Atlanta International 6thYear Of Fashionable Trendy Treats!!!

As July 24, 2012 rolled in quickly our team of passionate models, event coordinators, and directors were preparing for an amazing fashion show filled with a week of iconic fashion trends. From July 24th-29th our schedule offered style and class while delivering the experience to network with international designers, models, stylists, media, and sponsors. Our line up from the elegant Hotel Indigo to 200 Peachtree in effort to show our support for national charity organizations featured nearly 30 couture designers to display their latest looks. Since I myself am a shoe fiend, I was very impressed by one particular designer who's shoes were distinctively, not the average glass slipper...  You can certainly go check out some of this designers shoes online if you are looking for something to call your own! Ladies you know how we do "we want something no one else has" Imitation by Jerell is a perfect way to tell people "You ain't seen these before"!!! www.imitationbyjerell.com

The Pretty Academy school of  Fashion served the purpose to allow industry experts to show us how to make our fashion dreams into reality with a series of workshops with fashion, model boot camp, and extreme style make-overs by Motives for La La and the Beauty Shop. After training with Professional Model trainer Mike Jones in boot camp, I must say that I saw the models enjoy and express their improvement on the runway and behind the cameras. For the most part, some of our models unfortunately could not join us for our after party engagements but I hope that next year we can surely make them a part of the exciting night life here in Atlanta, GA. Our models came from all directions over the US and also from other countries their time and dedication to Atlanta International Fashion Week was most appreciated. If it wasn't for our fabulous designers such as Celebrity Designers Jason Christopher Peters, Sacred Heart Collections, Simply Beautiful Designs, Black Russian Label, Hyper Haute, J Rok Coture, and Nelson Arrington this show couldn't have gone on, but of course this list goes on and many others. AIFW was most amiable for all of the fashion trends featured. The kid models of L.A.H.A. for kids made the runway their own playground with extreme swag! I have to personally list two of my favorite designers were La'Moo Designs and Navoj Studios because when it was time to bring it they brought extraordinary in my book!

Most Importantly Thanks To Sponsors like Fashion In The City, Future Visions, Aveda Institutes South, Digital Fashion Group, and many, many, more.... My experience and opportunity to network with the best of the best in the fashion industry was an inspiration. A learning experience I will take with me as I grow more passionate about a leading industry that is ever evolving when it comes to the latest trends.

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Beauty Is In The Eye Of The Beholder...

Before I go into this article I want you to ask yourself a deep question, who is the beholder of MY beauty? Prior to my stroke of enlightenment I was into making my image match to those of what I was conditioned into thinking "this is the look that makes me acceptable to society". I've had the learning experience of modeling for 15+ years and my appearance was always important, constantly wearing weaves and at one point I tried skin bleaching for experimental purposes. When I looked at the magazines and video models or even television showed the reflection of what they wanted me to think I should look like as a natural black woman. Which always appeared to be the total opposite of my content as an African/ Native American woman, and for the most part to being on the cover of a magazine required me to look the part of what they find acceptable the sleek straight hair, curly, or permed high yellow red bone with nice boobs and voluptuous curves. Even the petite models had a certain look that they had to maintain to grace the covers. In the course of time I had to reflect on not only all the money I was putting into looking like someone else but also WHO am I really trying to be? and I hated my hair for no reason because it was strong, thick, and kinky.  I thought about how many natural black women I really see on magazines and certainly did my research, nothing shocked me about how something I was never really used to seeing was never there to encourage me to embrace what the good LORD had given me "Good Strong Hair". I realize I wanted to burn it chemically straight, hide it under a wig, intertwine it with someone else s hair to make the fit. All the while I'm losing MYSELF and my money in in something I was already blessed with "originality". So I asked myself why in the hell would I want to copy someone Else's image to make myself  worthy of acceptance. I am who I am because God made me that way.

And the last time I checked none of those people were MY makers. I freed myself by saying they can love me naturally because this is what makes me ME or they can create the lies and deceit that goes through time making others think this is the only way to be IN. Embracing my hair, skin, and body has been  a burden lifted off of me, as a matter fact I take pride in who I AM more so now today because I don't have to prove to anyone I'm IN. God didn't neglect the fact to show me that I am beautiful just the way I was created giving me the strength to discipline and love myself  regardless of what I see on a magazine or television. I think it's disappointing to not see as many beautiful authentic black women gracing the media, it sure would help the younger generation appreciate genuine real people instead of trying to copy paste the same scene that's had us lost for so long. If you don't like me for what I was made to be, talk to my Creator and I'm sure the quote can be found in the King James version bible "So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them". I see a lot of black women allowing someone else to "Behold"<<  (Word Origin & History) form)) their beauty changing and conforming them into the image others see fit for them. If that's in your nature to do so, by all means continue to do what's best for YOU, in the process of it all I just ask that you hold on to what's really you as much on the inside being (that is if you know exactly who you are) as well on the outside. I would say this picture made me think really hard about do I really want to look like a white woman? I'm just saying, not judging she may want to but I don't and I damn sure don't want my daughter to take on the same trait. She should be a proud black woman confident in her skin and hair for what it was meant to be naturally!!!! CAN'T PULL THE WOOL OVER MY EYES ANY LONGER....making me to be something I was never meant to be was never in ALMIGHTY GOD'S PLAN but I do have something much greater and that's a PURPOSE!   They're glamorous, but natural isn't.....  PLEASE!!!

"The Living Goddess" Book By: Linda Johnsen *My Review

"The Living Goddess" By: Linda Johnsen

I have to say that is book was one of the most inspiring books and highly enlightening, I stumbled upon this book not expecting it was going to bring me some of the most important answers I needed as a woman, "As a Goddess". I would have to say it was meant for me to read. It was so divine how my was path drawn out to attain this particular book. The Living Goddess was written by Linda Johnsen, this is a spiritual book, a guide to live with God more intimately.  You have to understand that everything has a history, it's a big world out here so why not find out the mysteries of Who YOU are? Through many Hindu traditions as well as others one of my favorites being the Egyptians taught the acknowledgement of The Mother Of the Universe. To my surprise she is everywhere alive in you and me as we go through day to day life it's hard to realize this when society and other influences try to pull the wool over your eyes. Mother Earth is always producing giving and taking life for the full circle of life to be fulfilled.  Like, the Goddess Lakshmi who is always associated with her husband a God Vishnu, he was knowledge and she was understanding, the very ying to her yang. I love their story because it teaches even though they were together they act on their own. There is a widely accepted myth that all human societies should consider the male principle active and the female principle passive! One does not work without the other this world is based upon True or False and Yes or No rarely no vivid details just black and white because it's easier to make you comfortable thinking that way. This book not only lists the many Goddesses who were forgotten and wiped out for Western Culture reasons, but it also extends the explanation of  why it's important to raise self-awareness in such confusing times as these. It teaches meditation methods that the yogis use to free yourself from the cycle of karma. Which goes along with be careful what you think  it's almost just as bad as acting upon it. So we have to learn how to carry out our rightful responsibilities in this world without polluting by claiming any award. I have several things I can talk about with this book it is so enlightening, for instance the explanation of  when a male devote makes love to a woman, he should free his mind from lust, contemplating her beauty as my own and her soul as my own self. It goes on to say For him, sexual union should be a glorious meditation on the Goddess. The pleasure he experiences is; my pleasure let him recognize this.A woman should envision her lover as the Lord himself, perfect and blissful. Of course you can't connect with everybody like this because in lust it has an beginning and end. Just enjoyment based on the conscious acknowledgement of my all pervading  perfection is endless. There are some phenomenal word passages that became poetry to my soul as I read them, directly spoken from the Goddess herself. The most intriguing story that caught my interest was how much love Lila had for her husband, and how she called upon Goddess Sarasvati for some pretty unbelievable request, granted she was very devoted and Sarasvati appeared to show her compassion and explain to Lila the power of consciousness. The Living Goddess reveals some breathtaking knowledge towards the end of the book it gives explanation of the Goddess and how deception began in the Garden of Eden. When I saw "Elohim" by way of Adam and Eve I knew these were some of the big answers I was looking for. This book was liberating with hidden information most people don't want you to know which is why it's history was thrown out and basically dominated to the belief system of what "THEY" want you to believe. I made a vow to myself that "THUNDER, PERFECT MIND" would be the very script I say to myself everyday! It was preserved among the manuscripts found in Egypt, it represents the Goddess Isis. I have come to realize she is in me and I am in her the power to give life, still my thoughts, meditate, and be against all the odds in the world but still remain in knowledge, wisdom, strength, and beauty without an ounce of doubt because I know who I AM....Do you know who YOU are?  I will read this book again and again just because it encourages and inspires acknowledging the transformation I feel growing inside of me everyday as I reclaim the tradition of  The Mother Universe.