Chicken Ceaser and Jammie Dodgers

First day back at SB HQ today after the long break. It was quite a hectic day, plus I think my brain had to get used to the bombardment again, but it was fun. I missed the crew and we had some new interns as well. We had lots of catching up and updating to do and organising calendars and travel plans for the upcoming fashion weeks: NYC, London, Milan and Paris - what a hectic few weeks it's going to be.

In the evening Amy, our Art Director brought the flat plan of the next issue of SB (the content which was put together and layed out by yours truly) for us to ogle at. It was beautiful. And yes I know that it just the print out and not the actual issue itself but it was still exciting.

Then I got sent a video link by Sola (of MMM) from Top Model of Colour which we sponsored and the first two outfits the girls are modelling are ours!! The video's here

Also today I confirmed an interview I'm conducting with Njide Ugboma of Let Them Eat Cake Magazine for Sketchbook Mag on Wednesday and should also be meeting Robin Derrick of British Vogue late this week or early next. Good day huh? I'm uber excited!

Good night lovelies, and also please support the Haiti Earthquake Appeal if you can.

It's your birthday...

Happy Birthday to my baby brother! Well he's hardly a baby anymore, he's 22 and wayyy taller than me.

Wasn't he soo cute?

Would you believe I was wearing 4-inch heels in this picture?

Have a great day today hun xoxo

My Big To-do List

I'm back! Should have been back earlier but got a bit distracted with Eastenders (guilty pleasure) and Hustle (two words - Adrian Lester. And then they go and put that man in a tailored suit...)


Anyway so the next few months are going to be a bit busy so I apologise in advance if I don't post updates as often. At Sketchbook I've been given a bit more responsibility, training new interns as well as my administrative/PR roles and writing features etcetera. Speaking of new interns there's a new illustrator that joined a few weeks ago... but that's a whole other blog post. So SB as well as the odd article for Dia Diwan (W has become the new editor for their online site, sort of the Middle Eastern Net-a-Porter and I'm considering a Features Editor position under her).

I have also started to blog for Style Cartel once a week and will also be covering London Fashion Week next month for Glam (and possibly Paris and Milan too - fingers crossed! I haven't been to Paris in years and never been to Italy. There's also talk of a Glam van and a pink front row for us bloggers. Pink is soooo my colour :D )

Another project that's in the works needs to be confirmed by Bloomsbury Publishing and I will let you know more about that as soon as I can.

So that's all writing work... On the other hand RooR is also stepping things up this year. We've presented our business plans to some investors and are currently waiting for a response from one in particular as to if they want to give us some money. Major prayers for that and hopefully we can get some investor backings soon. In the meantime D is trying to finish working on our website and we're preparing for our show in February with Fashion Mavericks that will be happening during 19th to 22nd of February (yes, during London Fashion Week eek!) as well as updating our portfolio. Some good news, RooR recently sponsored Miss Central Africa and the winner, Shelly Mobunda was wearing one of our dresses!


Busy? You can say that again. And then the boy is also trying to give me stress as if I haven't got enough already... but again that's another post. Maybe if I threaten him with the fact that there's a hot new illustrator in the office...

Still more work to be done; I'm interviewing Hermione de Paula, the most recent recipient of the Vauxhall Fashion Scout Merit Awards for Autumn/Winter 10/11, and have to finish the questions I have for her. Plus I'm also due to interview Robin Derrick, photographer and Creative Director of British Vogue on Saturday so need to get myself ready for that.

Good night and God bless

iBlogged

Two recent blog posts of mine (albeit for other blogs):

Make it while you Fake it for Style Cartel
Slimming shorts: is it possible that as we rock on this season trends for spring we could also shed a few centimetres off our hips and thighs? I'm sceptical but it anyone tries it out do let me know if you got results in 21 days as they claim.

And Dempsey's Musical Stamps for Sketchbook
For all the philatelists out there the Royal Mail releases special issues of stamps throughout the year with different themes. Their latest one which was released last Thursday celebrates some of the greatest British Album Covers.

Enjoy. I'm off to have some dinner and then do a spot of sewing then I shall be back to put up a proper blog post

What happened to our Honeymoon?

I had a fight with the boy today... it was kind of brewing from the night before and I called to kiss and make up so to speak but all I got was round two. To be honest I wonder if I can really call him the boy as we've only been talking for a few weeks and technically he hasn't asked me out yet.

By the by: do people still ask each other out anymore? I've been out of the dating scene for so long but I know back in high school (my last proper relationship, sad? I know) the boy had to officially ask the girl out. Is that still the case or do we just assume that if I like you and you like me that we're dating? On the other hand am I to be all women-have-balls-too and ask him out myself? Plus if he tells you he loves you before you're officially dating is that backwards or no?

He'd gone back home for the Christmas holiday and it was my turn to call him yesterday evening. When I did call he wasn't available and later on when he was free to talk I was busy. For some reason this was a problem; what could I possibly be doing that I was too busy to talk, and round one begun. I really didn't want to fight and tried to remain as calm as possible but apparently being calm = patronizing.

Blah blah blah, to cut the long story short it got me thinking about the so-called honeymoon period in relationships. You know those first few weeks, months (years if you're lucky) when everything is perfect and you never have any arguments? Whatever the time frame is I'm pretty sure 4 weeks is a bit on the short side (especially considering the fact that I'm not even sure if we're technically in a relationship). And not to go all Carrie B on y'all but I found myself wondering: is this a sign to cut my losses and run whilst I can, or is it a realistic occurrence in any normal relationship in which case I should see how we can settle our creative differences?

This is probably why I stayed single for so long. Men = muchos stress

I will Rise

Morning (or evening) lovely people, it's 2010!!! I've had the longest evening ever and I'm actually surprised I am still awake. We had our New Year's Eve celebration over at New Wine Church and it was getting broadcast so we were working our behinds off to get it all ready for our 5-hour show, glitches et al. I got really stressed out during the broadcast, and even broke down in tears at one point, but I managed to pull it together and we had a near-perfect production.

It got me thinking about how much we push ourselves; to do things we think we aught to do, setting targets for ourselves by ourselves. Setting targets is good don't get me wrong, but I find that I sometimes give myself somewhat impossible challenges. Like today I decided that I was going to get everything done perfectly, there was no room for errors. Now considering I was still only just receiving some of the song lyrics after we had already gone live I'm not quite sure how I thought I could prepare all 70-something Power Point slides in time to project them. Single-handedly might I add. And also why I was kicking myself when I couldn't.

Having said that I'll continue to push myself (you'll never know until you try right?) and I'm determined to be the best that I can be in 2010. It's crazy to think that I've been alive for two decades... pushing two-and-a-half actually. I did a little fast-forward in my mind and tried to see myself in 2020... three decades old, wrinkles and screaming kids, maybe finally having moved to NYC... hmmm. Whichever way I'm determined to make my mark on this world and this is my year for new beginnings.

So, new year resolution this year: Rise, Run and Reign. 2009 was a great year for me and I really grew as a person, but I truly believe it's just a stepping stone to the things that I will see/do/experience in 2010, with Him by my side.


Here's some food for thought: if you want something whole-heartedly why would you only put half your heart into it?