July Favorites!

I decided that I was going to start a "favorites" segment on my YT channel that consists of my monthly product favorites and most used natural hair products. I think this will help other naturals pick and choose what they would like to try and encourage them to do their own product research. 

So, the first video is above! I hope you enjoy.

xoxo

Alex

Updates and More

Hey y'all! The video below is just a quick update and Q&A video. I have a few things in the works and I wanted to make sure I shared them with you all! Also, a blog reader reached out to me with a question; in the video I made sure I included an answer for her. If you have any additional tips to offer PLEASE leave a comment, I am sure she will appreciate it! ENJOY :o)

Protective Style Challenge

As many of you know, I've been wearing protective styles for months now. Since about December I have tried to wear my hair (95% of the time) in low maintenance styles that include wearing my ends protected, tucked, ect. By December this year I hope to be at or close to arm pit length when my hair is stretched. I definitely think that it's possible to attain and retain that goal and hair length.

I am inviting you ladies to join me in a 3 month PS challenge! (I will keep up the PS challenge after the 3 months is over-- you are welcomed to as well). This challenge will be simple, fun and a way for us to come together and "fellowship" in a positive way while uplifting one another on our growth journeys. Whether you are growing out a TWA, a bad hair cut, dye job or just want to set a hair goal for yourself and reach it-- you are all welcomed! If this is something you'd be interested in click the jump for details.

(image from google search)

(My) 3 month Goal: 2.5 inches of growth.  Your goal does not have to be the same as mine--make your own if you'd like.

Side note: Hair usually grows about a 1/2 inch a month. The goal is to retain that growth and see a change in length your length.

How to meet that goal: 

• NO HEAT
•  NO cutting (unless you have to eliminate single strand knots)
• NO dry brushing/combing
• Handle your hair with care
• Wash when NECESSARY (I will be washing my hair in between protective styles, about once ever 2.5 weeks)
• Deep conditioning 2x a month
• Sealing moisture into the hair to eliminate breakage and dryness
• Keeping ends tucked and in styles that are low maintenance
• Taking vitamins and drinking ample amounts of water

Style Options:

• Buns
• Twists
• Braided updos
• Full weave installs (where hair is SEWN NOT GLUED)

If you have any other style option ideas please leave them in the comment box below. 

Recording your growth:

The options for recording your growth are as follows-

• Via email- I was thinking we could all check-in once a month with pictures of our growth, styles, tips and questions over email. 
• Blogs- if you are a blogger you can easily post your growth directly on your blog and link send me the to share with everyone who is participating.
• YouTube- making growth videos is always a good way to share what's going on in your journey
• Twitter- #naturalhair chat is another easy way to share what is going with you and your curls

Let me know which idea you like most in the comment box and we can go from there! The PS challenge will start on August 1st, 2011 and end on November 1st, 2011.  I would like the people who want to participate to leave their emails below so I can get in touch with everyone by the 31st of July. Pleas record your start length if you can. I have in a PS right now so I won't be able to until I take it down in a couple of weeks.  I am very excited to start this journey with you all, this is going to be fun!

Simple Summer Style

Yesterday I decided I had enough of wearing my hair out. It's been very humid in the DC area and my hair has been a frizzy mess lately! So I decided to throw it in a cute little bun and add bangs and a flower to give the style a little "umph!"

Read below on how I achieved this Simple Summer Style

Step 1: Spritz hair with water and apply a quarter sized amount of leave in conditioner

Step 2: Gently detangle and stretch your hair with a denman brush or a wide tooth comb

Step 3: Side part your hair and pin off the desired amount of hair for the bangs.

Step 4: Gather the majority of your hair in a ponytail with an "Ouchless" hair tie and tuck the ends of the pony tail under itself.

Step 5: Secure the ends with straight pins. I used about 4. 2 on each side of the bun.

(I 2 strand twisted my bang area for a more defined wavy look)

Step 5: Smooth down edges with pomade and a bristle brush, tie with a satin scarf and let set 

Once your style has set and flyaways are controlled add a flower or hair accessory to spruce up your style! 

My Staple Products

I have decided that I am going to stick with what works for me and my hair. NO MORE product junkie'ness over here! The reasoning behind this decision is mainly because I know what my hair likes but sometimes I still want to "try" and buy new things that I clearly don't need; hence why I have been having product sales on my blog. I rather not throw away the products I am no longer using and I figure there are ladies out here that may want to test a product before buying it full price and risking not liking it.

(image from google)

I have made a vow that I will not buy another "new" product if I haven't tried it and liked it already. The only time I will try something new is if I am requested to sample/review a product. I will be having one more product sale this week for those of you wondering, after that, I am sticking to what I know and love. Below you can find my staple product list, I have had a few people ask me what I cannot live without so, here ya go!

Alex's Staples

Oyin Handmade's Line 

Avocado Shea Butter

Sweet Ohm Hair Pudding

Vatika Oil

Kinky Curly Knot Today

Miss. Jessie's Baby Buttercream

Orginal Moxie's No Foam Shampoo, Conditioner and Leave In

Yes To Cucumber's Leave In

Dessert Organics Conditioners

Curls Whipped Cream

Aveda's Anti Humectant

Kiss My Face Upper Managment Gel

Eco Styler Argan Oil

Dr. Bronner's Castille Soap

Enso Naturals products

Qhemet's Amla and Olive Heavy Cream

There you have it, the products above are what I will be sticking too. Nothing more, nothing less. What are your staples? 

xoxo,

Alex

My day at OYIN!

I had so much fun today at the Curly Nikki natural hair meet up! Keeta, my "big sis", LOL, invited me to come and I jumped at the opportunity. We were meeting the other women at the Oyin Handmade store in Baltimore, MD and I was super excited to go. I LOVE OYIN and I needed to restock on some goodies. The Oyin store is so cute and I am so glad I was able to FINALLY see the store in person. I will definitely be going back. I saw a few familiar faces and all off the ladies were super nice and their hair, *swoons*, GORGEOUS! Of course, I snapped some pics to share with you all. I hope you enjoy, we had a blast!

I got this shirt and CANNOT wait to wear it!

Pantene and Me!

While walking through the very familiar isles of CVS I walked past the Pantene products. Doubled back, walked past them again and repeat. I did that about 4 times, LOL, which, I admit is weird but the Relaxed and Natural products were catching my eye. I've been wanting to try the oil cream moisturizer for some time now but whenever I have my mind set on getting a tube, it's sold out. I figured that since I've been wanting it and there was only once more left on the shelf, why not get it to try?

The oil cream moisturizer wasn't a bad price and I was immediately satisfied with the smell. When I got it home, the first thing I did was use it on a few strands. Unfortunately, I was not pleased, at all. The texture is perfect but extremely oily and not quite heavy enough for my thick strands. I am not sure what I was expecting but what I got, wasn't it.

Armed with disappointment, I decided that there must be a way for me to get SOME use out of this product. Lucky for me, there was! I created the perfect second day hair refresher. Using about a 1/3 cup of the moisturizer and 2 cups water in a spray bottle, I had a feeling that my new concoction just might do me some good. The next morning I spritzed my hair with my new mixture and coated my strands with Curl Junkie's Smoothing Lotion. My results were perfect and my hair looked and smelled GREAT! Voila, the mixtress in me strikes again!

Have you tried this product, if so how did it work for you?

Curls Quenched Curls

Today was wash day for me. I haven't had clean hair for over a week, gross. Usually when I wash, it's with a conditioner but today I actually used Dr. Bronner's Castille soap to not only cleanse but to also clarify. The water from my wash ran a muggy grey so I knew my hair was very dirty and co-washing would in no way, shape or form remove all the product build up.

After a couple of good washes I followed up with Dessert Organics Grape conditioner, I LOVE that product. One of my staple conditioners. I then de-tangled with my wide tooth shower comb and only rinsed out half of the product I applied. 

I find that towel drying my hair in sections right after my shower works best especially if I don't want my hair super dry.I prefer it damp to aid with applying a styler or definer. I ended up using Curl's Quenched Curls and I LOVE the results. I wasn't sure how I would feel about it after I first applied it but my hair dried nicely and was super defined/soft. I stumbled across the Curls product SAMPLE under my sink from months ago, LOL so I decided that today would be a great day to allow my hair to air dry with a new product. The above picture are the results I got. I'm pleased!

Have you tried this Curls product? If so, how did you and your hair like it?

xoxo,

Alex

What's in your spray bottle?

(source)

I get the question "what's in your spray bottle?" A lot! Especially on Twitter and I love it because then other naturals pitch in a dish what's in theirs. Fun stuff! Below is what I keep in my spray bottle. What do you keep in yours?

Daily Spray

1 cup water

1/2 cup rose water

1/3 glycerin

3 drops emu oil

3 drops rosemary EO

3 drops peppermint EO

* I like to use this daily because it helps me retain moisture through out the day and it leaves my hair smelling great*

Baby's Braids

Today is picture day at Char's school and she was super excited about wearing the new dress that MiMi (Grandma) got her. We decided to do her hair is a cute style too, which she was ECSTATIC about. I spritzed her hair with Carol's Daughter Detangling Spray and applied Avocado Shea Butter to her ends. I was able to detanlge her hair fairly easy with the Denman brush with those two products alone. I then slicked her hair back into a low twisted ponytail using "Curls" Pomade from target and a soft bristle, which reminds me a lot of Jam's pomade, I love that stuff. To "jazz" up the style we added a cute braid in the front, which she loves and kept swinging around! I was able to snap some pics of her and her new do. See below!

Wash Day: Thursday

After much "I need to wash my hair" procrastination I finally decided to give my hair the works. I pre-poo'd with My Honey Child's "Olive You" DC and I must say that product is a winner! It's packed with ingredients like Olive butter, Soya milk and Honey, yum! "Olive You" is also water based so it gave my hair MAJOR slip while detangling with the Tangle Teezer.

 I left the product in for about 10 minutes before jumping in the shower and rinsing. My hair was super soft even the hair I have left out of the install felt incredible! I ended up washing with Original Moxie's "Get Clean" no foam shampoo and that definitely got the job done, my hair was filthy. I smoothed the shampoo from root to tip and detangled with a wide tooth shower comb. I also made sure to pay special attention to my very dirty scalp. I find that detangling with shampoo in my hair, when using a no foam shampoo, helps distribute the product a little better. Once I was done shampoo'ing I DC'd with Organix Renewing Moroccan Argan Oil Treatment. OMG, this stuff made my hair so easy to comb through and soft! Not to mention it smells great and the pleasant scent has seemed to lingered in my hair. I really like this stuff, a great CVS find. 

Freshly washed hair no product.

**Click jump for styling info and pics**

Once my hair was all clean, detangled and ready to be styled I decided to go with the infamous twist out! Can never go wrong with that. I also didn't feel like doing anything else with my hair so throwing 8 twists in it was easy! I used Original Moxie's Everyday Leave-In Detanling conditioner, CD's Black Vanilla spray and Salerm 21 to twist. 

I started by sectioning off my hair in 4 parts and putting 2 big twists in each section; then I spritzed each section with the Black Vanilla Spray (I need a new bottle, love this stuff) and brushed with the Denman to smooth the hair strands. I then applied the 2 cream based products and twisted. It took about 15 minutes to do my whole head.

Unfortunately when I woke up this morning my hair was still wet. So my T.O. was not a defined as I wanted it to be and it was also KINDA frizzy. I will probably have to retwist with a heavy cream tonight (on dry hair) to achieve the definition that I want.

How I define Char's Type 3 Curls

Above is a video in how I define my daughters curls! I hope you all enjoy. :)

Random: Big Hair Don't Care

So I picked out my hair today and it was HUGE!

LOL, I had some fun taking pics too.

DMV Sunfest 2011 (June 19th, 2011)

I was contacted by the lovely Amber to be apart of this years natural hair SunFest extravaganza. I will apart of the blog panel and Safi will have a booth at the festival this year, I am very excited that I was given this opportunity! Anywho Amber is looking for a few more bloggers, vendors ect to come out to the event, I asked if she could type up a description of the event and what she is looking for so I could post and spread the word. If you are interested in being involved with SunFest this year please see the letter below and contact Amber to sign up! 

Hello All-

I go by CurryCurls in the natural hair world and I am producing SunFest 2011 in Downtown Silver Spring. I am hoping to have a Natural Hair Community booth with local bloggers from the DMV area there to meet and greet, answer questions, and provide resources for those who want to know more about natural hair care.  This would be a free shared booth.

SunFest is a summer solstice celebration of world cultures hosted by Washington Revels. Designed to give both professional and non-professional performers and groups an opportunity to shine and share their cultures, the festival features traditional performing arts -music, dance, drama, and storytelling - from around the world, creating connections among diverse communities. 

In connection to our performances we want our vendors to represent a world cultures with a diversity of crafts, foods, community services and more. If you hand make your own hair care line, or make natural hair jewelry, ornaments, headbands, t-shirts etc. Please contact me about being a vendor as well. 

The natural hair world is growing by leaps and bounds but there are still pockets of folk who perhaps don't have internet access or the resources needed to be a part of the vast online community. In the age of technology we shouldn't forget the importance of our physical presence in our communities as a show of support. SunFest 2011 provides the perfect opportunity to take all of the information we have learned and share it face to face. There are many that might say this natural hair thing is a trend but we all know that it is a true movement. This is my way to not only give back but to also make sure the knowledge I hold doesn't stop with just me. I look forward to hearing from those who may be interested. 

A Big Thank you to Alex for posting this on her blog, you all be sure to keep showing her love! 

Peace & Love 

Amber 

Please send initial contact to: 

CurryCurls@Gmail.Com 

Subject: SunFest 2011 Natural Hair Community Booth, or Natural Hair Vendor 

Tweet Me @CurryCurls 

#TeamNaturalHair

As you all know #NaturalHair is all the rage on Twitter! Yesterday I tweeted "Blessed and Highly Textured" with the natural hair hash tag and people RT'd it like crazy! So I decided to make a little decal for my natural hair ladies to stick on your laptops, mirrors, cars, light posts around your city... LOL, ect. They will be on sale starting May 18th and will cost $5, no shipping charges. Here is a sneak peak of the decal...

PS. This "saying" will be copy written and trademarked by next week. 

If you are not following MY NEW Twitter page click here. Same name , NEW PAGE!

@AisforAlex

New Naturals: Creating the perfect regimen

I have been asked many times, "what makes the perfect regimen?" In my opinion is all depends on your hair type and needs. Many people say knowing your hair type is irrelevant, I disagree. If I didn't find out what my hair type was I would have been lost when it came to trying products and finding what worked best for me and my kinky, coily, curly hair. I think a lot of people use hair typing in a negative way though, which can cause tension and discouragement in the natural hair community but that's another story.  When it comes to being newly natural having a regimen can be very beneficial especially if you are consistent with your process. Dedicating 1 or 2 days a week on caring and catering to your hair does not have to be a challenging task. Many of you have said that you're in need of a regime that is quick, simple and to the point so I created one for you. In the "Good Hair" regimen below you will see how simple it is to have and create a quick routine, I will give your basic steps that helped me but feel free to change the regimen around to fit your personal hair needs. I will also give your direct links on where to find products that are affordable and good for your hair! You don't have to settle for cheap products that may be causing your hair to be dry and brittle. There are a lot of natural, organic and inexpensive items on the market that will do your hair a lot of good.

The Good Hair Regimen

Hair Days: Sunday and/or Wednesday

  (Fell free to substitute your own days. These are the days I cater to my hair)

Pre-Poo (Pre Shampoo Treatment)-

Step 1: Section the hair in 4 to 6 sections and secure with clips

Step 2: Detangle each section of hair carefully from tip to root with a wide tooth comb

Step 3: Spritz sections with warm water

Step 4: Apply Vatika Oil from root to tip and massage the scalp

Step 5: Cover with plastic cap for 5 minutes

Co-Wash (Conditioner washing)-

Step 1: Apply Yes to Cucumber Conditioner on your pre-poo'd hair in sections (do not rinse the pre-poo our first).

Step 2: Detangle the sections with a wide tooth comb

Step 3: Rinse.

Step 4: Apply a leave in conditioner to your hair. My Good Hair Goop recipe will work great for hair that needs an extra kick of moisture.

**Some of us rather not use shampoo on a regular basis. Co-washing is great alternative for shampooing if you are deciding to stay away from shampoo. However, at least once a month I recommend that you clarify your hair in some way to remove excess gunk and build up that co-washing may miss**

Shampooing-

Step 1: Wash with a shampoo bar or castille soap

Step 2.Massage and clean scalp.Hair is dead and can only be preserved so be sure you are paying special attention to your scalp first. In order to grow healthy hair you need healthy and clean scalp. There is no need to shampoo your whole head. Start that the scalp and the soap will run down on to  your hair. It will get just as clean.

Step 3: Rinse with cool or cold water to seal the cuticle.

**Castille soap is a great product to use will clarifying. Adding a few drops of castor oil and a tablespoon of glycerin can prevent your hair from feeling stripped after the wash. Be sure to replace your hairs moisture with a good conditioner once you are done washing**

.

Conditioning (this step can be skipped if you co-washed)-

Step 1: Section hair in 2 or 3 parts

Step 2: Apply Hello Hydration Conditioner and smooth it on your hair from root to tip. 

Step 3: Rinse after 5 minutes

Step 4: Towel Dry

Style as normal! Make sure you are using products that will keep your hair moisturized if it's prone to being dry. Below are some of my favorite styling products:

1. Bee Mine's Deja's Hair Milk

2. Shea Moisture's Restorative Conditioner (can be used as a leave in)

3. Oyin's Shine and Define 

4. Darcy Botanical's Madagascar Vanilla Styling Creme

5. Curls Milkshake

I hope the above regimen will help some of you! Remember tweak it to fit your needs if you need to. The steps, products and order are completely up to you. I just wanted to set a foundation for those who were at a loss for what to do.

xoxo,

Alex

Headwrap Tutorial

So you all have been asking for my headwrap "secret" and this post is JUST for you! Click the jump to achieve the look below. 

Wrapped up

April is tomorrow and the area I live in is still RIDICULOUSLY cold. I am not sure what Miss. Spring is trying to pull but the DMV needs some warmth. I have been wearing beanies most of the week which has helped keep my head warm a little bit but I figured that I may need something a little more snug to keep in more heat. I decided to wrap my hair with an old H&M scarf that I found laying around my room.

After playing with it for a while I created a chic and simple look that can be worn to out in public.

I will be wearing my hair wrapped until it gets warm out. Being cold is NOT my favorite thing.

I will be making a YT video of the wrap style below. I know y'all are going to want to know how I achieved it. :-)

Four Generations of Natural Hair

Above is a picture of me, my daughter, my mother and my nana. We took this photo at today and I just had to share it with you all! Do you notice anything? We are ALL natural. I have been looking at this picture all day--it warms my heart every time I glance at it. Everyone in the picture,except my daughter, has "struggled" with their hair in some way, shape or form. I'm happy to see that all of us are past the perms and the need/want for them. THIS is who we are and I am glad that we are able to show my daughter unaltered beauty. A lot of people ask me how I keep my daughter in love with her hair, the answer is above. Natural is all she knows-- the 3 main women in her life have been natural since she can probably remember (she's only 3, lol). I honestly think that's the reason why my daughter hasn't had the "I want straight hair" itch yet; even with her being the only girl of color in her class at daycare. It's truly an amazing thing. This picture means a lot to me and I am so glad that the women in my life are strong, beautiful and NATURAL! :-)

xoxo,

Alex