I can’t keep my hands out of my hair….I’m in love….:weeping:  I know that in order for it to be healthy and growing, I need to not have my fingers in it all day which can cause knots, I KNOW this, but if it’s not covered, i can’t help but play in the soft curls!  I want to pat and coil and play and rub…is that so bad?

Also, I need to learn how to DO my hair.  I did the finger coils myself and thats a cool idea (if i can ever 1. get to do my whole head without being tired, lol and 2. learn to do them tighter and smaller myself), but I want to learn how to braid and do twists, both flat to my head and individual all over.  I have my work cut out for me!  This is the girl who kept my weekly hair appointment and just let a stylist do whatever she wanted!  Until now I never really attempted to do anything to my own locks, other than flatironing sometimes or spiraling with curlers.  I suppose I’ll have to get my mom to teach me the art of braiding and twists! (guess I should have learned that a good 10 years ago).

The next time that I wash my hair (couple of days, trying to let the rodded curls last but i keep PLAYING in them!), i may attempt to twist my hair…yikes, we’ll see!

hair heros:

Bought more products :blush:   I know I know, like I don’t have enough products already!  I have more products than hair, lol.  Today I stopped back at the health store and was saddened to see that the Qhemet amla and olive heavy cream hadn’t been replenished, so I couldn’t get cream that I wanted AND the Aubrey Organics Honeysuckle Rose was out too, which I really really wanted since everyone raves about it in the natural community and my hair idol, Chime, swears by it    Oh well, they should restock in the next week or so, and I’ll be back for both products.  It’s literally 5 minutes from my house, so not out of the way or anything (unfortunately, for my wallet, lol)

You know I didn’t walk out empty handed though, that just would not be right!  ;)  I ended up with some Qhemet anyway, decided to purchase the  Karkady tea mist since my beloved Frank Juice only has a 1/3rd left to the bottle and I wanted to try out Qhemet anyway.  But I’ll be buying some more Oyin juices, will try out the Greg and Juices and Berries since I love the Frank juice so much.  Also bought two new conditioners, BWC Moisture plus conditioner and Aubrey Organics GPB conditioner so that I can deep condition for some protein.  I bought the tiny bottle just so that I can test it out and know that my hair isn’t against protein, if it likes, I’ll buy the bigger bottle!  If I like the moisture plus BWC conditioner, I’ll want to try the  Rosemary-tea tree-mint conditioner, that sounds like great ingredients.

Was just reading the back of my Organix conditioners, the coconut and the shea butter ones, and they have cones in them  (silicones)  I didn’t know that at first and hear that cones aren’t good….I’ll have to do my hair without using either of those and see if I notice any difference.  I love the smell but if silicones aren’t so good for our hair then I won’t keep them around for fragrance alone!  But if my hair isn’t having adverse affects from them, then I’ll use anyway, because what’s bad for one person may not be bad for someone else, right?  We’ll see and I’ll keep you updated!

After January 1st, I want to get cornrows so that I can have a nice protective style in this winter wonderland also known as Chicago that I reside in.  So cold and snowy and windy lately, and the last thing that I want is for my hair to break off or dry out from indoor heating and icy cold outdoors.  I’ve been pampering it and keeping it moisturized so that I can try and counteract the effects, like spraying my frank juice, using marula oil spray, olive oil mix, patting on my coco light .  Hopefully my precious hair can hold on to moisture until I get it into some cornrows.  I found two different types of hair in my drawer from other braid sets, can’t decide yet which look I’ll go for, but the choices are curly black hair or burgundy hair.  My cousin or mom will do it and I’ll post pics definitely!

hair hero of the day:   I adore her hair!  I want mine like that

Happy holidays, everyone  How was it?  Get what you want?  Spend good time with family and friends? Eat good?  Had a fun day, ate well and then went to see my baby daddy, Robert Downey Jr.  in Sherlock Holmes.  Nothing sexier than a smart guy with a slick sense of humor and good body  Totally into that movie.

On top of all of that fun, my hair turned out cute, just like I hoped it would.  Thanks ashley for your help babe  I appreciate it, muah!

I used the Blended Beauty curl styling cream when the hair was rodded and my hair came out soft, not frizzy, and smooth. It smells really good too and the tub it comes in has a lot, so I should have plenty for many beautiful sets of rods or twists  I give the cream an A.   Great results after a day of hair pampering yesterday!  I love taking good care of my hair and hopefully it will thrive so much.  soft, with defined curls is always good to me!

Pampered my hair today and it felt oh so soft!  I cowashed with my Organix shea butter conditioner, detangled, then sectioned my hair into four and saturated it with olive and coconut oil, just poured lots in my hands and then smoothed onto my hair, root to tip.  Then I covered in two shower caps and my sleep bonnet.  While that was warm and feeling good on my head, I massaged my scalp periodically throughout the day.  I planned to do that in the morning and just rinse out and cowash again when my friend came to do my hair, so that’s what I did, and I ended up leaving that oil concoction on for about 6 hours while baking Christmas cookies and watching movies.

Once she came to do my hair, I cowashed with the Organix coconut conditioner (such a heavenly scent!  oh man, what a pleasure) and applied some Kinky Curly Knot Today as my leave-in.  Hair still wet, she put the back in rollers with blended beauty curl styling butter (I’ll give a review of this tomorrow when I take down the rollers, haven’t used it before, but thought that might be a good way to utilize it…hope so!)  and she braided the front with the Joie shea butter superlite that I talked about in my previous post.  So we’ll see how this all looks tomorrow!  here’s pics of the hair tonight:

Christmas is only two days away and that means holiday hair!  What are your plans to be pretty and festive for the upcoming parties, family dinners, etc?

I’m going to start preparing tonight by coating my hair in extra virgin olive oil and virgin coconut oil and sleeping with that under a shower cap and my bonnet.  That should infuse some good moisture, and I’ll massage my scalp well to stimulate it.   Then tomorrow, Christmas Eve, my friend is going to come over and help me flat twist or braid the front and then roller set the back.  It should be a totally adorable little hairstyle, something I used to wear a lot back in the day in high school.   Just now I’ll be doing it at home with natural hair instead of at the beauty salon with relaxed hair for $35-50

I’ll be sure to post pics of it after all complete.  So what’s your hair plans?  Let’s hear all about it!

hair inspiration:

I’m a happy girl  Got the mail and my check was inside!  That took a weight off of my shoulders, can finish my little bit of xmas shopping and now have enough for my student loan payment Jan 4th…WOOO.  Not only that, of course with each check I have to go out and to the health food store for more hair products! lol, it’s a sickness, I know.  Bought $30 worth of stuff, 3 items:  Virgin coconut oil, Joie African Shea Butter Superlite, and Giovanni Direct Leave-In organic conditioner.    I will give product ratings once I try them out, will wash my hair on christmas eve so that it’s pretty and fresh for the holiday.

Then I got home and was relaxing, doorbell rang and VOILA, my beautiful accessories from forever 21!!!!  Yay, they all look so pretty  Some of the headbands, well the sparkly silver one in particular, is so tight on my temples…will have to try to stretch that out a bit, can’t get a headache trying to be cute!  no ma’am, not this girl.  Here’s a photo show of my hair accessories like I said I would update

I decided to cowash my hair only and not use the shampoo, see if that made any change.  My hair didn’t feel much different, I think because that shampoo is SO mild, such natural good ingredients.   Anway, just cowashed by smearing in the shea butter conditioner in and massaging my scalp a bit.  Rinsed that out, poured in some olive oil and added coconut milk conditioner to that.  Let that sit and marinate while I did normal showering, rocking out to the always present iPod on my handy ipod stereo.  Michael Jackson, Gucci Mane, Duffy, all fun shower buddies, lol.

I think that I used more olive oil last Sunday when I washed my hair, it felt more silky then.  I’ll have to try that, not be stingy with the extra virgin olive oil.  I’m looking at the bottle now and it doesn’t look like I even used any, dunno why I’m acting like I have to hoard it, we’re in a recession but I think I can manage to stay out the poor house if I use a little more oil   Rinsed that out, finished and finger combed Kinky Curly Knot Today through for softness and as a leave-in conditioner.

Faced with the wet mop on my head, I decided to finger coil the front half again with fantasia ic gel. Sprayed with Frank Juice afterwards.  I don’t know why, I try to do them tightly, but it never sticks tight at the roots  womp womp!  So it appears puffy at roots but smooth spirals the rest of the way.  I’ll have to figure it out next time

bought fun new headbands from forever 21 online !! can’t wait until they get here, will post pics wearing the headbands when I get them, but here’s what I bought:

clip for side of hair

hair hero:  this great style is awesome! I want to rock it one day

Organix Shea Butter

This stuff smells like caramel cake, I swear!  It’s absolutely orgasmic, I was in love in the shower  I bought this and the coconut conditioner buy one get one free at Walgreens and must say, best $6.99 I’ve spent in a while!  Organix Shea Butter conditioner is pretty nice on it’s own, but I especially loved how my hair felt last time when I added olive oil to my hair along with the conditioner, so I will do that on any further washes.  Hair felt so soft and moisturized then.  It’s pretty fluffy and okay now that I used JUST the conditioner, but last time it felt amazing.

I still shampoo’d with my Pure Life soap co aloe 2 in 1 conditioner, next time I’ll just try co-washing alone, just the conditioner.

overall I really like it, mainly because of the smell. I’m a sucker for sweets, baked goods, so a conditioner that smells good enough to eat is just FINE by me!

I did a wash n go, just letting it air dry and do it’s own thing, but I much prefer my hair last time, when I did the finger coils and coil out.  I’ll be co-washing in a couple of days and will be sure to either get my mom to add some flat twists or braids to the front or to finger coil it myself, SOMETHING to give it some flair and oomph.

hair hero of the day: tracie thoms

I went to see the Princess and the Frog with my best friend and must say that I was very pleased!  The drawing and imagery was BEAUTIFUL, just gorgeous.  There’s a light path part of the movie that is just so well done, the lightening bug parade so to speak.  Just beautiful.

Storyline wise, I liked the hard working Tiana and her bubbly loud mouth blonde best friend, Charlotte.  Tiana is working hard, with no time for anything else at all, in order to buy a building to build a restaurant.  Throughout the story, she needs to learn that she should enjoy life a bit more too.  Prince Naveen has arrived, but he needs to learn some responsibility and acts like a typical rich frat boy stereotype.  He’s gorgeous, but his arrogant selfish ways weren’t too cute!  He has to go on a character building journey as well.

I liked the songs, but none stood out that made me sing out of the theater like “A Whole New World”, “Part of Your World” or “Hakuna Matata”.  The jazzy upbeat tunes are pleasing to the ear definitely, but as for iconic?  Not thinking so, but I’ll hear them again before I judge too greatly.  The sidekicks/secondary characters are also fun.  I HATED the lightening bug in the previews and stuff, but during the movie he was one of my favorites and a great ally.  The gator was also fun and just wanted to be accepted, lovely character.  The bad guys were quite scary, I mean whoa.  The shadow demons were quite terrifying, especially in the end.  if i were a young child i’d be having some nightmares, honestly!

Overall I give it an A-  I’ll add it to my collection as a favorite, wish that it had a stand out song to it though (or like Aladdin, Little Mermaid, and Lion King: MOST of the songs are stand out songs in those movies, lol)

Welcome to the Disney Princess’ Clique, Tiana.  You’ll fit in fine!  Beautiful, strong, good character, definite role model

Princess Tiana

Undid the coils from yesterday and I’m very happy with the results  it’s like when I used to sit under the dryer at the salon and pay to get my hair spiral curled with rods or curlers.  And all I had to do with my now natural hair is twirl my hair in my fingers with a tiny bit of fantasia gel and I have my own roller set!  how awesome, I love natural hair

I just woke up and spritzed with Frank Juice then sealed by patting with olive oil mixture.  Voila! here are the results of my coil out: click to make larger

Coil Out Results

Coil out

In person it actually looks just like the curly fro I admired on Wakeema Hollis a couple posts back, so MISSION ACCOMPLISHED