|d.denise| *blowing dust off the mic*

I'm baaack!

And not just cuz the thread was messed up. I am done with training in STL so I'm back to my regular posting and staying up all night and addiction to the site lol.

I am sittin on the couch with some Henna n Placenta in my hair lol. I got a sample pack from the BSS in Memphis (it's in the hood so they have so much more stuff than I have ever heard of). Had never heard of it but if it can give me some of the same henna benefits I may go back and get it. For you natural ingredient ladies you wouldn't have even picked it up. Definitely some stuff in there I can't pronounce lol.

I am gonna do curlformers again. When I did it last Sunday, I had to wake up early so it didn't dry.

Why...

• are there so many different textures in my head?
  
• is the hair at the nape of my neck sooo short? (always has been)
  
• did I ever get a relaxer in the first place?
  
• can't my hair hold a style for more than 3 days?
  
• can't I find a really good moisturizer for the tresses?
  
• have I been to Sally's or some other bss at least 8 times in the last month?
  
• am I on this site at midnight!? lol
  
• do I have hair envy of the right side of my head??
  

lol u r too funny, girl! im sure we all ask ourselves most of these questions as some point in our journey.... my hair doesnt hold a style for too many days either, regardless of the fact that I sleep with a satin bonnet on... i think i just sleep wild! lol and i certainly think sometimes... "if only i'd never gotten a relaxer!"... sigh... but here we r. Let us know how that H & P works out... i wanna say ive heard of someone using it before! also, i am really interested in how ur curlformers style turns out as well! please post pics!

I've also used the Henna & Plancenta DT with the olive oil. I like it. Leaves my hair nice and soft.

And btw, this site is the reason why I can't get my butt in the bed on time at night this week!

How does the placenta work for you denise?

I tried the henna and placenta it was good. I was bummed cuz on the pack it said it doesn't deposit color like henna. That's what I want some more color.

I also understand this addiction. I have the email address saved in my email circle so when someone comments I can check it on my phone.

It's ok tho.....we are all learning and supporting each other which is a great and wonderful thing.

rebelrocks wrote:How does the placenta work for you denise?

it wasn't spectacular but it was definitely a lot softer when I first rinsed. It's still softer I just need something to moisturize on a daily.

I learned an extremely valuable lesson today: keep my hands out my head! grrrr.. my curlformers lasted me about 36 hours because I can't keep my hands out my head. The first time I did them it lasted a lot longer and my hair was a lot shinier. Not sure what that's about... so today I flat twisted around both sides and just pinned at the back. sounds simple right? it took me like 2 hours to come up with that lol. FML.

what are some quick go-to styles you all use??? like if someone told you you had to be ready in like 20 minutes (clothes, make up, and all), what is your "go-to" you know its gonna turn out right style????? I know what works for you doesn't work for everyone but I am just in a creativity rut right now...

@sheetacular the reason I WANTED to try it is because I didn't want the color! lol. My hair is finally jet black after I don't know how many years and I need to find a good moisturizer before I start turning my hair some unknown color. That's my only hangup about henna and not trying it yet. I know jet black is boring to some people but it makes my hair look so much healthier!

I don't have my real camera with me to take pics of my do's while I'm back home but I guess that's why they made camera phone. The "good side" of my hair lol. I didn't even know I could twist. On the other side I have a flower clip I bought from forever 21 lol.

today was a decent hair day. it was my dad's first time "seeing" my natural hair sans straightening. Seeing is in quotation marks because It's a twistout and it's pinned back so you really can't see anything. But he LOVED it either way... Love my Daddy :-)

yesterday, went out to eat with my aunts and one def had a comment on my twisted hair (see pic above). she was like mmmm. is that how they wear their hair in cali?? i chose not to respond. meanwhile her hair has gotten considerably thinner. i'm talking when she wears her hair in a ponytail you can see her scalp :-( I told her she needs to lay off the relaxer - it was so straight and thin I thought she had done it that day, a "fresh" perm, but no, that was 2 or 3 weeks post relaxer. talk about brainwashed. she's going to relax all her hair away... I'm going to the club now so I need to get creative with this pin-up and flower clip! be back lol.

Soooo sleepy on a Monday morning at the airport... On my way back to LA. It rained today in Memphis and it felt GREAT I have never took my time walking in the rain lol.

Until I find the right products for moisture...which I haven't by the way - I am going to stick with protective styles and buns and just pinning my hair back. If I can go out with pinned back naturally curly hair in Memphis and get compliments I can sure as hell do it in LA. At first when people would say they are going to wear buns every day for a month I would be like WHAT? How do you do that??? Don't you miss your hair? And I do, but this definitely keeps me from messing with my hair!

I mixed giovannis with coconut oil yesterday before I went to sleep and that felt pretty good but I know there has to be something better :-(

Oh and I left my spray bottle at my mom's house! I think she hid it. She also had me leave the satin pillowcase I had to go buy since there wasn't one in the house. I'm only forgiving her because she's starting to toy with the idea of weaning off the creamy crack! Yay! And so is my aunt!

My mom is the same way! When I go home to visit I always end up leaving products with her. Last time it was the kinky curly stuff I brought with me. I did her hair for her and she loved it so I went ahead and left it for her.

in response to ur question regarding the nape hair being so short...Do you or have you worn ponytails in the same spot all the time, does that hair brush up against/rub against clothing, winter scarves etc?

and my go-to style is the one in my avatar...if i'm goin out i just twist and pin up one side and boom I'm done lol.

PS I like ur side twist I do that style sometimes but with a braid.

@cocacolacutie - PJism is not cheap she is going to have to get sample portions from now on lol. And I forgot I ended up leaving my little sister a headband! Dang they are robbing me in that house

@A85 I hardly ever wear ponytails. Like I can't even remember the last time I wore a ponytail. Usually if I'm working out (which is also rare! lol) or need to pull my hair off my face I do half-up/half-down, sometimes a headband or just pin it back. My hair is so many different lengths that ponytails don't look right on me (of course we are our own worst critic though so who knows). I've been in LA for 2 years and haven't been wearing turtlenecks or scarves but before this I was in DC so that could be possible. But it's seriously been like this since I can remember so I don't know.

If I could pull off your avatar style like it looks on you then that would be my go-to style too! It looks great lol. and Thanks for the compliment! My braids don't look so hot but I'm learning!

Product Review:

The product I'm raving about today is not really a product in the sense we usually talk about it - but an accessory. These flower clips from Forever 21 have saved my (hair) life for the past week lol. I have worn them (or at least one of them) every day since I bought them! lol I guess I could get some more becuase people are going to get tired of these same two real quick. So not only do they take the place of bobby pins (WHY DO BOBBY PINS ALWAYS DISAPPEAR??? I'm down to like 5!), but they're so flippin cute :-) And they take the attention off the fact that I really didn't do much of anything to my hair lol.



(by the way the flash def gives a false sense of moisture! my hair is so dry but it looks so shiny on this picture. i looked at the pic like "thats not my hair" lol)

so my hair today is still in the big side flat twists into the bun or pinned up. Macys is having a CRAZY one day sale and I found some cute earrings for CHEAP woo hoo!

I think I have found my go-to style for the next couple of weeks lol. Its so simple all I do at night is re-moisturize with direct leave-in mixed either with water or with coconut oil. I don't think my hair likes coconut oil buy itself. My ends are really "scraggly" for lack of a better word :-( I don't know if I'm going to have to trim them or if I'll be able to "condition" them back to normal.

I bought some HEHH and Aussie Moist 3 minute miracle to try next time I wash so we'll see how those work out! And I may buy a Denman too. Just THINKING about all the stuff I'm buying or have bought in the last month... MAN I just wanna find the routine that works for my hair already!

Product Review: Aussie Moist 3 minute miracle - I doubted it as I was putting it on because it wasn't creamy enough. But boyyyy when I took it out. My hair was soooo soft. Love this stuff! The only thing about it is that the bottle is so freakin little. I MAY be able to get 3 uses out of it lol. I wasn't impressed with the HEHH at all. Oh well.

The only problem is: when my hair dries, IT DRIES! so although the conditioner makes it soft, its only soft while wet. Then when it dries no matter what leave-in I use, it's never moisturized and shiny when I use it. Does anyone have any suggestions? Coconut oil just sits on my hair. Shea butter doesn't really do much of anything; I am not sure what to mix it with. Giovanni direct leave-in doesn't do much of anything either. When I mix it with water it's a little better but it doesn't last. I don't even know where to start. I am going to look for the shea moisture leave-in again. I have never seen it at a BSS so it looks like I'll be ordering off line which I HATE becaue not only do you have to pay for shipping, but there's also that delayed gratification lol. And who is ok with that these days??

So I 3-strand twisted my hair last night but I have a problem with consistency. None of the braids are the same size and none of them came out the same. So back to my flat twists with the flowers lol. I would post another pic but it looks the same lol. It's almost Friday!

MAN! I'm in San Diego with no satin pillowcase and no scarf. That's what I get for not packing the night before. I contemplated sleeping with a plastic bag on my head then I figured I might not want to risk my life to save my hair lol. Oh well - I'll pull that old school sleep on your hands so you don't mess your hair up (like when you used to get an updo or curls for prom or something lmao!)

So of course my hair was super dry when I woke up... I used some diluted direct leave in to add some moisture and let the humidity from the shower plump it up a little...and went back to the flat twists into a pin up style...
One of the "revelations" I had about my hair lately is that my curlformers haven't been as "juicy" the last 2 times I did them.. And that's when I cut out the cantu... So I'm gonna try that again and see if that helps... I'm gonna use the hsr again too - even tho there isn't that much left. Happy friday!

OMGoodness, I remember trying to sleep a certain way in order to not mess up my 'do.

As for the plastic bag, I do it often. I need to do it more now since the air in my house is so dry now that we have the heat on.

Happy Friday back atya!

I sleep wild i'd wake up and that plastic bag would either be on the floor or on my face! Lol so I just suffered that night.

got my curlformeres back the way i like em woop woop! But today it's in a ponytail lol. I really need to step my moisture game up but I have no idea where to start! man... nothing seems to work on my hair when it dries but I just can't wash or cowash it every day or every other day. i can't.

I think the reason my curlformers hadn't been coming out like they used to was a combination of products - i went back to the cantu until I find the shea moisture - as well as using smaller sections. I had to go buy another pack so I didn't have to use such large sections because those took forever to dry and just didn't look good.

not the best to sleep in:


freshly taken out! before I picked over the curls (which I tend to over do) i used some shea butter oil I found at the beauty supply store which is really just shea butter, calnola oil, some other stuff.


I tried to still use the flower but it looked too juvenile...soooo I just played around with some other styles


Curlformers make the best ponytails, updos, and sideswept styles! If you just don't mess with them and let them fall they look great - messy but not too messy...

the flower pins and the curlformers are so pretty on you!!

awwww thanks dajewel! I need to find some more flower pins asap they are a life saver! right after bobby pins they are my number 1 styling accessory/necessity right now.

I like your side twist 'do! I also noticed you mentioned in a previous post doing 3-strand twists? How do you do both of those styles? I'm definitely looking for new ones to try.

thanks! the side twist is really two chunky twists using all the hair instead of parting and just went all the way to the back. I did the same thing on the other side then just pinned the hair back. When my hair is stretched its long enough for a cute little messy bun.

for the 3 strand twists I'll have to find the video to explain it. It's just like 2 strand twists except you use three strands of hair. so you're basically going in a circle kinda. It seems simple but whenever you have three strands of hair in your hand you want to BRAID not twist lol. I would find myself having braided a whole section of my head before I realized I was doing it wrong. It took concentration lol. But I like it because the curls are more defined than with 2 strand IMO. As soon as I find the video that I learned it from I'll post it either on here or on the styling board.

yayyy look what I found! I did this in the original BNB thread and forgot that I had e-mailed it to my dad until he replied to it. :-) how cool! But again - sorry it's so long lol.
WEDNESDAY - My HairStory (get it - Hairstory, History... ha ok im done lol. *Disclaimer* this is just like history TOO LONG sorry)

In the beginning, God created...

this beautiful little curly puffball (I was 1 or 2 in those pics- I think). It was MY signature puffball; the only thing my mom did for a while. The only variation was that she may pull two little ponytails near the ears, but the puff was still there in full effect lol. I look at pics from childhood like whaaaat who allowed this perm??? I kept this style up until my hair got too long and then she started the traditional 5 twisted plaits until late elementary school. My mom took great care of my hair and kept it moisturized and we had our weekly or biweekly washing sessions and when I got older I would keep it in braids. She only pressed it for the occasions like Easter or something when I was in a play. They always say mom's know best but of course we have to figure that out on our own.

And then I succumbed to the creamy crack at 10 or 11 y.o.

I had been begging my mom for at least a year. I remember transferring to a new - mostly white - school in the 5th grade because it had an optional program. And on the first day of school I was the only black girl in class and at that moment I thought - this fro, has got to go. And unfortunately my mom gave in to my request although I wasn't getting them very often. In this pic I was 11 and my mom was still taking care of my hair so it is still very healthy and shiny and thick.... Thanks mom!

And then I got grown (15 on this pic - the day my baby bro was born :-))

I had moved out of my mom's house and was now living with my dad, hence the changes in my hair. I had no idea what I was doing in between visits to the beauty shop and you can tell from my ends. And this is when I started losing length. Shortly after this, maybe when I was 16 or 17, I got so grown I decided to get layers cut in my hair.... lordy lordy what was I thinking. That is the only time I've ever gotten my hair "cut" in my life but it has broken off so much and been so many lengths because it hasn't been taken care of.

Then there was college - the Enlightenment

So now I'm REALLY thinking I can take care of my own hair. A little background: where I'm from, in Memphis, EVERYBODY'S hair is straight. Mostly perms. I can count the number of people who got presses (too much humidity for that). So when I get to Howard University and see all these people and all this different hair I am AMAZED. It was the first time I started stretching relaxers and playing with my newgrowth and toying with the idea of "going natural". I was getting my hair blown out by Dominicans if I wasn't doing it myself... I would get relaxers when I went home and flatiron TOO MUCH... I was afraid of color but I did a rinse a couple times... Seeing that second photo after my sophomore years brings tears to my eyes forreal.. My hair used to be SO THICK and looking at how thin and broken it is in that pic is like what the hell??????

The First (Forced) Transition

I studied abroad in Italy during college and I got braids the week before I left - not knowing what I was going to do in a couple months when it was time to take them out. This was my first time having braids - which means it was my first time taking braids down - DISASTER. And then when I took them out I tried to find a beauty shop that could do something with the mess on my head. Oh I didn't mention that the summer before studying abroad I lived in Chicago where I would always (and still do when I visit) let the Egyptians straighten my hair instead of getting relaxers so this is like 6 months of new growth here! Anyway to this day I don't know what the black women in Milan do to their hair cuz they sure don't go to the beauty shop! There are a lot of braiders there tho.... Long story short - I lost a lot of hair and it was severely damaged and a hot natural relaxed mess... I got a relaxer the day after I got home...

The Second (and final! by choice!) Transition

My last relaxer was Jan/Feb 2008. I was just tired of my hair being flat, and thin (especially compared to what it used to be), and damaged, and broken off... So I transitioned with sew-ins. Which I kinda regret because I didn't adequately moisturize in between sew-ins. And I wasn't able to learn my hair as it was growing so I took the sew-in out and was like ok "now what??" I got my first sew-in Jun 2008 and got the last one taken out in March 2009. Since then, I have mostly been getting presses; and although those cause damage as well...In this last photo (March 2009) you can easily see how much healthier my hair is and how much easier it has been retaining length using the sew-ins and minimal heat and manipulation. (compare to college pics)

(Mostly Natural but pressed...)

Well, now I'm done with regular presses too! As of Sep 23, 2009 - its just me and my kinks and curls. We are getting to know one another slowly but surely. So far bantu knot outs and curlformers have been my weapons of choice....

My hair today (after twisting it at night and taking it out in the morning)