2017 My Year In Review — Arteresa Lynn

Happy New Year!! Can you believe it's 2018?!?! I am so excited for this year and have a lot of things planned for the site, but before we get into that I thought it was only right to recap my 2017. It was a great year of growth for me in my personal life and my business. Now ideally this post would have gone up on New Year's Eve or New Year's Day but the way my vacation was set up, I was busy living my best life and bringing in the new year right. But hey, better late than never right? Take a look at my 2017 journey below.

Leveled Up My Photography

For years my photographer has been my mom while I edited my own photos. We started off using a standard digital camera that I had for taking pics of family and friends. A couple of years ago I saved up and upgraded to a DSLR Canon EOS Rebel T3 just using the kit lens. About a year after that I purchased the 50mm lens to have the blurred background effect. Take a look at some of our old pics here, here, and here to see our photography journey. I am forever grateful to my mom for helping me with my blog photos for years and in 2017 I decided to give her a break and level up! I hired my very first photographer Stefanie Mariee. I remember our first photo shoot back in March 2017. I was extremely nervous but Stefanie made me feel so comfortable. For the next several months we had a shoot every weekend and I really noticed the difference in the traffic for my blog and my engagement on Instagram and Pinterest.

This year I also had the opportunity to work with my dream photographer, Kaye McCoy. I have been following Kaye's work for years. When I first started following her she was living in Atlanta and was the photographer for Mattie James (then known as Mattieologie). Fast forward to now where Kaye is out here in LA KILLING IT! She is so kind and great at what she does. I'm only posting 1 photo below because I will be posting the rest of our shoot in the upcoming weeks but just know that her angles and editing are everything! I hope to work with her again in 2018 and years to come.

And last but certainly not least I worked with the lovely Kristen of K Dot Photography by Kristen. I found Kristen on instagram at the end of 2017 so we only had 2 photo shoots together but we will without a doubt be working together more in 2018. She impressed me when I needed her last minute for a brand collaboration by giving me same day edits!! She had the pics back to me that same day in about 8 hours after booking her just the day before...unheard of!!

New Logo & Cohesive Branding

I also hired a Graphic Designer/Fashion Illustrator, Mikayla Jenkins from Sublime Cravings. We worked together to create my new logo, social media templates, social media headers/banners, and promotional templates for my styling services. My branding is now cohesive across all platforms. In 2018 we will tackle making over this site so get ready! Mikayla is by far the most professional person I have EVER worked with. She explains in detail, gives you a timeline, meets her deadlines (or is early!), and exceeds expectations. As previously mentioned, she is also a Fashion Illustrator so we also worked together on my next accomplishment on the list for 2017:

Launched My Tees & Sweatshirts!!

If you don't already know I launched the Curls and Confidence and Flaunt It, Flaws And All tees and sweatshirts at the start of June. This is something I had been planning for a while but just decided to finally go for it. There is a story behind both tees. Obviously the message is self-love but there's so much more to it; there's my personal story which I promise to share very soon. The support I received on my launch meant the world to me. Initially I thought I would only be supported by close friends and family but it was actually the opposite. My ig family really came through for me and I truly appreciate it. More tees and special things to come :).

Collaborated With More Brands

In 2017 I had the opportunity to work with some pretty cools brands. To name a few I worked with Carol's Daughter, Pantene, Sally Beauty, Tobi, Daniel Wellington, and Makeup Forever. I created my first media kit and learned a lot about the business side of blogging and being an influencer. I hope to continue to work with brands in 2018.

Felt The Love & Traveled

If nothing else 2017 taught me that my support system is so real. I have amazing people in my life who root and ride for me. My loves threw me an unforgettable surprise birthday dinner party. It is definitely going down in the books as one of my favorite birthdays. The thought behind it, the attention to detail, the guests...I just felt so loved and special.

I also traveled more in 2017 than any other year to date. I went to Chicago (3 times), Las Vegas (twice), Ohio, Cabo San Lucas, and Indio. And I may or may not have been reunited with love in 2017. I guess you just have to stick around to see that story unfold ;). All in all 2017 was a pretty good year of love and growth. I know that 2018 will only be bigger and better.

Thank you all so much for rocking with me!