrolling in the future)! To complete my look, I wore my black heels that matched my big black backpack and stacked a few rings in my fingers, added a 3 layer neck-chain (from the accessories section at Lifestyle) that had some mint color pendant that matched well with the tee and braided my hair on one side that made me good to go!

These were the first 2 looks that we created using our over sized tees! You can check out rest of the two looks on Poorvi's blog, HERE. I'm sure you'd love to view them too! ----- Lets us know what do you think of this post in the comments below and don't forget to share it amongst your friends because spreading fun stuff is no way bad! ;)

Photographed by : Daniel Joseph

~xoxo~

One Awadh Center Mall + Lifestyle Store Launch

Lucknow, the city of the Nawabs has always been traditional, elegant and deeply rooted in its rich history. But the new side to the city is as decorous as well; the side which is modern, buzzing and fast developing into a socio-economic hub. ONE AWADH CENTER, the lavish mall, owned by the leading player in the real estate development - Halwasiya Group, is situated in the posh Gomti Nagar area of the city. It opened its gates for public, officially on the 13th of April, 2016 and it is nothing less than a landmark for its style and splendor! This mall enjoys an immense location advantage, which in the past-few years, has emerged as the new central business, residential and shopping district. 

One Awadh Center is contemporary in design and stylish in built. It has Automated Building Management systems to make the whole structure energy efficient and environment friendly. Features like central air-conditioning, power backup, high level security provided by CCTV cameras, advanced fire detection and fire fighting provision in all common areas & basements and multi-level parking complete it as a truly modern commercial complex!

outside view of OAC

inside view of OAC

As a city resident and having a lure for fashion, I have been always been disappointed with Lucknow depriving us of all major fashion brands in town. But to my satisfaction, LIFESTYLE launched its first store in Lucknow (and 50th store across the country), at One Awadh Center on the 13th of April, 2016. And, I had this opportunity to attend the store opening along with a few blogger friends of mine, Poorvi and Sumbul, who of course were a great company!

OOTD details

 top : StalkBuyLove | pants : Pantaloons | heels : Dorothy Perkins | bag : Glitstreet.com

watch : Diamante | necklace : Old Buy

From L-R : Me, Sumbul Siddiqui (Style - Bon), Poorvi Naithani (Shades Of Jade)

I'm quickly gonna take you through the brand sections (floor wise) as displayed at the store. Starting with the ground floor, we had all kinds of basic women wear. Ranging from casual to formal, to chic and party wears, there are just way too many brands to choose from! Some of my favorites were : CODE, UCB, AND, Fame Forever, Ginger, Calvin Klein and Bossini.

Code

Ginger

United Colors of Benetton (UCB)

Fame Forever

Calvin Klein Jeans 

We encountered our favorite make-up brands in the opposite side sections along with the watch sections on the ground floor itself and were flawed by the counters at the first glance! Some of the best were : Colorbar, Maybelline, Loreal (in make-up) and Fossil, Timex and Rado (in watches).

Colorbar

Loreal

Maybelline

Timex

The best saved for the last, the accessories section won my heart instantly. Tons and tons of superficial designs. From coin bags, to keychains, to necklaces, rings and bracelets! I couldn't resist trying out most of the stuff on myself, glaring in the mirror and flaunting like a pro. Ah! Oh, and also there was a little lingerie section just right beside the accessories display, but it was in such a hidden corner that I only noticed it when one of my co-bloggers pointed it out to me, when we were at the billing counter. Like, damn!

Coming to the 1st floor, the men's section. I almost adored every bit of clothing on this floor, because of how me it was! If you know me well, you know I'm more of a comfort over fashion types and what better than men's tees would suit me best?! Just breaking it you, I actually picked more stuff for myself from this floor rather than any of the women's section. Oh, that should not sound wrong though! :P Check out the brands available, in the pictures below : 

Louis Phillipe

Kappa

Being Human

Colorplus

All Denim

The 2nd and the last of the Lifestyle Store floors, women's ethnic section. This floor also has bags, women's footwear and kids clothing section! All brands shown in the pictures below :

Biba

Glbal Desi and 'W'

Melange

Party Footwear

Sleepers

Clutches

Bags

Kids Section

Let me just take a moment to unfurl my love towards these mannequins displayed at Lifestyle Store, showcasing their SS/16 collection. It looks truly amazing! 

Well, we ended our short store tour of Lifestyle at the billing counter, redeeming our gift vouchers; and I simply loved picking up stuff for myself after spending almost 3 hours checking out what all to buy! An outfit post showcasing all my shopping will be up under the fashion category on this blog super soon, so stay tuned for that!

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One Awadh center being a posh mall in town, has a lot of top fashion labels and retail brands pouring in. One of them is Lifestyle and the other one that opened on the same day is MAX Fashions (on the 1st floor). Well, doesn't it already sounds like this will make the place a shopper's paradise?!

An eight-screen megaplex - the city's first, by CINEPOLIS has started impressing everyone with a truly international cinematic experience. Well, the part that thrilled me more was that Lucknow finally has some of the best recliner seating in the theatres and we can almost get some comfy, home like feels! Also, some of the finest cafes (like COFFEE TREE; as in the picture below) and multi-cuisine restaurants are coming up at the mall that will delight craving taste buds.

Let's be very frank, as the city is progressing, so are the people! One Awadh Center should now be your first-choice shopping and entertainment destination because it's not just another shopping address, but a celebrated social hotspot too! 

Photographed by : Abhishek Bose

~xoxo~