Actress Kimberly Elise: “Even in the hardest circumstances, remind yourself that you can make it and get through it the best way

Actress Kimberly Elise, whose credits include Diary of a Mad Black Woman, For Colored Girls, and Grey’s Anatomy, recently chatted with Celebrity Baby Scoop about her two daughters, Butterfly and Ajablue, motherhood, and her upcoming projects. When asked about her daughters’ unique names, Kimberly shared, “Ajablue is my oldest and I don’t think the name had special meaning, but her personality has given it a special meaning. I thought Ajablue sounded beautiful.  My youngest, Butterfly, actually renamed herself at a very young age- she was about two years old.  She was very adamant about being named Butterfly. It stuck until she was about 12 and wanted to legally change it, so it was legally changed. She’s always been Butterfly; she named herself.” When asked what her daughters are up to now, she said, “My oldest just graduated college and turned 24 a couple of weeks ago.  She’s getting ready to head off to Morocco to do some volunteer work and see the world.  She’s a writer.  My youngest is in the 9th grade in high school and is just having the high school experience.  They are wonderful girls. They’re partners in life.  We’re really journeying together and I feel really blessed to have them. It’s been a lot of fun, because they’re great girls.” Now that her daughters are older, does she think the relationship has changed? She said, “I’ve always treated my daughters like people.  I never treated them like they didn’t have intelligence or like they didn’t have the ability to decide things for themselves. I encourage that.  We’ve always had very open communication, so even when they were young children, I spoke to them as people who were full of conscious awareness. Now that they are older, there is a trust level and an open communication flow that we share.”

As for upcoming projects, her new movie Apple Mortgage Cake is premiering on Up, and her new TV show Hit The Floor starts in May on VH1.  She also has another movie coming out in April called A Day Late and a Dollar Short airing on Lifetime. She says, “It’s a busy time.”