Belly

What ‘Black-ish’ Got Right About Pregnancy Discrimination

Beyonce is Pregnant Again, With Twins! Some MyBrownBaby Advice For Dealing With the Second Kid(s)

Janet Jackson and Her New Baby: Nevermind Her Age—Congrats, Girl!
Baby

Teacher Knowledge vs. Mommy Knowledge: A Child Chooses

Explaining Thanksgiving To Brown Babies: The Truth Doesn’t Have To Hurt

Is Natural Potty Training The New Throwback?
Thought

Freedom, Speakeasy with Denene: Killer Mike Wants Us to Get Free

Christmas Cocktails: #TalkEarly About Responsible Holiday Drinking

BLACK, Speakeasy with Denene: Being Black Is An Extreme Sport
Table

Five Mother’s Day Breakfast Recipes That’ll Make You a Hero This Sunday

Cider Apple Pie with Apple Cider Drizzle (RECIPE)

Italian Meatball Recipe with Home Made Red Wine Tomato Sauce
Taste

Everybody Loves the Sunshine: Finding Joy in Blackness

Happy Book Birthday, “Just Like a Mama,” the newest addition to Denene Millner Books

BLACK, Speakeasy with Denene: Being Black Is An Extreme Sport
About
Market

Jan26

The Best of Denene Millner’s MyBrownBaby

SIGN UP FOR YOUR FREE COPY OF THE BEST OF MYBROWNBABY HERE.

MYBROWNBABY SOCIAL

Tweets by @MyBrownBaby

Instagram post 2229990632232125466_2218537

A vibe. 💋

Instagram post 2227947238584583959_2218537

After you finish boo-hooing all the way through the first segment of SPEAKEASY WITH DENENE, get ready for laughs, eye-opening commentary and some sage storytelling as I’m joined by New York Times bestseller and my fav unicorn, @nicstone, author of “Dear Martin,” “Odd One Out,” and the new mid-grade novel, “Clean Getaway.” Nic, who is every bit as funny and outspoken as she is gorgeous, gives us insight into why we need more diverse books for children and teens, what it takes to present an authentic voice in her pages, why it’s a good idea to write romance novels for tweens and why she does her absolute best to have as few white characters in her books as possible. You know this is my passion and mission at @denenemillnerbooks, so the convo is lit!

Joining me for the interview with Nic was Lyric Eschoe, a teen staff member with Vox Teen Communications in Atlanta. Lyric attends Spelman College and is a major Nic Stone fan. She helped me ask Nic all the important questions in this raucous, energetic interview.

We opened the #NicStone with a peek into a book signing featuring Nic and New York Times bestselling author Angie Thomas, who penned the hugely popular book, “The Hate U Give.” You will absolutely love the convo, period, but if you care anything at all about black children, their representation in books and the right of black artists to be storytellers, get to it—listen in! #speakeasywithdenene #blackpodcasts #podcasts
.

Instagram post 2227760483473548802_2218537

Though I’ve been a journalist for almost 35 years, I don’t write about my father a lot. James Millner fiercely guards his privacy and is so much more satisfied being humble and living a simple life, that I have no other choice but to respect that he’d rather I not put all his business in the street. But as we considered who in my personal life would be the embodiment of “sunshine,” this week’s password for Speakeasy with Denene, it made perfect sense to invite Daddy to the mic.

He is, after all, my heart. My rock. My shoulder to lean on. My “you can do it” cheerleader. My “it’s gonna be all right, Baby” comforter. The best papa on the whole, wide, planet. The one who found me and said, “She’s mine.” My hero. My daddy. The man who literally lights up my life.

James Jr. is my sunshine.

I thought he would say “no” when I asked him to join me, but, to my surprise, he happily obliged and, a day after Thanksgiving dinner, with a cup of coffee and a thick slice of lemon butter pound cake on his napkin—the cake is my mom’s recipe—he sat in my dining room and submitted to my queries about parenting, marriage, losing the love of his life, being a widower, and learning to look for the sun after the rain.

I’ve done countless interviews in my lifetime, and checking my emotions in the interest of objectivity is the hallmark of my training as a journalist, but this was wholly impossible as I interviewed Daddy. Yes, I cried all the way through it because that’s my father—my sunshine—and when he says he’s proud of me, this 51-year-old, very grown woman still melts like a little girl.

I’ll adore you, Daddy, until the dolphins fly and parrots swim at sea.

Always.

Check out the season finale of SPEAKEASY WITH DENENE, out today on your fav podcast platform and at www.speakeasywithdenene.com. #blackpodcasts #podcast #gpb

Instagram post 2223034832677995725_2218537

Queenin’. 👑

Instagram post 2221247952655266318_2218537

Oh happy day for JUST LIKE A MAMA, the debut book on my all-new @denenemillnerbooks imprint with @simonkids! Today is #JustLikeaMama’s book birthday and I’m so proud to present to the world this glorious children’s picture book, penned by Alice Faye Duncan (@alicefayewrites) and illustrated by Charnelle Pinkney Barlow (@callmechartreuse), who makes her picture book debut, following in the footsteps of her illustrious grandfather Jerry Pinkney!
❤️❤️❤️
JUST LIKE A MAMA is about a little girl who comes to understand that the woman raising her while her parents are absent loves her “just like a mama.” I know about this kind of love: as a child of adoption, I’ve written quite a bit about the home my parents made for me—how they made a point of disciplining me, teaching me, embracing me. Loving me. I am their daughter. They are my parents. We are a family. Forever.
So, it only made sense that JUST LIKE A MAMA pulled at every last one of my heart strings. But beyond my personal experience with #foreverfamilies, this #childrensbooks pulls double duty honoring a long-held tradition in our community, in which grandparents, aunties, godparents and the like love children whom they care for and offer kindness to when those babies’ parents cannot.
See, stories about foster care and adoption will have you thinking that only white people adopt brown babies—that Black people don’t look after our own. But we know better. Black people taking care of each other’s non-blood-related children is a long-held tradition that stretches back to the days of slavery, to counter the actions of slave owners who broke up Black families for profit and punishment. Taking care of each other was a strategy for survival. Still is today. And JUST LIKE A MAMA celebrates that.
Buy a bunch of copies of JUST LIKE A MAMA anywhere books are sold and share them with the people in your life with the big hearts. Happy Book Birthday, Alice Faye and Charnelle! #adoption #fosteringsaveslives #foreverfamilies

Instagram post 2217662910301606574_2218537

This summer, on a raucous girl’s trip to Las Vegas, I got a tattoo. I know, I know—so cliché. But I’d been threatening to get one for years—a ladybug to honor my mother, who always was and still remains my good luck charm. But while I was standing there waiting for my turn in the chair, I decided to go a different route: my first tat would be a word that holds significant meaning—weight—with me. That word is FREE. I’d already made it my word for the year and did my best to live up to the meaning in every aspect of my life, particularly considering that sometimes, as a black woman in America, feeling truly free can be a challenge. But getting it tattooed on my arm upped the ante on my relationship with the word; it is a constant reminder, right there on my arm, to always—always!—hold myself accountable to honoring my needs, my wants, my desires first. To be unapologetically me. It was this that I was thinking about when I chose “freedom” as a password for an episode of SPEAKEASY WITH DENENE. I talk about my relationship with the word, and also check in with the extraordinary rapper/activist/ATL legend, @KillerMike, who waxes poetic on all the ways we black folk need to get free. To listen, visit http://speakeasywithdenene.com (link in bio), or pull it up anywhere you listen to your podcasts. Check out prior episodes on platforms like Spotify, Stitcher and Apple Music, and leave a review on Apple Music, too. #blackpodcasts #freedom #podcasting

Instagram post 2217640593710180971_2218537

This week on #SpeakeasyWithDenene, we break format and solely feature someone who absolutely embodies the password—FREEDOM—in both word and deed: Michael Render, aka the rapper, @killermike.
I’ve followed Killer Mike for years, not just because I dig his music (aside from being a solo artist who laid down a verse in one of my fav songs, “Never Scared,” he also is half of the rap duo, @runthejewels), but because he is a southern Black man with a brain and a big mouth. He often waxes poetic on politics, blackness, freedom of speech, economic independence, land ownership, gun rights and being a southerner, and, true to form, he held nothing back on those topics when I visited him at @theswagshopedgewood, one of the barbershops he owns with his wife, Shay, in #ATL. Our conversation was nothing short of dope because Killer Mike is dope, but what was most special to me was his dedication to lifting his voice on behalf of black Southerners. Let me explain: I’m from the north but I was raised by southerners. And it seems to me that the entirety of the world dismisses that black people existed before and still exist in the south beyond slavery and the Civil Rights Movement— as if we’re nothing more than water hoses, bombed churches and strange fruit. We have homes and know how to work the land and believe in God and guns and go to church and have accents that let you know the South runs through our blood. Killer Mike celebrates that. And demands that we all do it, too. Southern, black and proud with a fist in the air. I just know you’re going to love this episode and everything Mike has to say. I’m so proud of this work and grateful to Mike for sharing his time and beautiful brain with Speakeasy with Denene. #blackandproud #blackpodcasts

Instagram post 2215609685968809609_2218537

I’m so hyped about the next episode of #SpeakeasyWithDenene! The BRILLIANT @killermike is on deck, breaking it down so it’ll forever be broke.
#Repost @gpboriginals
・・・
Here is a sneak peek of the new Speakeasy with Denene podcast episode, 'Freedom,' coming out this Thursday.
@mybrownbaby interviews Grammy Award winning rapper @killermike about his work to protect freedom of speech in music.
You can subscribe to the show at SpeakeasyWithDenene.com, GPB.org.podcasts or wherever you get podcasts.

Instagram post 2214130864648120902_2218537

I know TLC said don’t go chasing waterfalls, but who could resist these gorgeous natural wonders? Found these in Highlands, NC; the first is called Glen Falls and the second is Dry Falls (though ain’t nothing dry about this waterfall, which you can walk behind!). Also discovered a beautiful covered bridge, and caught a wondrous sunset at the top of the Blue Ridge Mountains. What a revelation—a testament to the wonders of the universe. God was there. #waterfalls #sunsets #skywatcher #mountains #love

Load More... Follow on Instagram

MYBROWNBABY’S DENENE MILLNER

Mom. NY Times bestselling author. Pop culture ninja. Unapologetic lover of shoes, bacon and babies. Nice with the verbs. Founder of the top black parenting website, MyBrownBaby.

MYBROWNBABY EYE CANDY

View the Gallery

MOST POPULAR THIS WEEK

Everybody Loves the Sunshine: Finding Joy in Blackness

RECENT COMMENTS

Denene Millner on What Beating A Child With A Cord Looks Like (Newsflash: It Is NOT Good Parenting)
William on What Beating A Child With A Cord Looks Like (Newsflash: It Is NOT Good Parenting)
Alison Mason on This Picture of Hero Mom Toya Graham, Her Son and Anderson Cooper Is Worth 1,000 Words
Alison Mason on Dear Parents With Belts: STOP Beating Your Kids

CLOSE