Gone and grab your 🍿 friends bc this is a long one... Hello hello! Happy Friyay! Holy hell there are A LOTTTT of new folks around here 👀 so I reckon it’s time for a quick reintroduction. BUT FIRST. This has been an incredibly emotional and overwhelming week. I am still working through a vast range of emotions. I am not ok. But I will be. I want to make this VERY clear: I AM NOT AN ANTI-RACISM EDUCATOR. I am a BLACK woman who is also a QUEER woman who is also a MOTHER and a SISTER and an AUNT and also a VETERAN and a fiercely loyal FRIEND who also HAPPENS TO BE a DESIGNER (yes I went to school for it) and a HOMEOWNER who loves living small, moody spaces, making my home pretty and inspiring others to create spaces they love and that bring them joy as well. I also have a Great Dane that EVERYONE loves even though she acts like middle management and her ass is ALWAYS in the way not doing a damn thing and taking all the credit 😅. all this to say...to all my new white followers who found your way over to my corner of the internets: I am not here to specifically teach you about racism or the Black experience. I am here to share with you my life, my stories and my home in all of its various forms. What you gain, learn and/or take away from that is on you. At the very least I hope you connect with SOMETHING about me that helps you SEE that Black lives and voices matter just as yours do. Because it’s the lack of SEEING us or being able to see YOURSELF or pieces of your own lives in us that makes you indifferent to ours, and which made many of you “not even notice” that your feed never had a single one of us in it prior to this week. I hope this time you’ve taken to mute and #amplifymelenatedvoices has also been eye opening for you in noticing just how much space you occupy...especially here in the interiors and design world. Welcome to my instafam new friends! I started blogging in 2012 because I didn’t see a SINGLE person who looked like me, had a family like mine, or who shared my same style in the design/interiors blogging world. NOT A SINGLE ONE. And since #representationmatters I decided I WOULD BE WHAT I WANTED TO SEE...what I and others NEEDED to see. ⬇️Cont⬇