I won’t admit to a building of anticipation over the upcoming release of Chris Rock’s documentary Good Hair, but I am growing increasingly surprised how the media & press  are choosing to cover this topic, from the NYT article a couple weeks back to Tyra Banks’ premier episode talking about ‘real hair.’ Convoluted and at times biased…at best, I can’t see the trend ending any time soon.

I didn’t touch on Tyra’s ‘big reveal’ episode because in the end…‘it is what it is,‘ many women’s hair experiences are relative to their lifestyle, upbringing, varying influences in their lives (professional or personal),  etc..! But when you can factor in one of the biggest influences in American culture to date…it MUST be recognized.  On Wednesday, September 30th y’all, Chris Rock is set to chat it up with our main femme Oprah about his soon to be released documentary, & rounding out the show’s theme will be a Q&A discussion with Solange!

I’m excited because…really, if you want something done right, go to the right people and Oprah is emphatically the gal for asking the right questions WE want answered, and if I’m not mistaken that may very well be her philosophy on interviewing.  Chris Rock and Ms. O have always had a great dialogue relationship on screen, so it’s already a given we’ll be treated to a fun show! Enter in Solange and we’re almost guaranteed hair hot topics for a solid week or two!

Oprah is set to  share her hair experiences with audience and viewers as well, and my interest will be in the feedback after the show.  So check out the forums on Oprah.com if you dare after the show, and no doubt hit up the natural hair blogosphere for opinions galore;-)!

Back to business this week! Ever so slight change in approach though, a few add-ons from last week, and going forward. What did I do last week?! Ahh! Took me a minute, but it was typical pre-poo, wash, style. Can’t remember what I used for pre-poo, but found some Organix Coconut Shampoo to cleanse my scalp. I applied directly to my scalp, massaging in for a good minute before rinsing. Product buildup has been a part of my weekly thing for a while, so the poo bars while cleansing effectively, sometimes I just need to get gritty and reach the scalp directly for a thorough cleansing, and a liquid poo helps to do just that.

This week was sort of the same focus, using the remainder of the Organix Shampoo to cleanse the scalp. And because I’ve developed a phobia of over stripping my hair with poos, I pre-pooed with Vo5′s Moisture Milks Strawberries & Cream (the smell of this is Yum!). Before washing this week, I picked up a bottle while grocery shopping and was delighted to find…the price! Always loved the price of these conditioners, never exceeding $3. Pocket friendly, smells delicious & works/moisturized my tired/dry seven day hair!

Instead of detangling while applying a DC, I detangled with the Vo5 saturated in my hair. Last week, I temporarily retired the Denman until my ends get their proper TLC treatment. What I’m experiencing these days is not cute, and a good DC/conditioner can only do so much…it’s well over due for my trim. But to still keep it in the family, I looked to my Denman comb, a three tier comb that detangles crazy good, a bit more gentler on my ends and what I love as an added bonus is that it doesn’t shrink my curls once finished detangling.  Once the comb slides easily across your strands, it leaves curls clumped and elongated, ready to twist & style.

DC via AOHR, which went on smooth after earlier detangling.  Raked the DC throughout the hair, passing over once or twice with this hand duty Bop accessory, another tool from the Denman collection.  This is great for scalp massages and for general smoothing of the hair before styling.  Left on for an hour, cold rinsed and styled this week with Alaffia’s Virgin Coconut & Shea Enriching Hair Lotion. Last week, ran out of Darcy’s Botanicals Lemongrass Detangler and found this to be a fair substitute underneath the Madagascar Vanilla Creme. The lotion is quite light, which works well paired with something as thick and dense as the Vanilla creme.

Dried on a low setting using my Soft Bonnet, sealed ends with the new edition to my routine, castor oil! Ok, to be fair, I tried Castor Oil a while back with only so so results.  My theory back then was that it did not work well with the product I’d used at the time on my hair, and YET…lol, after reading this glowing praise over at Afrobella’s blog, I joyfully climbed back onto the bandwagon.  Poured a small palmful onto hands, and slowly worked it throughout the dry twists & to the scalp, applied my oil infusion. This morning, results were lovely, shinny and well moistrized! My roots are soft/twists are toucheably soft/all is good again;-)

Alright, so the plan is to bust through this post, just to get back in the flow again.  With the whirlwind of grad applications behind me (yeah, fingers crossed!), I was sitting home yesterday at a loss of sorts…trying to figure out what I’d done to my hair just a week prior.  What I know for sure is that over the past week or two, time wasn’t all that friendly, and I did scramble some to do the do.  I also think part of the reason my memory is so blurry is because I really hated my hair this past week…lol.

I’ve had it in my mind for a minute to do a braid out on my hair, something I seriously hadn’t done for many years.   Yet for some reason, the crazy part of me decided to attempt a braidout with hardly enough time for my hair to dry for the next morning.  I’d lightly co-washed, no DC, finger combed/detangled rather than using the Denman because my ends are beyond knarly.  So in essence I was attempting a braidout on poorly conditioned, under-detangled hair. FUN!

I used the basics, my Darcy’s Botanicals Lemongrass Detangler underneath the Madagascar Creme.  The problem was the actual braiding! I haven’t used three strands to do ANYTHING with my hair for YEARS! I figured it’d be just like riding a bike…la de da…da. Alas, a big fat NO!

First of all, when braiding, the hair needs to be smooooooth. Detaaaaagled. I’ve been repeating this in my head over the past few days, particularly when it came time to style my hair in the morning before work.  My struggles this past week had everything to do with my lack of insight, and the only thing helping me to try this style in the future would be to practice!

What I’ve also been fighting for the past few weeks are tangled/fried ends.  Without a deep condition and proper detangling, my already brittle ends that’ve long been in need of a trim, were beyond help.  The braidout was a great lesson learned in that I was able to elongate my hair without a blowout.  I LOVED the look of the braidout, yet the time…the TIME it takes to braid, and subsequently unbraid the hair the following day or few days…it’s defintely time consuming. A big part of me wishes I’d had the gumption to try this early on during the Summer!

In essence the braid out did not last until wash day yesterday, so I ended up lightly co-washing again Friday night, twisting with AOHR mixed with water, then applying KBB Milk to the twists before drying.  I had a fun curly fro for work the following day which was easy and fun.

Going into Sunday’s business, I had full intention of changing the game plan.  With colder weather creeping in, it was sort of inevitable, yet my adjustments are forcing me to give up old favorites and to also try new techniques.  This week I’ll begin to outline the new tools I’m falling back on, retiring the ‘ol Denman, and new products I intend to use going forward.

Late, but quick checking in before this crazy week is up! I’m in the homestretch of polishing off my grad school applications, so unfortunately no time to post this week. Will be back in full force once that envelope lands in the nice hands of the postal woman at the USPS office!

But in PJ news! Mala is back from her Ghana trip, and Afroveda is once again open for business! Yeah! You can click here to read snippets from her AMAZING , inspiring journey.

Shop’s open, which means my lovely locks can get reacquainted with the addicting Shea-Amla Butter Creme! My added excitement this go around comes from the fact that I can purchase the creme in a 16 oz bottle! With colder temps approaching  might even stock up on two jars.  For $15 you can’t go wrong!  If you can sense your hair’s craving added moisture these days, or feel the change in temps these days is a foreshadowing of what’s to come, I say now’s the time to sample much of Mala’s goodies, you will not be disappointed! And if you’re into easy scavanger hunts,  surf around the home page for a discount code courtesy of Mala!

Alright, I said no time to post, but must make time to eat!

Hope all’s well;-)!

Alright, so it’s that time of year when you really can’t fight it anymore…it’s time to ditch the cute sandals for laced up kicks and closed toe shoes, layer-up that short sleeve blouse with a denim jacket or light sweater, and reassess the hair products you’ve been using over the past season or so.  I’ve done all this before, nothing new…but the feeling of being right back at square one is sort of hanging over my head.

I’m sorting through a lot of my old hair products, most that I haven’t used for whatever reason, or simply don’t know how to repurpose.  I’ve used perhaps…2-3 applications of each, but always find myself scratching my head, wondering where it is I could’ve gone wrong.  After carefully reading the labels, listening to other ppls. product reviews…I’m always just a bit disheartened to find that I could never get the product to work for me!

So! Instead of relinquishing defeat, I’m choosing to embrace a new season, and a new way to possibly incorporate it into my regime.  Somehow….SOMEWAY, these products will be used! I have several in my stash to go through, but today I’ll begin by featuring just one while continuing to feature others sometime down the line.

These are products that:

• After following the directions still don’t understand it’s intended purpose
• Spent too much $ on to either throw away or swap
• Like the ingredients (for the most part) & want to hitch a ride on the love wagon

If anyone has used this before with moderate success, DO hit me up! I’ll be grateful for any suggestions;-)!

I can’t believe it’s already mid-week! I don’t think I’ll ever fall out of love with Holiday weekends! Rather than start/wash my hair on Sunday this past week, instead pre-pooed Friday evening with Trader Joe’s Refresh Citrus Conditioner, then finished off the last of my Chagrin Valley Olive & Babassu poo bar. DC’d with AOHR OVERNIGHT! I debated whether or not to do this because of the strong smell of the condish, but was much too tired and groggy to twist the hair well into the night. I sectioned, detangled and applied the AOHR, slept with the conditioning cap sealed tight to prevent any leaks, and woke up at the crack of dawn the next morning to cold rinse.

Seriously, the SOFTEST HAIR EVVAH! It’d been well over two years since I did an overnight DC treatment, and considered it a real treat when it came out so amazingly light, soft & manageable. Often times in order for a conditioner/DC to be effective enough to produce significant results, 1-3 hours is ample time for the product to penetrate the hair… but that night you really couldn’t have told me otherwise! I was almost reluctant to apply a leave-in or styler. Almost.

My quest to find an adequate twisting gel though left me empty handed at the end of the day. I had TWO picks for a gel, and could find neither at Ricky’s here in NY. I did not want to fall back on old gels that had not worked in the past, so instead I filed home and twisted with Darcy’s Madagascar Crème. Leave-in this week was the Lemongrass Coconut Detangler. The twists were made smaller, and thankfully took much less time to dry.

All in all my holiday hair was very convenient, one day pinning the twists to the side, another day clipping them up with a claw clip. 

I regretted taking them down for the rest of the work week, but made a promise that I’d revisit this protective style sometime in the winter, making the parts more even, and perhaps making the twists slightly smaller for better styling.   While the hair was in twists for a few days, they managed to remain very well moisturized, never falling flat.  At night I simply tight with a satin scarf, and donned a satin bonnet to prevent my pillowcase from soaking up the oils from my hair.  Untwisting the hair Tuesday morning, didn’t have well defined curls, instead I had skinny waves all throughout my head, and really there was no need to separate each undone strand.  The twist-out was fresh, meaning the hair was still laying relatively flat against my head, but it had good bounce/body and even today (Wednesday), hair is still very much moisturized and I have not had to apply product at night.

up-do's

The pics are not the best, my PC camera does not capture the best lighting…next time I’ll use my handheld.  Monday afternoon I clipped my hair up before heading out to visit my Aunt.  I love the look of twists pulled up and away from the face, it really shows the fullness of the hair, and it’s the easiest style to do;-)!