A series I’ve been working on in my spare time to practice mindful artmaking.
As a graphic + motion designer, I am one of the lucky people who get to do what I love as a career. But working in advertising is not my dream. My dream is to sustain a comfortable life with the money I make from my creativity, outside of having to clock into an office building. As a Manifesting Generator (more on my human design journey in a future post), I am a true multi-hyphenate who cannot be put into one box. You can honestly blame or thank my mom (I like that better) for that. The things that I’ve found spark joy in me are filming and editing YouTube videos, writing and illustrating zines, creating my own characters, and really just overall making stuff. So, eight years later, I’ve decided to spin the block and launch Haus of Elleezus again. I’ve been working on relaunching my online store for months, just constantly reworking the content and trying to figure out how shipping works (spoiler alert: it’s confusing as hell). And then I heard someone say, “Done is better than perfect.” So, consider this a soft launch. Between you and me, I am still trying to find the balance between working and resting, but that is so hard when you are like me and always find something new to do. I’m giving myself until my birthday in May to curate an official launch. But until then, I am so grateful to each and every one of you for following along as I chase my dreams, and as a personal thank you, you can use this discount code to get 10% off your order: “SUBSTACKFAM.”
P.S. To all of y’all who still have the OG merch, I love y’all for real.
I cringed soooo hard watching this. From the dip brow eyebrows of the 2010s (iykyk 😭) to my rambling (do yourself a favor and listen to this at 2x speed as I did), I could not finish this video fast enough. But it did make my heart flutter to realize I’m still following through with the dreams of 20-year-old Danyelle. Shoutouts to her.
Dreams and realities are opposites.
Action synthesizes them.
- Assata Shakur
This might be my favorite color palette so far. My mother and sister are both Aries, so I had to channel that firey trailblazer energy they both exhibit. ❤️
Books I’ve read in March…
“The Davenports” by Krystal Marquis
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
This is the first book in a series set in the 1910s revolving around The Davenports, one of Chicago’s few wealthy Black families at the time. The patriarch is an ex-slave with an entrepreneurial spirit who hustles his way to building up one of the premium carriage businesses in the country. But the story centers around the young women in the family and their friends/acquaintances tasked with trying to figure out their own way in the world, separate from the expectations their elite surroundings have for them. I heard an adapted television series is in the works, and I can’t wait.
“Ring Shout” by P. Djèlí Clark
⭐️⭐️⭐️
This book has a super dope concept. I am absolutely seated for a reimagining of the Ku Klux Klan’s reign of terror as a result of supernatural forces. However, in full transparency, I listened to this as an audiobook while multitasking and wasn’t really intrigued. I’m sure this rating will change once I reread it in the not-so-distant future.
