It’s been a while since I’ve posted a haul video so I do a lot of talking in this one (I guess I’m making up for lost time lol). For the Asos section of this video, I took advantage of the 70% off sale +10% coupon code. You know that this diva always appreciates a good sale.
I hope you like it. If you have any questions, leave them below

Long time no posts (lol). I apologize for the delay in between posts but I am definitely going to make more of an attempt to post more often. This past Sunday was my Hubby’s Birthday! It really crept up on us lol, but we were super glad to celebrate it together and extremely grateful to God for allowing him to celebrate another year. It’s funny, I remember when we first met in college and eventually had a conversation about relationships and marriage and I said to him, “I don’t understand how someone can commit to one person for the rest of their lives.” Well, now I know…it’s love + the grace of God. I honestly love this man more and more every day and I am beyond grateful that God has placed us in each other’s lives.

Anyway, before I get too sappy (lol)…
Get Ready with me as I prepare to head out to dinner and hang out with hubby to celebrate his special day

I remember when I bought this skirt from Asos (Africa line) sometime last Fall/Winter during their clearance sale; it was actually love and first site, not just because of the way it looks, but because of what it represents. It is made from a printed cotton fabric that is worn a lot in Nigeria, known as ankara (although other African countries call it by their own names). The thing that I love about ankara is that the majority of the prints are bold with various color combinations. Traditionally, we would normally just purchase the ankara fabric and take it to our seamstress or tailor and have them make an outfit, dress, skirt, pants, and/ or blazer that we design ourselves or have them design. One of my outfit changes for my wedding was made out of a fuchsia pink and black print ankara fabric. All of my bride’s maids actually had the same fabric and designed their own custom creations for the reception.

Anyway, back to the skirt…This skirt represents to me how far perception has come. I remember growing up here in The United States and realizing that the last place that any child wanted to say that they were from for fear of teasing and ridicule was Africa. With the media portraying Africans as sub-human, malnutrition people that live in bushes, walk around naked, swing on trees like monkeys, or ride lions as  if they were horses, I didn’t really blame them… even though I knew that was not how it was (especially in Nigeria), so to fast forward almost 20 years and mainstream fashion is embracing  and celebrating African fabrics and prints is long overdue and pretty amazing to this little African girl…so how could I not show my support?!

The best part is that ASOS Africa is produced in collaboration with SOKO Kenya, which allows underprivileged communities to establish sustainable business through local craftsmanship .

Granted, there are certain fashion “rules” that I think should never be broken like always wearing clothes that are your current size or never wearing a skirt or dress so short that everyone can see your cookie jar (lol), but what might be a rule for me may not be a rule for you. I think that fashion and developing your own personal style should be fun. If you want to mix animal prints, go for it! If you want to mix stripes and dots, go for it! There really are no hard and fast rules anymore.

More and more people are starting to realize that with all the seriousness going on in the world, we really have to have fun wherever we can… so why not start in your closet?! Experiment! Put things together that you never thought of before!  If it doesn’t work…guess what? You can take it off and try another combination. You may surprise yourself with how many things actually do work… and if they absolutely don’t, at least you tried something new. Life goes on…relax and take a breath…it’s just fashion .

*Diva tip- The easiest way to mix prints is to stay within the same color family. When mixing animal prints, try and keep both (but definitely at least one print) in the neutral spectrum. When mixing other prints like stripes and dots, try and make sure that both prints have at least one color that is primary in both or at least a primary color in one can be seen as a secondary color in the other.

I hope this helps…Happy mixing !

I usually get a lot of questions about how I make some of my wigs, so I decided to do a long overdue video showing you how simple it really is…

I hope that it was easy to follow. If you have any questions, you know what to do below

When we initially decided to renovate the space, my husband thought that I was a little crazy because the entire space was a HOT MESS!!! He didn’t see the vision, but I knew that with a little TLC the grungy dark space could transform into something fabulous.

Before…

The first thing that I did was come up with a concept in my mind of what I wanted the finished product to look like. I knew that I wanted it to be contemporary but elegant, chic yet sophisticated at the same time. I knew to get the warm elegant feel that I wanted, I would go with a neutral color palette with pops of white for more of a contemporary feel.

The first thing that we did was replace some of the old sheet rock and change the old dingy floors.

When looking for flooring, I knew that I didn’t want carpet because various people would be coming into the space and I knew that carpet would be too much maintenance and would not be able to hold up over a long period of time. I considered hardwood flooring, but the hardwood that caught my eye was waaay over my budget. I then thought about vinyl planks because I’ve heard so much about their affordability and durability, but when I saw them in person, I didn’t like how they looked. It then came to me! So many commercial properties (restaurants, small boutiques, etc.) in NY have been using something called wood-grain porcelain tiles. They look so chic, are low maintenance, and hold up very well over a long period of time. I decided to check them out on line first and I loved every picture that I saw of various projects using them. The next step was to price them. I was fully sold on them and ready to move full speed ahead until I started to see the online prices with the least being $4 a square foot all the way to $9.50 a square foot! That was totally waaay over the budget that I set for flooring so I was thinking it was a lost cause until I got an email from Lowes sending me a 10% off coupon 2 days later. It hadn’t even occurred to me to check out Lowes or Home Depot. When I did it was full speed ahead again… Lowes had the flooring for $2.48 a square foot plus my 10% off coupon! How could I resist?! I got our handyman to come and measure the space for me so that we would know how much flooring was needed, which was about 30 feet by 17 ft.

We initially purchased 20 boxes of the wood-grain flooring because I forgot the measurements at home, but quickly realized that it would not be enough and headed back the next day for an additional 10 boxes. All 30 boxes of flooring were used with only one single piece of floor tile remaining.

The flooring actually blew my budget because I underestimated how many packs of it was necessary, not to mention the other elements necessary like the bonding agents, grout, and paying our handy man to install it. We got 2 different quotes of over $1000 to install the floors, but when I asked our handyman if he was willing to do it, he gave us an unbeatable price of $300 to install it, if hubby and I would grout it ourselves. We said Deal without any hesitation!

The grouting and wiping process took us about 2 days to do the entire floor, but it was totally worth it.

We decided to go with a chocolate grout to compliment the dark floors.

The next step once the floors were done, was to decide on what color I wanted to paint the walls. I was initially going to go for a neutral color paint with an accent wall, but decided to go with a contemporary Spanish Tile print wall paper instead. Once I decided on the Allen & Roth wall paper (which was such a great price at $20.98 per roll with 10% off; especially since I had to make up for overspending on flooring); I was originally going to use it for an accent wall, but I loved it so much that I decided on using it on 75% of the entire wall space.

I then had to decide on what color I wanted my accent wall to be since the wall paper is more of a taupe color so it classifies as a neutral. I decided that since I want the room to have an overly feminine feel, why not go for the girliest color that I can think of…Pink! I decided to go with April Blush by Behr in a satin finish.

I then painted all of my trims and moldings white to really pop against the taupe-y wall paper.

I’m not finished yet, I still have to pick out a few furniture pieces. I already have a sofa in mind, but I need to decide on accent chairs, 2 large mirrors (which will most likely come from Ikea), new lighting fixtures, new garment racks, and art, but I think so far so good.

What do you think?

I will keep you updated with the progress until completion

If you are a true fashion-holic, this is a must see to truly gain a genuine appreciation for all it takes to make the glamor and fantasy of fashion week a reality .

Look 1- Dinner & a Movie…

Look 2- Dinner & Dancing…

Look 3- Dinner & a Show…