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Friday

Dry hair BEGONE

Well that's the idea anyway. I co-washed my hair with Tresemme Naturals Vibrantly Smooth Conditioner and did something new with my leave-ins! This is what I do with my Friday evenings (I know I'm way cool).

It wasn't my idea though; the technique is outlined here at the wonderful kisforkinky.com. Anyhoo what you do is apply a water based leave in and immediately follow it with a creamy one and then seal this with oil. My hair is generally kind of wiry feeling and since I don't really know my texture yet I kind of thought that was normal...

This is an experiment to see if it's at all possible for my hair to cottony soft. At the moment i have high hopes but we shall see. I used Naked Miracle worker as my water based leave in - Naked is a good brand all '97% natural' and against animal testing so I was keen to give it a try - and Lush R&B for creamy. My hair really liked R&B on it's own early in my transition but I guess hair has it's whims. Oh and I sealed with castor oil because I'm unwilling to gouge into my new bottle of Vatika oil tonight. Coconut oil should always be sold in jars. The bottle I bought is really small and cute though so it's hard to stay mad at it.

I can''t wait for my hair to dry so I can admire its downy softness see if this technique has worked out for me.

In other news I am utterly failing at NaNoWriMo and am going on a Alpha course retreat tomorrow which should be interesting. NaNoWriMo is a challenge to write a fifty thousand word novel in the month of November... I got close in college with about thirty but this year I'm dragging my heels at a measly three thousand.

The Alpa course is for atheists, agnostics and new Christians to better understand the religion. Predictably it's brought up more questions than it answers. But I'll see how it goes. I'm a spiritual journey and all that malarkey.

I think I'm going to stop writing now.

Thursday

This weave is coming off...

I'm really fed up with my hair at the moment... I guess the minute I take this off I'm going to regret it. I'm still transitioning and I'm at the 10 month mark now so I should be glad of the respite. I'm torn between doing it right now (4.30am like a boss) or waiting until after lectures.

Decisions decisions.

I've been neglecting this blog. In future I'll be blogging at the very least weekly.

But anyway I'mma get this mess off my head today I'm sure of it.

x

Tuesday

Argh?! A Tiger in Hampshire?

Terrifying! Or about as terrifying as a toy can be, anyway (well, almost). I haven't got much to say about this really, other than it was pretty hilarious and as such I feel it should be recorded for all prosperity, as a gift to generations before the melted polar ice caps juices fold over our heads.... I digress - digress quite horribly - I should be proud that my adopted county springs to the defence of its citizens so readily, sending a helicopter and tranquilliser darts after a stuffed animal.

It kind of makes me depressed in light of other instances when the police took their sweet time and it had repercussions but surely this is the start of a new era of lightning fast, over zealous responses?

In any case I guess it's not completely ridiculous, peacocks escape all the time and aren't seen until they turn up in people's gardens, but somehow I think a tiger is a bit more attention grabbing.

Friday

Politics and the rise of apathy

Well the AV votes have rolled in like the evening tide and predictably enough NO seems well set to win. If you have no idea what I'm talking about you'd probably be better off going here or typing AV into you tube. I'd have nothing very well researched by way of  explanation.

Done? The whole situation annoys because although I didn't vote the lack of difference it'd make upsets me. I left my passport at home and wasn't sure which end my poll card would end up at anyway and by the time I realised when the polling was and that I hadn't got a card it was too late... Which sucked. In any case my tinny shout of 'yes' against a crashing wave wouldn't have made much of a difference.

The point of this is that I never feel properly informed. Any political decision that I make feels hasty, spiteful or improperly formed. I guess it's good that I care, if you'll forgive me a slight air of pretence, but caring and feeling informed enough to make a good decision are completely different things.

And yes, spiteful, I said spiteful, mostly because of the slightly stilted internal dance I did when I discovered Cleggy lost a good deal of seats (slightly marred by Cameron's triumph of course) and conversely seeing on facebook that someone went and voted 'no' to negate someone else's yes.

Anyway, I'm going to shut up for now.

Thursday

Regimen

When it next occurs to me:

Henna - Caca Noir from Lush (it was hellish to wash out but I like my hair to be dark, pitch as opposed to off black, don't judge me!)

Weekly:

Pre-poo with Vatika Oil.

Shampoo with QP Elasta Creme Conditioning Shampoo or Lush's Trichomania (the latter I realised has SLS but I'm not too strict with the ingredient stuff, I'll see how it goes).

Condition with Lustrasilk Shea and Mango Butter Choleserol (which I've only just got an dhaven't actually used so i'll tell you how I find it) or ORS Hair Mayonnaise (which in my opinion smells kind of manly and doesn't seem to do much, so I'm the market for a new protein treatment, any suggestions?).

Final rinse with Black tea or Aloe Vera juice (I'm trying to use this stuff up, it's kind of expensive but I don't feel it's amazing for my hair).

Leave in condition with Lush's R & B (this shiz is expensive but all the reviews I've read seem to covet things of a similar price, so I'll let it fly. I guess it's just expensive to a stingy student at £9.95/100g and it smells and makes my hair feel lovely)  or Africa's Best Kid's Organics Shea Butter Detangler (feels a tad snotty and now has a ton of aloe vera juice in it and may be decanted into a spray bottle, I bought it so I could leave my expensive Lush stuff at uni) or ORS Carrot Oil.

Seal with Vatika oil (love this stuff!) or castor oil (though the one I have has lemon flavouring in it so I'm using it up) or Grape seed oil (using up) or Sweet Almond (yeah I'm a bit of a PJ).

Daily:

2x Moisturise with Shea Butter dentangler or AVJ/Rose water spritz and seal. 

Friday

I'll admit it, I'm a little worried

I've been reading all the natural hair blogs for a quite a while now and they've helped me immensely. The only thing that they aren't able to help me with at the moment is my attitude towards my hair. All the transitioners I've read about thus far seem to all have been in love with their natural hair before relaxing and simply didn't have the time or energy to deal with their, or hated the way their hair looked curly.

I sympathise with the styling but I feel so far that I'm on another level... I'm a serial comb snapper. My mum once  split her nail trying to braid my hair. Learning that combing your hair wet saves a lot of the pain was such a wonderful discovery but I worry that when my hair gets longer that I'll give up.

Have any of you had similar experiences?

Thursday

Checking In

My webcam isn't the best for taking pictures of hair (you can barely see it unless I have excellent lighting, it just looks like a dense cloud of black foam) and my camera, which has a jaw dropping 6 megapixels to boast, unfortunately neglected to bring it's cable along. Or maybe I did, I forget. In any case, as I haven't posted in a while I thought I'd just tell you some stuff about my hair in general.

I've been transitioning - well, it started off as a relaxer stretch but hey ho - 3 months and a bit now as of the 23rd March. And it is beginning to annoy me. Not enough for me to go all the way and chop all the relxed ends off but enough for me to serious consider it. I got a low cut in sixth from about 2 years ago and I tried and failed to find the pictures on facebook but I must have deleted them, how stupid of me. I'm scared I'd cut it off and it would take FOREVER to get to a length where I felt I looked acceptable. I guess I'll just see how it goes.

In other hair news, I'm accidentally becoming a bit of a product junkie. I think I caught it in the bud but I'm currently the proud owner of almond, vatika, lavender, eucalyptus and castor oil, lush r&b, rose water, aloe vera juice, organic root stimulator carrot oil cream and their hair mayonnaise too. Luckily the holiday is coming up so when I go home I'll force myself to mix up and use what I've already bought and more importantly, use it up, before I buy anything else.

Can't think of anything else interesting to say right now so I'll stop now.

Hope you're having a great week!

Saturday

The Beginning

That is where people traditionally start, right?

I'm a black girl in the UK, who is, perhaps foolishly, attempting to grow her to waist length, and longer if at all possible. I've done considerable amounts of research online and it seems it is possible for women of my hair texture. I know a lot of black girls seem to think they can't get past shoulder length, so i hope to help inspire a few of them.

There also don't seem to be many of these blogs specifically in the UK... The only blog I have found so far is AfroDeityUK (check it out!) but I may be wrong.

Are any of you trying to grow your hair? Any hints or tips to share?

Bye for now,

Olli