If January is a free trial of 2016, I’m already ready to buy the real deal. A lot of awesomeness has happened so far into 2016 and I’m strapped in ready to see where this roller coaster called life happens to take me.

Young African American women in the Pittsburgh area don’t get a lot of praise or even have a lot of networks beyond their college networks that’s why I was ecstatic to find out about the Beautiful, Brown, BOLD Project that selected 100 women in the Pittsburgh area that have overcome obstacles in their lives and are making a positive impact on the community.  Me and 99 other Beautiful, Brown, BOLD women were selected for the project which entails a photo shoot on the 31st. I’ve never modeled for anyone so this is going to be an experience. Those photos will be turned into an art gallery with our stories on display sometime after. I’m excited to meet these wonderful women who deserve the acknowledgement and praise. Things like this excite me for two reasons. One is the fact that society doesn’t give black women a lot of representation beyond the angry black woman stereotype. These 100 women are from different backgrounds and are in different fields but all share the commonality of positive energy. Secondly, we sometimes get so wrapped up into being humble and forget that it’s okay to pat ourselves on the back. The Beautiful, Brown, BOLD Project has been featured on the news and even the radio. You can check out the interview below. Click here to check out the project’s Facebook group.

Little known fact is Pittsburgh has quite the fashion scene. I first heard of Fascino Boutique a while back at a pop up shop in Market Square and they have very nice things. I met one of the owners and it’s nice to see people making their dreams come true. It gives me the motivation to keep going and never give up (I’m readying three books this year for self-publication- and its possible). Fascino has nice jewelry and clothes and I happened to enter a contest from blogger Stark Raving Chic (she has amazing fashion sense by the way) and I won a bunch of Fascino accessories and a gift card that I’m overwhelmed to spend.

I’m in love with some of these accessories and can’t wait until I find somewhere to rock them.

I’ve been getting a lot of freebies lately to review and some are awesome and some are not so awesome. Maybe Friday I’ll post what I think of them and share a bit more. It’s weird that people are willing to give you free stuff in exchange for you to tell people about it but hey! I love to write so I write about it. I will say I’m not too pleased about Eos lip balm anymore. After using it for over a year my lips have cracked and swelled (it’s not as bad as the woman that’s suing but bad enough for me to throw all my Eos stuff out.)

Until next time,

Stay blessed.

xoxo

Daé