April 27, 2024
A lot has happened since my last blog. In my last blog, I talked about my best friend ‘going home.’ I still miss her – especially with Mother’s Day approaching because my husband and I would meet her and her son at the Olive Garden. Yesterday, I was looking at houses and when it got to the bottom of the page her information was filled in on the form from when she asked me to help her find a condo. I’ve been looking at houses on a regular basis but her information just started popping up at the bottom of the page this week so I believe she was reaching out to me.
I also talked about my series ‘Like Father, Like Son.’ I’ve been writing chapters in between creating more collections but I’ve also been introduced to some new characters for another story – ha ha! These characters are more patient so I was able to fill up another notebook with chapters for ‘Like Father, Like Son.’ I’m a little over 800 pages in on that series but I’m moving different with this series because ‘my kids’ are growing up and I can’t wait for you to find out what happened to them! If you’ve visited my website, you’ve seen the ‘Black Love Collections’ and if you haven’t – go check them out because the entire collection is based on the ‘Like Father Like Son’ series. You won’t have to scroll down because I have a tab at the top to the right.
I also talked about my newest collection at that time, ‘Energies Don’t Lie.’ That complete collection is on my website under ‘Beautiful Complements A-J.’ I also moved the ‘Stay & Play Together,’ collection out from under ‘Valentine’s Day,’ revised it, and gave it it’s own page under ‘Beautiful Complements L-Z.’ If you haven’t been to my website lately, go check it out – I’m really happy with it and I believe you will be too. I also created the ‘Cannabis Connoisseurs’ collection for those that celebrate 420 as well as those that live the ‘Cannabis Lifestyle,’ & the ‘Urban Sipper Glass’ collection. In addition to the collections on my website under ‘Beautiful Complements A-J,’ & ‘Beautiful Complements L-Z,’ I have new Facebook groups, ‘Cannabis Connoisseurs,’ ‘Beautiful Urban Black Love,’ & ‘Beautiful Urban Audio Books.’
I’m also excited to tell you I have ‘COFFEE!’ I actually have my own coffee y’all! If you’ve read my ‘Coffee Is Served’ series, then you’re familiar with the books and the chapters – so what I did was I actually created a brand of coffee with my book covers! I’m so excited for us coffee drinkers! If you’re following me in Facebook, you’ve already seen the flyer but if you haven’t – you’ll see the ‘Coffee’ tab on my website to the right and once you click on that tab, you’ll see the following collections: ‘Coffee Is Served,’ & ‘Coffee Introduction.’ I also created another Facebook group, ‘Coffee Is Served,’ and I’ve been posting items in that group daily.
If you’re subscribed to the Beautiful Publications YouTube Channel, you’ll see I’ve added the following collections to the channel: ‘Urban Fiction Serial Killer’ ‘Cannabis Connoisseurs,’ & ‘Urban Sipper Glass.’ If you’re not subscribed to the YouTube Channel, go subscribe and check out my videos!
This week I created another collection that will be my biggest yet – the ‘Summertime’ collection. This collection is so big it has it’s own tab at the top to the right and it’s been split into three separate collections: ‘Summertime-Adults,’ ‘Summertime-Kitchen,’ & ‘Summertime-Kids.’ I’m still working on it but I will have the complete collection for all three of them up on my website and the videos will be posted on my YouTube channel within the week.
If you’re still in clubhouse, I’m still hosting rooms in the ‘Los Angeles Lakers Fan Club’ and I’m still hosting in the ‘Music Hour Club.’ If you’re a Laker Fan, I’ve written ‘Stalked By Magic’ for Laker Fans, I have a tab on my website to the right, ‘Laker Fan Collections’ & I also have the ‘Beautiful Laker Fans’ Facebook group.
That’s all for now. Enjoy the rest of your weekend.
March 8, 2024
A lot has happened since 2024 began. I started writing ‘His Worst Nightmare,’ I celebrated my 61st birthday, and I lost two best friends. The first best friend I lost was my cover designer. Thank God I was able to finish my book and get a flyer before his retirement date. I was able to finish ‘His Worst Nightmare’ before my 61st birthday and thank God I was able to celebrate with my best friend of over 20 years because I had no idea that would be the last time I’d see her. On February 3, 2024 the last thing she heard from us was, “I love you,” and as I’m sitting here writing this blog I’m seeing that beautiful smile she has. She went from smiling to being admitted to the hospital on February 22 and she passed on February 23. Twenty days later. I pushed forward and attended my Annual Black History Spoken Word Poetry Tribute on February 24 because I knew she wouldn’t’ve wanted me to cancel.
My characters from ‘Like Father, Like Son’ waited for me to finish writing ‘His Worst Nightmare’ before they started talking to me again and I’ve started working on that series again. I wrote a chapter on what I’ve been dealing with lately and I love how my characters handled things – especially because I wrote in a psychiatrist that specializes in marriage and couples counseling. Being the multi-tasker that I am, I’ve also created a couple of Facebook groups: ‘Coffee Is Served’ and ‘Urban Fiction Black Love.’ ‘Coffee Is Served’ is everything coffee and I can’t wait for you to see what’s coming. ‘Urban Fiction Black Love’ is going to feature another collection I’ve been working on based on ‘Like Father, Like Son,’ and will also include my books because ‘Black Love’ is what I write. ‘Urban Fiction Black Love’ is also a promo group for urban fiction authors to promote their books.
I listened to a reading in Facebook earlier this week and the message that resonated with me the most was ‘Energies Don’t Lie.’ That message inspired me to create another complete collection and the t-shirt above is just one of the items.
It’s time for me to do the ‘Music Hour’ in the ‘Music Hour Club’ on Clubhouse. Happy Friday everyone.
January 19, 2024
It’s been a long day! I have now created three collections for Valentine’s Day – but it wasn’t without a few challenges. First, the Urban Valentine’s Day Collection web page was all out of alignment and I had to go back and re-align everything – which took a few hours! I finally got it done, got a few flyers done, and I’ve also added a few new ‘Complements’ to my website – the jewelry box above is a hint. I’ve also changed the appearance of my website a bit to make things flow a little easier. I’m taking a break from working on my website for a bit to eat dinner, watch Power, and host tonight’s Laker game in clubhouse. If you’re in clubhouse tomorrow, I’ll also be hosting the 49ers game against the Packers – I don’t normally host NFL games but we had a big discussion about this game since I’m a fan of both teams in the Los Angeles Lakers Fan Club (that’s what we do) and they asked me so I’ll see you there too. My husband is a 49er fan and I told him I believe they’re going to beat the Packers so we’ll see.
January 17, 2024
My intention was to do some writing while I was doing laundry, but things don’t always go as planned. I did do laundry; however, instead of writing, I ended up creating a collection for Valentine’s Day. As I was creating the collection, my characters continued to talk to me from the book I’m currently writing and then my characters from Like Father, Like Son also started talking to me. I love when this happens – especially because Like Father, Like Son is a spin-off from the Twisted Series and Bazil & Beautiee are publishers so I can’t wait to write these characters into Like Father, Like Son. My Valentine’s Day Collection will be up tomorrow but tonight, I’m hosting a game in the Los Angeles Lakers Fan Club – oh – I almost forgot – I started another group, ‘Beautiful Laker Fans’ and I’ve been posting complements in that group. That’s all for now – the game’s about to start.
January 10, 2024
I started my day by attending a S.C.O.R.E Workshop, IRS Resources For Small Business Owners. I knew most of the information that was presented, but there was some additional information added so I’m glad I attended. I also updated my Urban Candle & Urban Shot Glass Collections to include the Like Father, Like Son complements. These complements have been added to Beautiful Complements pop-up shop and I’m incorporating them into pages on Beautiful Publications so they’ll be available soon. One of my favorite items is the pillow I created from the flyer. I love how the colors pop off the pillow and I love the size! I may re-do my entire pillow collection!
January 7, 2024
I wasn’t happy with the changes so I went back to Canva, created a new header, and revised all the blog posts while I was eating breakfast. I also made more changes to my website. Time to finish my coffee.
January 6, 2024
Happy New Year 2024 – Part 2
I started off 2024 creating a few flyers for Beautiful Complements and Beautiful Publications, I bought 2 book covers. If you’re a book cover addict like me then you are welcome to join my group, Book Cover Addicts. I also hit a scratch-off for $18 and today, I taught myself how to indent text using the classic WordPress editor. I’m still working on ‘Like Father, Like Son,’ – well – let me re-phrase – my characters aren’t done talking – LOL. I’ll also be celebrating my Retirement Anniversary on January 11, 2024 with friends who are also retired. I created another flyer for the ‘Amethyst Collection that I will start promoting on January 21st and I will continue to promote through February 20th. If you’d like a sneak peak, the collection is already available on my website under Beautiful Complements A-J.
January 6, 2024
Happy New Year 2024!
2023 was something! I created my pop-up shop, Beautiful Complements, in July 2023 and to date I have 1,434 ‘complements’ to choose from. My ‘Happy New Year’ series inspired the following collections:
- Anniversary
- Christmas
- New Year Countdown
- New Year
It’s amazing what you can create when you focus and I thank God I’m still able to do it.
On Christmas Day, December 25, 2023 I released ‘Twisted Christmas: The Next Generation PG-13.’ This is the start of the ‘Twisted Series PG-13’ for readers that prefer things toned down a bit.
I saw a few of people post their accomplishments for 2023 and it inspired me to write my accomplishments down:
- Started my Beautiful Blog
- Created a pop-up shop with 1,434 complements to choose from
- Made my first sale within two months of creating my pop-up-shop
- Learned new skills in Canva
- Learned how to add different backgrounds to my website pages
- Started writing my first Generational Series
If you haven’t written your list of accomplishments – do it – even if it’s just one thing – if you accomplished just one thing – you moved forward.
October 29, 2023
TikTok
I decided earlier this week I was going to be ready for Christmas before Halloween – just like they are in the stores! It seemed easy enough because I had already planned my posts for Halloween and I’m ready for Christmas so all I had to do was schedule some posts. Everything was okay until I went to TikTok. Once I got to TikTok, I posted my image, made my reel, posted it, and went to check the reel on my page. I was shocked when I saw the following message: “Music removed due to copyright infringement – please select different music.” Excuse me – I thought the music we used on TikTok was already approved for reels in TikTok! Oh well – back to getting Ready for Christmas.
October 22, 2023
I was just writing. I knew where the plot was going so it was easy to write this particular chapter until, out of nowhere, this ‘character’ started talking slick. As a reader you’re probably saying, “But you’re the writer!” and you’re right – but this character had to be dealt with none-the-less. The best part about dealing with this character is that when I called my niece to tell her I had to kill this character for getting slick with her, my niece told me she worked with someone that had the same name as the character I killed – and my niece couldn’t stand her!
October 12, 2023
As frustrating as technology can be sometimes, when you finally see through your frustration and things begin to work, it’s a beautiful thing! Thank God I was able to fix the glitch that customer service couldn’t help me with after being on hold for over 45 minutes! Today, that familiar feeling of frustration was starting to creep back in as I couldn’t figure out how to get something to line up on one of my pages and – wala – I discovered something called a ‘spacer’ that puts your text on the next line so you can line your page up exactly how you want to!
October 8, 2023
Earlier this week, I was having a discussion with my husband. I already knew what LGBTQ stood for but I didn’t know what I.A. stood for so I told my husband, “Google it for me because I want to make a t-shirt.” Yes, this all started because I wanted to create a t-shirt in my ‘Beautiful Complements’ pop-up-shop. Once I learned that I stood for Intersex, A stood for Asexual, and + stood for everyone else, I was ready to create my t-shirt for my family, my friends, and my followers. If you’ve read my books, you already know I’ve written stories that include LGBTQ characters – if you haven’t read any of my books, let’s get into them here.
In my first series, ‘How Far Are You Willing To Go? Murder Is Just The Beginning,’ I created a character for one of my friends that was married to a bisexual man. Some of her friends didn’t and couldn’t understand how or why she was willing to marry a bisexual man and she explained it very simply: “I’m married to a bisexual man because I get the best of both worlds – when he wants to be with a man, he shares that man with me.” I created this character because one of my bisexual friends shared part of his journey with me. First, he told me he’d been married for 9 years and had a daughter, but he couldn’t stay married because he just wasn’t happy. Second, he told me that most of his relationships were with married men who were on the down-low.
In my second series, ‘Twisted Beautiee: An Erotic Thriller,” I created a character that isn’t bisexual, but fell in love with a man. How did this happen? I’ll explain:
My character, Bazil, went to prison. While in prison, one night he heard a man screaming for help because the man was about to be ‘traded for payment’ (I won’t say what was about to happen but I’m sure you know). Bazil called for the guards, stopped this from happening, and asked for the man to be transferred to his cell to protect him. They became good friends, talked about everything that men talk about, and eventually the conversation turned to sex. One night Bazil’s friend offered to ‘do him a favor’ and suggested, “Just close your eyes and pretend it’s a woman.” This worked for a while but eventually, as if often the case, they caught feelings for each other. Bazil always wanted a wife and falling for his friend didn’t change any of that but you’ll need to read the entire 14-book ‘Twisted’ series to find out what happens and how this all plays out. This story also continues for these characters in another spin-off series, ‘Erotic Zombies in the UK,’ which is book 4 in the ‘Erotic Zombies’ series – I know – I write psychotic & crazy – but I love it. This brings us back to my t-shirt that turned into an entire collection.
I went to my Canva, found what I wanted, and created my design. I was really proud of the design I chose and I was pumped to go create my t-shirt. I couldn’t stop there though. I continued to create and realized I had created 24 different items! I was excited! I even went so far as to create a suitcase for traveling! I was pumped, inspired, and went back to canva to create the flyer for my products!
I posted the flyer and link for my products on social media and Mega prompted me to create an ad. I’m always careful about creating ads because I’ve been denied a few for (you know what) so I was surprised that Mega actually suggested I create an ad, but I was happy to do it, so I did.
It didn’t take long for the negative comments to come in. Each time I got notified of a comment, I’d go to my business page, look at the comment, sigh, show it to my husband, and then I’d hide it. Maybe I should’ve left them there? I’m not sure. They went from bad to worse. Meme’s with Barack & Michelle Obama hugging with either a male organ protruding from between her legs to one of them hugging with the comment, “I love it when our b… touch each other,” to Archie Bunker with the comment, “I guess you can’t fix stupid,” to another meme of two girls with one girl down on her knee pointing between the other girls legs with the comment, “This is a real girl,” to the final comment, “F… Off!” Under that particular post, someone commented, “Calm down – nobody asked you,” and I appreciated the comment in defense, but I also realized this wasn’t going the way I wanted it to go. I initially posted this flyer twice so my plan was to remove the post that I didn’t promote and continue to hide comments but what ended up happening was I ended up removing the ad all together. I believe that was God because I still have all the posts on my personal pages, my promotional groups, Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, and Linkedin.Am I still happy I created my collection? Hell yea! My niece that is currently married to her trans-male husband was the first one to see it and she was excited. My pansexual friend was the next one to see it and she was also excited. This collection was started for my family. For my friends. For you.