Love from, Florence Grace

Today I published a post on my magazine's website by one of my writers, all about women who are criticised for not wanting to have children and get married. It was a really good article and is definitely something I've seen happen to people I know- although not me personally because I'm all about having an OTT wedding and having babies because I love 'em, but that's beside the point. The point was, women shouldn't be criticised for not doing what society tells them they should  be doing.   It's basically the same as what I've been going through for the past eleven months, being single. While my best pals have been all for the new independent Flo smashing her career goals and being generally fab (look, they say it, not me), other people aren't so understanding. I'm almost continuously hit with things like  "You mean you're not dating yet?" "You want to get out there whilst you're still young!" ...

2016 has been the weirdest year of all. Don't you agree? Let's just have a brief recap on the year so far. We started off 2016 in an incredibly sad way, losing a very large number of celebrities in quick succession. Now yes, people die every day, but you never hear about so many celebrities dying at once. We lost the likes of David Bowie, Alan Rickman and Prince, to name but a few. It was an incredibly sad time and has people panicking every time a celebrities name is trending on Twitter now. We all began to hate a girl called Becky who we didn't actually know, simply because Beyonce implied that her long time partner, Jay Z, cheated on her with "Becky with the good hair". No one wants to be called Becky now. We've also had to deal with Brexit. Bloody Brexit. Within the space of 24 hours the country left the EU and the Prime Minister had resigned. Racial hate crimes rose dramatically and the country has basically been a shambles since. We lande...

As I wrote about yesterday, last night I was fortunate enough to see Beyonce! As anyone could have expected, it was incredible . To be honest, she actually exceeded my expectations, and I can't really put into words just how amazing the night was. Every single performance was off the scale, her dance routines and costume changes were flawless, and her voice ...well, it was just as good as on the CD, if not better! It wasn't just the performance that blew me away though. It was the message behind the entire show, the idea of female empowerment, being comfortable in your ow skin, standing on your own two feet no matter what tornado of crap life brings your way, not needing a man to be happy . Of course, every single one of those key themes resonated so strongly with me and I was beyond inspired. It made me feel better about everything I've gone through in the last six months, really. I've had my heart broken, I have been grinding non stop to make money, I've...

Guys... Today is the day! I'm off to see Beyonce!!!!!!!!!!!!! I literally can't believe this. I have waited so  long for this moment. Beyonce's music has been a part of my life for as long as I can remember. My earliest memory of listening to her is my mum playing 'Crazy in Love' at my old, old house when I was...what, seven maybe? Basically, I don't remember ever not  listening to (and loving) Beyonce's music!  When she went on her last world tour, I was so excited. Finally, with my o2 priority, I'd have a good chance at getting tickets to see the goddess herself! I managed to get in the queue, get tickets- but I was in a group of three friends, and I could only get two tickets. Neither of them wanted to come without the other and so I gave up the tickets. I had to watch almost every girl at school go to Beyonce whilst I sat there, knowing I gave my pair up.  But they say everything happens for a reason, because this year she'...

"Beyonce could throw Blue Ivy in the sea and the Beyhive would be like YASSSSS THROW THAT LIL BITCH" "Beyonce could kill Jay and have all these chicks killing their men too" "Beyonce could nuke a country and the world would be like YES B" Sigh. These statements themselves are far from funny- in fact, the failed attempt at humour is the funniest part of them. In case you aren't clued up on the situation, these statements come around as a series of meme's every time Beyonce does something amazing  totally out of the blue that gets the world talking- for example, when she dropped Lemonade.  Now people who share these kinds of memes and jokes are right in the fact that Beyonce has a huge amount of support no matter what she does, and she certainly does set her fans of into a mad frenzy, creating a world wide movement of mass hysteria every time. However, the people who share these meme's forget one teeny, tiny detail... ...

Of course you knew it was coming- a blog post on my one true love, Beyonce, and her visual album 'Lemonade'. I had basically watched it on launch day via people's streams of tweets but unfortunately, without HBO, I couldn't really  watch...so I wanted to wait until I'd experienced it in all of it's glory before writing about it for you guys. Well. I have one word for you all. Wow. That is literally all that I can say. We moaned at Beyonce via social media, we complained about the fact she was taking her sweet time to bring out more music for us, but I can absolutely forgive her now because the wait was 100% worth it. It is an absolute masterpiece from the lyrics, to the melodies, the political messages, the strong story line running throughout the visuals that tie the songs together...I just physically can't put into words how incredible it is.  Beyonce touches on some hugely  important issues surrounding police brutality and racism, parti...

"Formation" One word was all it took. One word in a simple, plain white font, plastered across an image of Beyonce with long braided locks, posted to her instagram after a 10 week absence and the world went wild . Within seconds, "Formation" was trending on social media, and once everyone had managed to access her website to watch the full video and hear the full song, both "Beyonce" and "Blue Ivy" were trending across social media too. So why all of the fuss? Well, first and foremost, Beyonce hasn't released a single, let alone an album in a very long time and this came totally unannounced and unexpected. Secondly, she dropped it just before her performance at the Super Bowl half time show, meaning that more people tuned in to watch the Super Bowl just to catch her performance (God, the gal knows how to do business). Thirdly- and most importantly- the song is totally iconic. Discussing important and often ignored black histor...

Feminist. A word that over the last three years or so seems to have been flung around here, there and everywhere more often than ever before. From being a fashion statement to an attempted "insult", we have definitely been made more aware of feminism. However, the definition has been completely misconstrued, warped and twisted beyond recognition, with the term being surrounded by such negative connotations that many people are actually happy to deem themselves not  a feminist, and unwilling to support feminism! By definition, feminism is "the advocacy of women's rights on the ground of the equality of the sexes". According to the recorded clip in Beyonce's 'Flawless', a feminist is "the person who believes in the social, political and economic equality of the sexes". In other words, being a feminist, and feminism itself, is purely about equality between the sexes on all levels . It is not about women being better than men. It is ...

The unthinkable has happened. Photos of un-airbrushed Beyonce have leaked online. Kim Kardashian tried to break the internet with her behind, but Beyonce has caused a break down- with her face. Fans from the Beyhive went into meltdown when over 200 photos, which had allegedly been untouched, appeared online. Not only did they jump to Queen B's defence immediately, claiming the photos to be fakes, they also sent hate to the people who had sourced the photos and shared them with the world, forcing them to be removed. If you thought you could get away with insulting the Queen, you were sorely mistaken. Me, however. I could not care less about photos of Beyonce and how airbrushed they are or not. In my opinion, photoshop is a thing of the devil. It edits celebrities beyond recognition half of the time and creates unrealistic expectations for women to set their sights on, often leading to damaged self esteems, especially in teenagers, as well as mental health problems and eating dis...

So, unless you've been living under a rock for the last year, you'll have heard all about the controversial series of novels- and now, an even more controversial film- 50 Shades of Grey. Raising questions as to whether the relationship between the two main characters is a healthy one and inviting people into a new world of sensuality and sex toys/positions you would never even have imagined, the series has caught the attention of anyone and everyone. To me, the parts of the books I did read were dull, and for now my feminist self has decided to boycott the movie too. However, I cannot deny the amazing  soundtrack that has been created for the movie. Featuring artists such as Ellie Goulding, Sia and The Weeknd, the album hosts a great variety of music. The most enchanting song has to be Queen B's latest version of 'Crazy in Love'. Slowed right down, the song has a whole new sensual take, fitting for the month of love and the 'romantic' film. I must admit,...