Anz30 on the street....journaling bout my curls

I have acutally been lurking here for a couple of months. I've even asked a few questions (thank you ladies for all the help). But more importantly I've been admiring all of your glorious curls and have been inspired by you. I guess I was just a little shy about journaling. So here goes:

My last relaxer was in Nov 2008, bc'd in Feb 2009 and grew it out until Aug 2009. I decided that I wanted to go back to my funky fly twa and rocked it some more until March 2010 when I decided to let it grow out again. It felt to me like that was taking forever until one morning I woke up with gi-normus fro (at least that's how it seemed). Now I'm just trying to figure out how best to work with it. Because clearly it has the upper-hand in this curly situation.

While I love my fro in all of its gi-normus glory, I am looking to learn how to create more definitive styles and/or styles that will give me some hangtime. So I think I need to stretch it? Whatever that means, I just know that you guys know, so please help me lol. I'm also looking for a new moisturizer. I haven't been able to find the old moisturizer that Cantu had. It was creamy light and fluffy, not oily like the one that is out now. So I will take any suggestions there for my 4 something hair.
Alright so you guys may realize that despite my time served (as a curly that is), I'm not all the way on the up and up. HELP!! LOL

Anz

P.S.--can someone help me post pics? I tried but lost this message and had to type it all over again

Welcome!! Glad you came out of lurkdom. LOL!!

https://curlynikki.forumotion.com/t310-how-to-post-a-picture

Welcome to Curl Street! I will come back to see your pics!

Got it now. Thanks Lynnieluve for the link. Here are a few pics from my journey thus far:

sweetdrk1 wrote:Welcome to Curl Street! I will come back to see your pics!

Thank you! I love your hair, your journal is one that has really helped me out

Welcome to Curl street, your hair is gorgeous!

Krazy Coils, thank you. I have sooooo many questions for you about your hair. I checked your fotki. But before I fire off, do you have a blog or video that describes how you did the twists that are in your avi? But I have to know now lol, are those 2strand twists? Did you twist in a way to make it look like a bob, or is it cut that way? Love it!!!!!

When I 2strand twist, they just fall flat, never cute. So I always keep them covered with a scarf or head band for a couple days then I wear the twist out.

Very cute pin up do and I love the last pic!!

Your hair is beautiful! I especially love the second to last pic (the last pic too actually)!

-Reese

Wow you have some great pics. I see youve already went through the hardest part of the journey. I love your fro. You are lovely girl ! Keep it up!

anz30 wrote:Krazy Coils, thank you. I have sooooo many questions for you about your hair. I checked your fotki. But before I fire off, do you have a blog or video that describes how you did the twists that are in your avi? But I have to know now lol, are those 2strand twists? Did you twist in a way to make it look like a bob, or is it cut that way? Love it!!!!!

When I 2strand twist, they just fall flat, never cute. So I always keep them covered with a scarf or head band for a couple days then I wear the twist out.

Thank you for the compliment. Sorry currently I don't have a blog or video. Yes they are two strand twists and to get it to look like a bob I pinned the back of my hair up. The back of my hair is touching my shoulders, and I pull the back strands up to keep them from rubbing against my clothes and pin the hair up. The sides and front of my hair are shorter than the back so that kind of contributes to the look also.

anz30 wrote:

sweetdrk1 wrote:Welcome to Curl Street! I will come back to see your pics!

Thank you! I love your hair, your journal is one that has really helped me out

I am glad I could help! Your hair is beautiful! I love it!

Thanks to all of you.
Lynnieluve-I haven't been able to duplicate that pinup for the life of me :/

I have been reading about the protective styling and how it retains length. I notice that when I wear my twist outs my hair does look a lot longer by day 3/4. So I want to challenge my self to twist more often. I really want to wear my hair in twists, but I don't like how I look with the twists. I usually 2strand twist on a Saturday and will wear a head wrap or scarf to cover the twists and then on Monday I will do the twist-out that will last me the better part of a week.

I wore a twist updo once (pic above) but have not been able to duplicate it. And even in trying I can't seem to make any pinup work in a way that is cute. Today I was actually able to pull my twists back into a teeny twist bun (had to pin up the sides) with a twist bang. I still don't know how I feel about it so I'm going to keep wearing it around the house to see if I get used to it.

The only thing that worries me about it is whether the pulling on the twists can be damaging, which would defeat the purpose of me wearing a protective style anyway. It is in a scrunchy that is on loosely. I didn't pull too tight on the sides which is why they needed to be pinned up. I'm going to play with it some more and see if I can come up with something I like. If I do, I'll post up the pics.

This pic is how I make my errand/store runs on the weekends that I put my twists in. I should really start to embrace wearing my twists:

I had no such luck today with the twists. I will keep trying though. I'm also going to watch more youtube videos to try to get the techniques down. It feels like I'll never get good at protective styles

Here are pics of a twist pin up do I did here and here

It was pretty simple to achieve. I put my hair in 4 sections ( 2 in the front, 2 in the back). I twisted up each section. I started pinning the twist in the back first. I pinned all the twist toward the center part. Then I started pinning the twist in the front toward the back.

I hope this makes sense and helps you achieve a great pin up do.

Thanks for sharing. My hair isn't long enought for that style, but it just may give me a good foundation to start with

I'll take pics of what I come up with.

I just talked to my bestie. She is stationed in Germany and has been there for a year now. We talk everynight (here) when she is on her way to work (am there) and then again in the am here when she is on her way home from work. So anyway tonight she tells me "Everytime I call you, you're doing your hair. What are you doing, and why does it take so much?" I tried my best to explain, and in the process of explaining realized that I actually have a routine down. At night anyway. I'm playing in the morning because I'm on break, lol.
Yaaaaaaay for me!

Have you tried a pin up do yet?

Great for the routine! I love the fro by the way!! Happy New Year!

Hi Ladies! Happy New Year!

Lynnie, no not yet. I'm just now putting twists in tonight, but my hair is fighting me every step of the way.

Sweet, thanks!

Dilemma!

I have been co-washing only for probably six months now. Maybe even longer than that. Today I felt that I needed a good shampoo and condition. I was thinking I would invigorate my scalp or something. NOT!!! My hair is now infuriated. It has turned on me. Detangling became such a nightmare that I gave up, and now I'm scared to begin again because my hair feels like a brillo pad. I did a deep condtion but that has done nothing to curb the effects of the shampoo. I think I'm realizing that my hair doesn't like cones. I used the same shampoo (Cantu) that I've been using since I BC'd. I never had a problem with it before, my hair LOVED it. But now it's an awful mess.

The problem with that is that I refuse to pay for the natural hair line products because for one they are far too expensive. Something in my soul won't let me do it. Actually I did it once with the Kinky Curly line and my hair HATED IT. Also because I refuse to order hair products from online. I know there are some in the stores but again too much money for way little product. Looks like I'll have to keep making my concoctions, which is not something I planned to do all the time, but since my hair is OBVIOUSLY in control, looks like this will be the plan.