Curl. EEEEE!

Curly CURL.EE curlie.

**i did not dye my hair. it was the lighting.

Cutesy Coil Out

"they're taking advantage of the fad"-DJ

Around my 2nd month of naturaldom I tried out my very first coil out. I'm not sure I even took a picture of it. And if I did, I have no idea where it is. It wasn't all that great at all. It actually looked like I was starting locs. Wasn't a fan. But now, here I am just a smidge over a year in and I thought I'd give it another try. I recently did the style on my mother's hair and thought it was pretty cute. Using Miss Jessie's Curly Pudding I coiled my hair up and allowed to air dry over night. Here are some pictures of the next day...All the accessories in these pictures were hand made by yours truly and will eventually be for sale right here on the blog via paypal! :)

I'm usually 99% against products such as Miss Jessie's, Kinky Curly, or any other product that I feel is targeted at newly naturals because of their price. I feel like they're taking advantage of the "fad" + lack of knowledge. A lot of women run for those products without any other knowledge of natural hair care and then are upset when the product does not yield miraculous results......but anyway! Miss Jessie's actually did a good job. I DID NOT purchase the product, my sister bought it a while ago, and like most women, was not too impressed and gave it to my mom who then gave it to me. (LOL) I used my Giovanni Direct Leave In and coconut oil underneath it as well. I'll do another coil out without Miss Jessie's to see if the product is really responsible for my results.) Here are some camera phone shots that better display the curl. :) I'll more than likely be doing a tutorial on this style as well.

What A Difference

I think the title speaks for itself! Here's a picture of my hair's growth over the past 6 months. That's big! Especially with my scissor happiness! I'm excited what it will look like in September, 6 months from now. (Click to enlarge)

Picture Perfect

So here's a couple shots from yesterday. One is a camera phone bathroom shot and the other is a preview of my senior portraits! Hair and make up both done by yours truly! Check em out!

Comparing Curls

Hey guys! Its been a while since I've posted a picture of my hair. Today I did a summery puff (a puff on wet hair left to dry in the style as opposed to my puffs I do on a dry twist out due to the cold weather)and remembered a picture I had of one I did back in July. Here's a picture of today side by side with the picture from six months ago! Now, this isn't the official length check but it is a pretty cool look at how much my hair has grown. Keep in mind, though, that I've trimmed several times over that 6 moth period.

Take Two

So I gave the Halo Style one more try and I was pleased with the results. The difference? I didn't flat twist it all the way around. I flat twisted it until I got right above my ear and then just I guess "monotwisted"? it to the back. Basically, I only used the hair I had left from the front flat twist without picking up any extra hair from the back. Also, the twist I did was not a two strand twist...hence me calling it a "monotwist". Seriously, what are those called? Anyway, here are the pictures!

Starting Over

that's me on the left :)

There was sooo much that I was trying to remember to eventually put up for YGY but after this homecoming week, I am completely drained and my brain is simply not working! I did however want to come and update you all on a couple things that I DID remember! Well for one, last weekend I lightened my hair with a honey blonde hair lightener. As I expected, my new growth absolutely did not take...AT ALL! However, I've been getting nothing but compliments on it so I'm very pleased! My ends needed to be trimmed after the excessive heat that it's been enduring over the past couple of week so I'm about an inch shorter but I'm not even upset. I will, however be going on a no heat challenge starting NOW until Christmas! YUP! THAT'S RIGHT! I SAID IT! CHRISTMAS! That's two whole months from today. Hopefully I can go longer but I'm thinking I may want to straighten it for the holidays. We'll see. Anyway, I do have pictures! Hope you enjoy!

Afro Love

Hey there! I know it's been a while! Although I was trying out a new style while I was gone, my phone was broken and thus I was unable to take pictures for YGY. I really do apologize for this and I promise to recreate it and update you all as soon as possible. Until then, I'll do my best to describe it! I do have a couple pictures of my hair when it was straight but the camera on my replacement phone wasn't taking very good pictures of the style that I tried out while it was straightened. Basically what I did was made sure that my hair was bone straight and then bantu knotted it up. This created soft beach waves that fell throughout the day and created a soft alternative to the harsh straight look. I got a lot of compliments on it and I will definitely be returning to this style the next time I straighten. I've come to dislike how flat my hair looks straightened; the perm look. Doing bantu knots allowed for a nice alternative as well as made it easier to maintain my straight style with minimal heat! It was a win/win! Here's a pic of my hair straightened:

More recently, I experimented with my very first afro! Usually, if I'm wearing my natural texture (no gels or defining products) I'll wear it in a puff. This time I decided to be a little more daring. I wore my hair out with a little moisturizer and allowed my curls to fall where they may. Now, I won't lie, I didn't get any compliments on it but when I asked a few close friends what they thought, I got good feedback. Hopefully they weren't just trying to be nice! Here's a few shots for you to decide! The first are from me just being on campus and the last is from last night when I went out for my birthday celebration. I'll be 22 years old on Wednesday, October 13!

Sittin' Sideways

Hello All! So I know I'm slowing down on the posts and it because school just started and I am busy busy busy!! I'm actually glad to be back at school though. I'm enjoying being back with my linesisters and FINE ARTS! Yesterday was the Alpha Kappa Alpha and Alpha Phi Alpha collaboration party called "Phrozen Pearls: Pumps and Ties" hosted by my chapter and the chapter of A Phi A here at my school. So ya'll know I had to get cute! Unfortunately, I woke up with a terrible cold Thursday morning and was completely out of it! I spent the whole entire day in bed on Thursday trying to get better in order help out the next day. So anyway...that didn't work! Friday I woke up feeling worst but trucked it to class anyway. After class I ran around getting things together and such. The day was a blur but around 5 or so I was able to slow down, take some medicine and take a nap. When I got up my first thought was "crap...I gotta look decent" LOL. That entire day I'd walked around in sweats and a hoodie just completely not feeling it. Ironically enough, I was hit on more yesterday than when I look decent on campus. Hm =/...but I digress! So I got up, got my outfit out, threw that sucka on and topped it off with some pumps and a tie! Next was hair and make-up!

So my make up was a subliminal shout out to the Ice Cold Brothers of Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, Inc. with the gold in my inner corners and the shimmer black on the outter lid. It was cute but of course I didn't take any pictures..SMH. For the past week I've had in a micro twist set. As usual, I'm LOVING it! People ask me all the time if I plan to loc up and as much as I love my twists the answer is no! I have the power to get the lovely loc look and still take it out the next day to wear my natural curls or blow dry and flat iron this sucka toWhip My Hair Back And Forth (see the post below)! I'm too in love with the versatility at this point to settle with just one look! Now as you all know, I've been trying to figure out what else to do with my hair when it's twisted up other than just twisting the front. Well last night i did my usual twists but I went a step further to twist it into a side do. I loved it and even got a few compliments for the style! Below are some shots of it. Pictures of the party haven't gone up yet but if I find one that shows my style off a little bit better I will certainly show you guys. Hopefully these get my point across though. Enjoy! And also, if you recreate this style send in your pictures! We wanna see!

(Side Note: pardon the first picture, I was having a full blown conversation LOL)

Length Check (Updated)

As we know, I had to cut away my poor frazzled ends after a mishap with a blow dryer and a brush. *tear, tear* Well, that was about three weeks ago and here I am with an official length update. You all may remember that I said I didn't have to cut much off the front so that part is cool. It's funny, even though my hair is straightened out I still had to pull it because of how ridiculously tight I bump my hair under. (Sidenote: I'm thinking of going lighter with my hair color in about a month or so. What do you guys think? Drop a comment and let me know!)

Give It To Me Straight

Excited like a child with a new toy, I wanted to see how my usual styles looked with my new color. I tried my usual twists in the front with my curly fro in the back, my pony puff and of course my wash-style-and-go with a head band. The only thing left to wonder about was how my color would look on straightened hair. It's a known fact that hair tends to look darker when it's wet so yesterday I straightened my hair out using all of my wonderful heat protectants and this is what I got...

Also, because hair dye destroys the elasticity of hair strands, I am making sure to keep my hair moisturized now that it's straight. When I wear my curly styles, the daily H2O handles that part but now that it's straight, I have to be extra careful. I think I'm doing a pretty good job with it. I've see maybe 10-15 broken strands since I've dyed my hair. Could be better, but not bad at all.

Color Me Spontaneous

Spontaneous as hell! So yesterday after I finished blogging, I looked up natural hair salons in the downtown Newark area and came across Cynthia's Natural Hair Salon. I called her up, got a price and was SOLD! At first I just want highlights which ran me $35. Not bad right? Well, after getting back to my internship a few blocks over and fully examining my new streaks, I decided that I wanted the color all over. I gave Cynthia a call back and she agreed to do my whole head for just $30 more. Now, I don't do hair salons but I think $65 for a dye job is pretty reasonable.....I guess. Well anyway...here are the pictures. First of my hair before going into the shop, before and after the streaks, and then finally the finished product. Today was a really gloomy day so later on I'll have better pics to show you all the color. It's Strawberry Blonde...check me out, right? LOL

As far as the salon itself goes, I'd give it a 6/10 and that's lieniant! It wasn't the cleanest, flies everywhere and not easy to find at all. However, Cynthia is one of the nicest stylists I've ever had to deal with. She was very sweet and helpful, not to mention QUICK! I would definitely go back. But that's just me, I can't say that I would rush you all to go check it out while in the area though. I'm from Newark, we're kind of rough around the edges but I've been to much, much nicer places still. I guess customer service is this shop's saving grace!