2015: The Recap

Sometimes you can look back on a year and think you haven't done much at all. The time goes so fast and it's hard to find the time to process everything you encountered in 12 months. So New Year's Eve exists and like the procrastinators we are, we do all our thinking on this one day. Accumulating flashbacks, drawing out new dreams, new vision boards and new affirmations. 

This year was the best of my life.

I accomplished more than I thought I would and the reason for that is I learned to take risks. Big ones and small ones to cultivate the best year I could. With the help of family and friends, I can look back on this year and say I achieved everything I set out to. Saying that makes me want to dream bigger like the overachieving millennial that I am. I want more. Don't we all? But this post isn't about more, this post is about gratitude. Giving thanks to all of the wonderful things that happened this year. Let's take a look back...

Canada

January - May 2015

On January 1st 2015, I found myself on a 10 hour plane ride to Vancouver, Canada. I packed my bags 10 minutes after watching fireworks on TV at 12AM and three hours later I left for the airport with the family. Around this time, my older sister moved to the UK to start her new job as a midwife. For a second, it felt like my big family of 7 were splitting up - what with everyone moving in different directions. 

I left for Canada and never looked back... until I realised that I didn't have any bed clothes with me and had no idea where the supermarkets were based. I also didn't have Internet for the first two days. Too scared to leave my apartment for fear of getting lost, I stayed in and starved to death. That was lesson number 1 of moving far, far away from home. It jolted me and suddenly I wanted more so I told myself I was going to get everything out of this experience that I can. I wrote my business plans and proposals over there with the help of my very successful entrepreneurial lecturer, I made international friends from all over the world, I learned to stay focused and suddenly I was no longer the ditzy girl who cared just about fashion and not much else.

France

June 2015

During the time I lived in Canada, I decided I wanted to launch all of my new ideas that I had for Diamants au chocolat. So I set about changing everything about this site: adding new sections like "mood" and "classe" and drastically changing up my writing style. With that, I wanted to shoot new content for the Lookbook section so my best friend and I travelled to Nice, Monaco & Cannes and filmed everything we could for summer. Coming home and publishing all of the content led to instant success. My traffic quadrupled, my inbox was full and I was suddenly the girl people wanted to know.  

London

July 2015

By the time I relaunched my blog, I found myself suddenly being invited to events hosted by Movado in London! Spending my birthday over there was a huge highlight for me. That same week, I landed an interview with Stellar Magazine. Were my efforts finally beginning to pay off? 

New York

September 2015

In September I received invites to attend shows at New York Fashion Week. Again, I couldn't believe my luck. Was this really my life? I mean it was one of my New Year Resolutions but did I really believe it would happen? No. 

But it happened. I spent 5 days in New York smiling from ear to ear, snapchatting everything and spending tons of hours in Starbucks writing up new projects. Till this day I still questioned whether it all happened. I left New York suddenly convinced that once I finish my degree, I will pack my bags and move there permanently. 

Diamants au chocolat

This was really the year Diamants au chocolat began to flourish, the year I came up with all of these super cool ideas and now I find myself with even more goals and more ideas for this site. I can't wait for you to see the change that will take place on this site in 2016. It will shock you. Hell, it will shock me.