First one I heard about was Macy’s. Then Sears and KMart. Then JC Penney. Then mall staple The Limited closed 250 stores. Then long-beleaguered American Apparel announced store closings. Now BCBG announced plans to close several stores. By the time this post goes live, there’ll likely be more to add to the list. The list of nationwide…
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Be a Jewel – In Honor of Jewel Figueras
This month we suffered a tremendous loss in the multicultural blogging community. If you knew Jewel Figueras, count yourself amongst the lucky. She was a great friend to so many of us, beloved by all who encountered her smile, her laugh, her welcoming warmth. Jewel = LOVE. Her blog was called Jewel’s Fab Life and…
#RealTalkAboutCare – How to Care For Caregivers
It isn’t something we think about or talk about in my family – it just IS. We are a family of caregivers. My grandmother cared for her mother. My mom and my two aunts in turn cared for my grandmother. It’s a generational thing. “Back in the day, older people remained in their homes until…
“What’s Normal?” SheaMoisture Asks Tough Beauty Industry Questions
This post was sponsored by SheaMoisture. I’ll never forget the first time I had to buy my own hair products in America. It was late August, 1998. I had just become a freshman at the University of Miami. I had grown up in Trinidad, surrounded by women with similar hair issues to my own. We…
The Perfect Father’s Day (According to the Fathers I Know)
Socks and ties and socks and underwear and socks and a nice shirt and maybe a wallet or a belt or some of those whiskey stones — for years I took a very material, literal approach to Father’s Day. My dad could rely on certain gifts every year. It’s always a challenge to think of…
7 Times That Prince Shaped My Life
My best friend Lauren texted me at 12:23 pm on April 21st. I thought that was odd, it was in the middle of the work day. I was in the middle of a hectic afternoon myself, and hadn’t been paying attention to social media for much of the morning. “OMG, please tell me it’s not…
Let’s Go On a GirlTrek! It’s #ActivismApril!
“Caring for myself is not self-indulgence, it is self-preservation, and that is an act of political warfare.” Audre Lorde made the declaration in the epilogue to 1988’s A Burst of Light, and today that quote has come to resonate in the online community. You see it shared on Facebook, Pinterest and Instagram, but what does it really…
All About The Purple Purse! Why I Joined the Allstate Foundation’s Important Awareness Campaign
Bellas, if you know me then you know my love for the color purple goes back long and far. It’s been my favorite color since I could first say the word. It’s become my signature shade, in lipstick and in life. And now, I’ve found a new reason for loving and respecting purple. The Allstate…
Remembering the Charleston Victims. How We All Can Help
Last week, a coward and a terrorist committed a vicious, pre-meditated hate crime against an innocent group of people as they gathered to worship. He sat with them for an hour while they prayed and admitted that they did their best to make him feel welcome, and still he had enough hate in his heart…
5 Reasons To LOVE Baltimore, By Oyin Handmade’s Pierre and Jamyla Bennu
I’d say that Baltimore has an image issue. There are sweeping perceptions of the city based solely on news headlines and fictional representations in TV and film, that don’t begin to capture the complexity, the reality and the beauty of Baltimore as a whole. Baltimore clearly is a city with real issues that need to…