Pageant day will always be a little bit stressful but if you get organised and pack early, you can eliminate some of the stress for yourself. After competing in a few pageants myself, I’ve come up with a system that really works for me which I hope will help you too when it comes to packing for your pageant.

Packing Outfits for your Pageant Round
-Plan out each pageant round separately; Start with the first round and plan your outfit head to toe. Put your outfit into a garment bag clearly labeled as “[PINUP NAME] Round One”. With your accessories, label a zip lock sandwich bag with “[PINUP NAME] Round One” and put all your accessories inside the bag. Each zip lock bag should have a little note in it; use this to remind yourself of a prop for that round, a separate accessory such as a handbag and your shoes. Use this note as a final check.
-Do this for each round. Use clear labels and keep each round in its own zip lock. If you are sharing an item over different rounds, write than on your note for that round.
The goal of this is so when you are racing back to the change room, you don’t have to go digging for an earring or possibly forget your hair flower. Having everything in a pouch that’s labeled will save you time and stress believe me. Give your note a last look incase you forget your prop or something else (I’ve had to race back because of a forgotten handbag and it was really stressful!).

Packing your Props
After packing your outfits, prepare your props for travel. Depending on size, weight and your props fragility, be really careful when transporting them especially if you are travelling long distance. If your props are covered in glitter, make sure you cover them in a glitter coating and then put them in a bag to stop glitter getting all over your things. Carefully pack your props into a bag if you can and look after them.

Other things to pack:
-Portable steamer; incase your outfits get creased you can quickly steam them before your turn on stage. If your backstage doesn’t have power … do your best to press your garment.
-Bring your makeup; it’s very likely you will arrive to the pageant already made up but always bring some spare makeup to touch up. A translucent powder can control sweat and shine and if your eyeliner is smudged, you can fix it up.
-Makeup remover wipes; if you do smudge something really bad, sometimes you just need to wipe it off and start again.
-Bring spare eyelash glue; I find that is what people scramble to find the most during a pageant so always have a tube handy incase your lashes lift.
-Bring hair items; a spare brush, comb, pins and some spray can really save the day especially if you’re planning to change your hair between rounds.
-Mirror; I used to struggle without a small travel mirror for pageants but now I always take it. You never know what the mirror situation is like for a pageant and you don’t want to battle other contestants for an inch of your own reflection so just bring your own.
-Snacks and water; you may be too nervous to eat or drink but try to do so anyways. Healthy snacks such a fruit and a mussel bar can help you start focused and keep your sugar levels up and of course water is great to sip on.
A straw; if you have your lipstick on, using a straw when drinking will help your lipstick stay in place. Use a metal straw to help the environment for extra brownie points in my books
-Portable battery; sometimes you get nervous so you scroll a lot on your phone so you may need to charge your phone on the day.

Emergency kit;
-Bobby pins
-Safety pins of various sizes
-Clear nail polish; incase your stockings get a hole you can stop a ladder forming
-Duct tape; you never know when a prop may fall apart
-Fabric glue
-Mini sewing kit; lets just hope its for a loose button
-compact mirror; for that last check
-Deodorant; if you get the nervous sweats
-Plain stockings; incase yours get damaged
-Bandaids
-Pain killers
-Spare tampon or pad

Try to pack a few days ahead if you can; it really will save you time on the actual day and you will think more clearly if you’re not running around doing 101 things. Try to stay as organised as you can; I find creating a list of the entire outfit and routine really helps me as a sort of checklist of what to bring. Run through the routine in your head so you know for certain everything is packed.

This post is part of a Pinup Pageant Guide mini-series. Feel free to find more posts from this series here:

-Writing a Pinup Bio
-Sending in Pinup Pageant Applications
–How to Plan a Routine
-Planning your Pageant Outfits
-Planning your Pageant Hair and Makeup
-Using Props on Stage
-Posing on Stage
-What to do on Stage
-What to Pack for Pinup Pageant Day
-Pageant Etiquette

Note: This is not a sponsored post. All opinions and thoughts expressed are solely my own and not influenced in any way.