Sis,
Is this a safe space? I have to be honest in saying that making creative friends over the last few years has been incredibly hard for me. I hate to say that, but I believe there is power in being honest. Being a creative is such a unique experience because we have our quirks, we have our art forms we love and some of the world just does not understand what we do and why we do it. That's why having creative friends as a creative is so key. You need people that get you and most importantly, see you. They see the beauty in what you love and why you choose to create.
Knowing the importance of having community within the creative world is why I originally built the Triad Women Bloggers Network several years ago. I know how essential it is to have a place where creatives can come together, learn and talk about our journeys with people that truly understand. Although the group is deactivated, I still know the significance of finding your creative community. That has been my personal struggle over the last few years.
In fact, it has been a pain point I have often brought up in therapy. I currently do not feel I have creative friends that I can turn to for support and that's hard. It wasn't always this way, but I slowly started to see a change over the last year. I've seen creative friends that supported me heavily online for years slowly stop their support. I understand that people have lives outside of social media and the algorithm does not always show our content, but this was different.
I had to learn to stop over giving. I'm so big on supporting other creatives that I was often blind to the fact that that support was repeatedly one-sided. I had to learn to fall back on that. I also learned that at my core, I do have a big heart for people in general. There will never be anything wrong with that, but with that, people can take advantage. Your discernment has to be on point and you have to know not to ignore it. 
As much as I love being a creative, I've had a few times where being online has reminded me of high school. I was never in the in crowd in high school and I often feel the same about social media. However, I had a few close friends in high school that meant so much to me and I'm hoping that one day I will find those same creative friends today. The journey has been hard, but it's most certainly not over. Here's to manifesting I connect to the right people this year...
God bless & stay fab,
Sis,
A few years ago, it was brought to my attention that a lot of my friends are a part of the LGBTQIA+ community. It was an observation spoken, not in a malicious way, but it was noticed. I suppose as a Christian and someone who identifies as heterosexual, it may be something that others didn't quite understand. I kind of laughed at the observation at the time, but when I thought more in depth about it, I realized what they stated was a fact. Many of my friends do identify as a part of the LGBTQIA+ community. 
Do men still complain about the cost of dating these days? This thought came to me last week because if you follow me online, I have been outside a lot these days. From art galleries to music events, I have been going out and enjoying myself. All of the events I have been to lately have been free and several have even had free alcohol as well. This is why the question of complaining about the cost of dates came to mind for me recently. I have been married for almost nine years and one thing my husband and I have been big on since day one is continuing to have fun and date each other.
It's a new year and I've already experienced two firsts in my life. I recently went viral on Twitter for the first time ever, which was such a strange experience yet good in so many ways. It was strange for me because I've been on Twitter for over 10 years and although I tweet often, I've never really given much thought to going viral. I tweet randomness like most people, but also helpful things when they come to mind.
Dear Black Business Owners,
I woke up with an urge to write this this morning because Black Owned Businesses are dear to my heart. Anyone who knows me knows this; however, if you are new here, I want you to know this first and foremost. I have always supported Black Owned Businesses and over the years, the surge of Black Owned Businesses has been both encouraging and inspiring for me to watch. We have been doing the darn thang and I'm here for it! 
It honestly seems like all hell broke loose in our nation right after my last blog post. As if coronavirus wasn't enough, we were made to witness the murder of George Floyd as a nation and it seemed like things began to spiral from there. Racism and unjust killings of Black people have been going on, but in the midst of a pandemic, this was the first time so many were made to sit down, be still and watch what was going on. For many people, it was their first time really seeing the Black experience and they couldn't turn away.
When it comes to having thicker ankles, I know all about it girl! My ankles have been one of the parts of my body that I wished I could make just a tad smaller in the past, but not anymore! I have learned over the years to embrace them. The things you cannot change in life do not have to be a negative. Learn to work with them! I can't tell you the amount of shoes and ankle jewelry I could not wear at one point, but curiosity and my local shoe repair opened a brand new world for me. So gone are the days of limiting myself and my fashion!
Two things that help me start my day are prayer and reading my devotional. If you follow me on Instagram or Twitter, you are likely familiar with me sharing portions of my devotional daily. Some parts of my devotional are so good that I know they may bless someone else so I started sharing them several years ago. One portion of my devotional this week talked about friendship and provided a prayer for the friendships in your life. It was so good that I have read it over and over again throughout the week. I thought it would be awesome to share a variation of the prayer here on the blog.
Can you all believe I have been married for almost six years? Time has truly flown by and if you've been here with me for awhile, you may even remember pictures from our wedding here. 2020 actually makes a total of eight years that Mr. Carter and I have been together. We have learned so much about ourselves throughout the course of these eight years and this blog post is the result of a discussion we had a few years ago.
If you follow me on Instagram, you may have seen that a few months ago, I debuted a new tattoo. Prior to this newbie, I already had two small tattoos, including a heart and of course, my nickname, fabellis. The idea of a third tattoo had been on my mind for quite some time. I'm one of those people, though, that takes crazy amounts of time to decide on things, especially tattoos, because I know that it's permanent. As I'd been thinking about my next tattoo, the word, worthy, kept coming to mind.
I'm a fat, black woman. I'm sure most of you are having one of two thoughts after reading that. One being, "Ok and?" ...or... "Ashley, you're out of pocket right now." For the longest time, the word, "fat," made me feel uncomfortable. In fact, I know it is a word that many people aren't fond of, but I recently realized that that word doesn't bother me anymore. To be honest, I've always been a bigger girl. I often laugh to myself when I reminisce on how my mom used to order my school clothes from the JCPenney catalog when I was younger. I mean, where else were you going to find clothes for a big girl in the country back in the 90's?!
If you follow me on Instagram or Twitter, you probably aren't new to the fact that I love sharing positive affirmations and excerpts from my daily devotional. I gain so much inspiration daily from my devotional and quotes I read online. They give me just the right boost to start the day so I love sharing them in hopes that it does the same for you. Over the last week, I have been reading a lot about loving yourself in my daily devotional. Love is always a popular topic, but how often are we discussing loving ourselves?
Earlier this summer, Boutique +, the plus size brand you may know from JCPenney, gifted me with two swimsuits from their recent collection. I'd been waiting for my chance to wear one of the swimsuits and last week, I finally had my chance. I went to a local pool and of course, rocked the two piece they sent me. This two piece, which is 70% off right now, is so comfortable with just a hint of sexiness. When I received the set, one of the things I loved most was the sheer panel along the top of the bottoms. As I was waltzing around the pool in my swimsuit, I realized that one of the main things I felt that day had nothing to do with my swimsuit.
It has been six weeks since I went into my OBGYN's office and had my first IUD inserted. I plan to talk about the why, the experience and of course, the after, but first... Occasionally I do lifestyle posts outside of beauty and style because my overall focus is encouraging women and talking about real situations. This is a post that I plan to keep it all the way real on and I hope you are open to us talking about birth control. In fact, I did not realize that this would be something I would actually be sharing.
It is hard to believe that #Blogalicious9 was a month ago. I went into Blogalicious knowing that it would be an incredible experience, but it surpassed my expectations. I knew from the first day that I was in for an inspiring, knowledge-gaining experience. Trust me, I got exactly that. VIP Mastermind Day started the conference completely getting my life together and encouraging me to go after what I really want and deserve. The thing is, though... Blogalicious goes deeper than just encouraging you to get your coins. Blogalicious taught me the power of true sisterhood and truly how to treat your sister.
The first day of #Blogalicious9 was an incredible experience. Imagine the first day of a conference being so good that you could have gone home feeling fulfilled and inspired all in one day. That is what the first day of Blogalicious gave me! Blogalicious is a one of a kind conference that I already knew would be amazing because my first time attending four years ago was out of this world. This year is extra special for me not only because I am a Social Media Ambassador for this year's conference, but I was able to experience the VIP Mastermind Day presented by AARP for the first time. VIP Mastermind Day was amazing from beginning to end and let's just say... It got my life together!
I just returned a little over a week ago from my first BlogHer Conference. If you are unfamiliar, BlogHer is the largest community and conference for women content creators in the world. The annual conference was held in Orlando, Florida and included over 2,000 attendees. Needless to say, I was a bit overwhelmed by the number of women at the conference, but it was such an empowering experience. Imagine women of all races and ages who are sheer girl bosses all in one place. That was the essence of this conference and after hearing amazing keynotes from women like Serena Williams, Carla Hall and Cat Cora, I walked away feeling enlightened and even more full of purpose.
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| Photography by #BlogHer17 |
I have thought about writing this post for some time. I kept pushing the idea to the side, but I decided that today I needed to share something I felt was important with each of you. When I was younger, my mom always taught me to be careful with what I watched on television. She, of course, was speaking from a biblical standpoint because in the bible, it often talks about guarding your eyes and your heart. What you watch can effect your inner spirit. We live in a day where it's not just television that we are watching all day. We are watching social media too. From videos on YouTube to scrolling Instagram, many of us are connected all day long, me included. We are exposed to so much daily and it wasn't until last year that I realized the importance of guarding what we take in.
Remember last week when I openly professed my love for iced caramel coffee? Making a morning stop at McDonald's for a medium iced caramel coffee is a faithful routine for me, but I realized that I rarely visit McDonald's for lunch or dinner. All that has changed now because of the new Signature Crafted menu McDonald's recently introduced. I'm a girl that likes options and if I'm being real, I love fancy things too. You get both with their new menu and who doesn't love being able to create their own sandwich? I had the opportunity to try the new menu for myself last week along with the Triad Women Bloggers Network and let's just say... McDonald's is changing the game for fast food!
