Hair Oil: Benefits of Coconut Oil for "Natural Hair"

How I Did My Hair Today

So this isn't exactly how I did my hair today, more so how I did it yesterday, lol. I meant to put this post up yesterday but some ugly internet drama had me wanting to stay away from the keyboard for a while, so I'll just share it now.

I wore (and am still wearing) my hair in a fro hawk done on Wash n Go hair. I did my hair in the shower, first detangling with my paddle brush while my hair was loaded with Yes To Cucumbers conditioner and Giovanni 50:50 balance conditioner. I didn't section or anything because I was in a rush to finish my hair, but I should have gone ahead and detangled in sections. :(

But anywho, after my hair was detangled, I just let the conditioners sit in it for a few minutes while I completed the rest of my shower routine. Once I was finished with that, I split my hair in half, one section on top, one on the bottom, and rinsed out most but not all of the conditioner. Then I added a nice fingertip full of Shea Moisture Curl Enhancing Smoothie to my hair via smoothing and raking, then followed with Olive Oil Eco Styler gel. I then split the top section in two and followed the same process on each of those sections.

To finish off, I put some extra virgin olive oil in my palms and spread it throughout my hair to seal in all the moisture and soften up the gel's hold. I put my head back under the shower stream for just a second to give it one last rinsing of water, then shook my hair out vigorously, while covering my face with my hands. This allowed all of the curls to separate and clump into their own preferred units. The last thing I did before stepping out of the shower was to scrunch my hands all throughout my hair to get rid of the excess water and product.

After that, all I did was pin back the sides, put the front up into a little quiff, and diffuse for a few minutes before stepping out of the house. I had a GREAT hair day, despite people on the internet trying to bring me down and convince me I was a "tumbleweed head, nappy headed hoe" who needs to get a perm. Excuse my french but f**k the haters! My hair is fabulous, and I'm beautiful so if you don't think so, you can go somewhere else. Bye loves! :-*

Daily Hair Blog: New WnG Method

Hey guys. I've been doing my hair in a different way for the past few days. I normally cowash my hair in the shower and then spray my hair thoroughly with a water and conditioner (Garnier Fructis Triple Nutrition) mix, seal with Extra Virgin Olive Oil, and then rake my fingers through my hair to evenly distribute the products. That usually left me with soft hair, and lots of thin little curls all over my head. I say thin because there never seemed to be that many strands of hair per curl, but I always just thought that was how my curl units liked to clump.

But one issue I always had was the crown/top of my head. The hair there doesn't have any curl to it (yet), it's just wavy and it loses all the water from my shower almost instantly. Since I like my hair to be almost soaking wet when I style it, to seal in all the moisture I possibly can, that was a serious problem. After my hair was done it would always look good at the sides and the back/bottom of my hair, but the top was normally just wavy with no real clumping going on, so it always looked frizzy. I had to find some way to counter that issue.

So, the very first thing I changed about how I do my hair was doing it with a spray mixture. I waited until my bottle of water/condish mix was completely out and started doing my hair in the shower. First, instead of Garnier Fructis Triple Nutrition (which I still absolutely love!) I used Tresemme Natural's Nourishing Moisture conditioner to cowash my hair, and then reapplied it to use as my detangler/leave in. Then I detangled with my fingers until I didn't feel any major knots and then followed with my denman brush to remove all the shed hairs that my fingers missed and applied Extra Virgin Olive Oil after scrunching out the excess conditioner to seal in the moisture. The whole time I would be raking my fingers through my hair to help (or so I thought) with definition.

My hair turned out nice and soft, and very moisturized, which is my main concern. But the top was still looking a bit frizzier than I'm happy with, so I decided to try something else. I bought LA Looks Sports Gel to try as a finisher because it was very cheap, it's CG friendly, and I've heard really positive reviews on it. So, I did everything the same way I had been doing it, minus two things: After I detangle with my denamn, I don't rake my fingers through my hair. I just smooth on the EVOO and gel. Then, once I'm done, I shake my head from side to side and back and forth to get rid of any excess product still sitting on my hair, and to separate the curls. I decided to try shaking instead of raking because I wanted to see if it could give me better definition in my crown area, thinking that if I shake, all the curl/wave units will just break up into all the little sections they naturally want to. Whereas if I rake, I'm mechanically breaking them up into little units that they may not have chosen on their own.

Well, let me just tell you guys, MY HAIR HAS NEVER LOOKED BETTER than when I use this method!! I have more definition than I ever really thought I could because my curls are nice and plump, with lots of hairs in each unit. And the addition of the gel gives my hair the hold it needs to stay in each little curl without every being crunchy or hard. I was so impressed! Obviously, once my hair get's longer I will probably have to find a different method to separate the curls, because I don't want to make a mess shaking my hair out. But for now, my hair is #winning! Lol

How I Did My Wash n Go Today

So today I did my hair in a kind of experimental way. I normally just used my water and conditioner mix to do my hair but for the past couple days I've noticed that my hair is only soft for the first half of the day. By the time I'm almost ready for bed my hair feels dry and almost crunchy. It doesn't become totally crunch but its close.

So what I decided is the conditioner alone wasn't doing enough to keep my hair hydrated for more than a day. As my hair gets longer and I'm finally able to stretch my wash n go's, I don't want to still be forced to redo them on a daily basis. So I decided to start sealing my hair before adding the conditioner to see how my hair likes that.

I normally seal with extra virgin olive oil but I've found that that can be a bit too heavy and its hard to control how much I'm using when I'm just pouring the product straight from the bottle. But I really do love that EVOO is one of the only oils known to actually penetrate the hair shaft and moisturize from the inside out. So I wanted to keep using it, but in a way that would offer more control and add to the softness of my hair.

Welcome, shea butter! I made a mix of equal parts shea butter, aloe vera gel, coconut oil, and olive oil, with a few drops of tea tree oil added to act as a preservative. The consistency is hard to describe. It's kind of like a creamy and slightly gritty solid. But its very easy to scoop.

I added this mix to my hair as soon as I got out of the shower while my hair was still dripping wet. I divided my hair into three sections, one on the bottom/back and two on the top. About a finger tip full was enough for each section. Then I sprayed each section liberally with my normal mix of GFTN and raked the product through. Using paper towels, I squeezed out most of the excess water and product, then diffused my hair on low speed and low heat for about five minutes.

That was about two hours ago and so far my hair is nice and soft. Hopefully I can keep my hair as healthy as it is now. It's all just a bunch of trial and error. Wish me luck. :)