So, I am back as promised for the last post for the year 2011. The month of December just wooshed past, seems like A perfect hangover and I don't know what all happened in this month. The highlight of this month was: I GOT ENGAGED. After 4 years, we finally took the big step not exactly a big step....at least the first baby step towards MARRIAGE!!. Now I have perfect excuse for staying up in my room after office. :P. 

The diamond earring is a gift by my to be in laws. Of course, they know about my love for earrings and they decided to gift this gorgeous pair. No complaints:D Owning a diamond stud was part of 30  things to do before 30 from here but, then now I am proud owner of one without sweating it out. I am still planning to keep the point intact cause 2 diamond studs doesn't hurt does it?:D




On a random note, violetbag.com is spoiling me rotten. Every week me and my mates end up spending our hard earned cash on cosmetics. Thanks violetbag for bringing up awesome brands at discounted price. Online shopping is so much fun. For this month, I got myself a Lakme aqua shine gloss in sand, Maybelline eye studio pencil in silver and gold, Colossal kajal and  Maybelline Color Sensational Lip Color Shade Reds Magnetic Coral (In transit). 

Have an awesome year ahead guys. See you next year...My resolution for the year 2012: To make the blog "Girl with A pearl Earring"  bigger and better than that in 2011.

Introducing Sheena and her Jhumkas

Presenting these gorgeous jhumkas courtesy, my fantabulous work-mate :Sheena. The girl , have to admit has a good taste and these jhumkas are a steal for 350 bucks. I myself own few pairs of jhumkas and adding to the growing list is an ethnic gold pair gifted to me by my to-be-in laws during my engagement. Will feature them soon along with my engagement earrings and two other gifted earrings. It's raining earrings this month I guess. I would probably do a post tomorrow so this would be my official second last post for this year.

Channelling Chanel!!!!

I have this thing for pretty fashion mags. I religiously buy em every fortnight, every month or even every week, turn through the pages, enjoy the colorful pic, take in the price tag with a smile, update myself on latest trends and throw them to my ever growing stack of mags. Most of the mags are hard to come by and this lady near the bus stand knowing my obsession with fashion mags stocks most of the popular ones. You should see the way her face lights up when I visit her shop. Every time I visit the book shop I return back with my hands full. My dad feels that it's a waste of time and money but, I beg to differ. These mags not just tempt you with high end labels but also publish some good articles. Mags like Marie Claire and Femina has something special for those who are least bothered about trends and fashion be it cookery, relationship advices, health advices and stories of REAL women!!!!. Even after all these I like mags to be closer to reality and that may be one reason why I am not a big fan of vogue. I know high end labels are every girls dream but a price tag of 2 lakhs for an ordinary bag is little hard to chew. One of those days when I was visiting the good old shop, I saw a black and white ad of CHANEL!!! at the back of this magz. The ad screamed classiness and I had to buy it (VOGUE) though I know that I don't have much use for this particular magazine.

This particular gold earring encrusted with semi precious stones is a gift from dad's best friend from Rajasthan. I love how royal the earring looks against the Chanel ad. It's one of my favorite pieces purely because it was gifted with so much love.

Hope is still lurking there somewhere

One of my colleagues ordered little something from ebay.com . She opted for free shipping and payed the amount via credit card. She placed her order 2 weeks back, which consisted of a peacock chain, an adjustable leaf ring, few studs. Her total order was worth 250 bucks( That's when rupee was at 50 per dollar ). She received one of her 3 couriers yesterday, it was packed well and shipped via hong kong air mail. I was little skeptical about placing any online order after my disappointing experience. Today as she showed me her chain, worth less than 125 bucks I regained some of lost trust. The packaging was proper and so was the delivery. I have seen the same chain retailing at 3 times the cost in some of the blog shops. Here is the  image which was posted in ebay.

ebay.com image

Here is what she finally received, an exact ditto.

What she received

closer view

 Our experience with ebay has been much better than that of blogshops. So, people who are really into fashion jewellery please stop by ebay.com. You may be able to find something you love at half the price as that of blog shops. A word of advice: Never order in bulk or for a large amount of cash. Always, but in small units . You may never know when your packet may go missing in transit.

Lessons learnt

I am done with buying things online!!!! except from my favorite stores. Lured in by perfect pictures, one tends to buy overpriced cheap products. For a blooming online retail sector in India, it's absolutely necessary to hold to customers faith no matter how ever small the amount of purchase is. Superior customer service and quality products would install faith in lost souls like me but, the sad part is :No is trying and everyone is taking the poor consumers like me for a ride. Iv written a post on Customer satisfaction here.

ebay.com

And now for the story, I saw a FB mail from this lady, requesting me to check out her shop and I gladly hoped in to see if they have anything to be worth purchasing. I placed an order for 2 statement neck pieces on 1st Dec and made my payment on 4th Dec. I paid 730 rupees including a 100 extra for shipping. The day after I made my payment, my friend showed me an exact replica of the necklaces in ebay for under 5 dollar (Free shipping included) ie, max 250 bucks. This lady promised me that I would get my package before the end of week on 5th Dec.On 7th, she let me know that my order was dispatched. On asking for tracking id she gave me an excuse that as they posted in bulk she doesn't have the tracking id. After a near to break verbal dual with this lady finally my courier arrived on 13th. DTDC never takes this long (From prior exp). I came back home and was in for a rude shock. The plastic container in which the neck pieces was kept was broken and the packaging was pathetic. Adding to the fuel, one of the black thingy had come off.

I paid freaking 400 bucks for a half broken, cheap looking Chinese made stuff?. I could with my money buy something useful. I mailed the lady with the image and she tried to offer help but, then with my engagement coming up and a tough time at work I have no time to heed to her lame apologies. I bought myself a feviquick on my way back from office and carefully stuck the black thing on and then strike two!!! the colour started coming off, thanks to the superb quality. I  felt a rush of anger but, no one but moi has to be blamed for blindly trusting these blogshops. Finally, I decided to make use of my black maybelline nail polish. I carefully painted the whole black-white patched thingy black. Now they seem wearable.

I have decided not to just buy random stuffs from random blog shops trusting these guys would only sell quality stuff. I am done with Online shopping for accessories for good!!!

Colours of Fall

Fall has paved way to snowflakes and snowmen but, I am still stuck at the FALL season. I am wishing for bright colors of orange and yellow, dreaming of maple leaves and light breezy chill.