Hey, it's Courtie!

I let mine sit for 10 hours...You can leave it on as long as you want, it won't harm you. I left mine on that long (with cling wrap) because i wan't deep color...Not sure if the shorter time will condish as well...if you try it let me know!

I cold water rinse after each wash now..it eliminates my frizzies!

I did a whole post replying to you guys and it ate it. HMPH.

@rebelrocks - Organix is a condish you can buy at CVS or Walgreens. It's $7 and comes with a rebate you can send in to try it free. It's got great slip, it smells great, it last forever, you can use it as a deep treatment, etc. Well worth the $7 to try it out.

Giovanni Direct Leave-in is also about $7, you can get it at Ulta. It makes my wash n gos look like I've shingled them when I haven't even brushed them. Dries shiny with no residue, lets you have third and fourth day shiny hair, and eliminated my fairy knots.
HOLY GRAIL PRODUCT.

@ChrsLvsBks - I let it sit for only 2.5 hours now, but my hair just sucks up that red color. I am going to do indigo soon, so we will see what that does.
Here's the link to a post I did on the Cherry Lola treatment - Cherry Lola.
I do also cold water rinse -- It makes me shiny and keeps the frizz down.

I must buy!!!

Target has the organix for $4.99 right now

Court - what is cherry lola and how often do you henna? I have done it once and liked it. It turned my gray hairs bright orange LOL but I didn't mind. But I noticed today that the gray is starting to show again at the roots. It has been about 2 weeks - is that too soon to henna again. I had some left over in the freezer.

Corygentri you could henna every day if you wanted! It's not too soon. Just keep it hydrated and you'll be cool.

I personally henna once a week, but I alternate between a full henna and a gloss.

Thanksgiving throwback -- this is me at 8 years old (1989) at my jazz dance recital.



Couldn't tell me NATHAN. Seriously. The costumes were all different colors and I fought so I could get the pink one.

My mother is not good at hair, this is the only style she could do. I literally wore my hair like this from the age of about 4 to the age of 10 when I started doing my own hair. Then we moved on to fan ponytails, slick backs, and slicked down bangs ---- it was not cute, and I don't have any pictures.

Here is a pic of me as a baby -- you can see my hair was straight when I was born. My mother messed it up on purpose, she thought it was a style.



And here I am today. This is a third day braid out and it's still shinin!

omg what a beautiful little girl! your hair rocks ! how can i be like you!

what gloss do you use? is that the lola?

Hey, thank you girl!

The gloss is just henna with conditioner added. I let it sit on my head for 2 hours. It adds a nice shine and that way I don't have to do the whole henna treatment every week. This week is gloss week -- all I have to do is thaw the henna, throw some condish in there, and slap it on.

HEY Y'ALL!

That Thanksgiving weekend nearly killed me. I had to cook dinner for 12 with no help and one oven mitt. By the end of the night, my braid-out was kicking.

So Friday I had a spa day and did my henna gloss treatment. I forgot to take the Mehandi out of the freezer so I stopped by the Indian grocer and picked up a packet of Dulhan ($1.49!). Mixed it up with the tea, froze half, then mixed the rest with HEHH. Slapped it up there for an hour and a half, then DCd with some Garnier Triple Nutrition and some melted coco oil. I did a braid out with some Giovanni Direct Leave in. Did this all while watching Precious (good movie!)

It worked okay, but by yesterday night it was frizzy and dry.

So I heated up some olive oil and melted some coco oil and shea butter in there. Added a teaspoon of amla powder, mixed it. I applied this mixture to my dry hair, put a cap on, and let it sit for an hour. Then I washed with a small amount of Tresemme shampoo, detangled and conditioned with Garnier Triple Nutrition. Used Organix Conditioner and Giovanni Direct as leave ins, sealed with coco oil and shea.

That was last night, I let it air dry, here it is today.





My hair really liked the amla oil treatment, I will be doing that again. Tonight I am going to try to twist on dry hair and do a bunch of little twists to wear until the end of the week. We'll see.

First, I love the baby pics. Too cute! Second, I love your hair! The color, the shine, everything. Its really nice. Where do you get your amla from? I think Im going to do a henna gloss tonight. I'll let you know how it goes since you are my inspiration to do it.

Thank you so much!

I get my amla from the Indian grocer down the street. It's $3.49 for 100g, and I only use about a teaspoon at a time.

Do that henna gloss! Only an hour to leave on and it's so worth it. Definitely let me see some pics, girl!

So I thought I was doing a henna gloss and I may have but I need to input to be sure. I had some henna already mixed in the freezer which I think is what you said you had. Mine was just mixed with water that was steeped with horsetail/chamomile/and lemon balm herbs. I thawed that out and then mixed it with some Aussie Moist Conditioner.

I left it on overnight because I didn't apply it until last night around 9 so would that be considered a henna gloss or just a full treatment lol? Either way my hair was so soft when I rinsed it out. I forgot to take pics of it right after I rinsed but I'll take pics when I rinse out the conditioner and after I style it.

AfrikanLatina -- Yeah, girl, that was the henna gloss. I'm glad it worked so well!

I did a lot of stuff this weekend and I have pics!!!

So, Friday night the hair was looking a fright. Dry and frizzy. So I did an amla oil treatment.

I use Hesh Amla powder.


The ingredients are Hesh Amla, Dabur Amla oil, Vatika Coconut Oil, shea butter and olive oil. I use the exact same mixture on my hair and my boyfriend's hair (he's Italian), but I omit the olive oil for him because it's not necessary.



So I melted the coconut oil and shea in the microwave, then added olive and amla oils to the warm mix. Then I put in one heaping teaspoon of amla powder.



And mixed.


I put the oil mixture on my dry hair, then wrapped it up for two hours. I then put the Cherry Lola treatment directly over this. I left that on for one hour, then rinsed.

WOOOOOOO BOY! My hair detangled under the water. I just took the Denman and stroked it through once on each side. My hair was so soft and so manageable. The amla also toned down the red from the henna.

Here is the hair after washing out. Nothing on it.



I then put in some Organix Nourishing Coconut Conditioner and Giovanni Direct LeaveIn and let it air dry in preparation to do twists.

Air dried hair:



Shiny.

So then I twisted my hair. I used a tweaked recipe of tiashauntee's holding cream.



I used 1 tsp shea butter, 1 tsp olive oil, a couple of squirts of Organix Coconut, a squirt of Giovanni Direct, and 2 tsps honey. I am in love with this stuff, it is better than any gel, and my twists have never looked this good!

Twists on dry hair:



I wore the twists all weekend and took them out on Sunday night.

Twist out:



It looks great!!!!

I am wearing it up for work but taking it down later.



Any questions on that amla treatment, let me know. You can see how shiny my hair is. My boyfriend is now doing amla like twice a week. Don't sleep on it.

WOWZA!! Im going to do that treatment as soon as I get some amla. You are inspiring me to try some new stuff.

Girl, that amla is the business!

It's so easy, too. You can just do it the same as you would do a pre-poo. And if you do that, then co-wash and do a deep conditioner after ---!!!! Your hair will thank you!

Thanks for the compliments, y'all!

Here is my hair today. This is day two of the twist out. The holding cream is still going strong. This is going to go until Friday with no problem.



Texture:

Nothing really new to report.
Third day hair -- I wore it down last night but it's in a ponytail now.

Im in love with your color.

How is your mom doing after her hair situation?

Oh, thank you so much! It doesn't look that purple in normal light.

My mom is doing fine. She keeps asking me when she is going to be able to wear it straight. I had to explain to her that if she wants it to grow, she's going to have to take care of it and leave it alone so it can get healthy.

I haven't posted for a minute cause my camera was out of whack.

So anyway, last Friday I was rocking the fifth day twist out. It looked -- okay, I guess.



I had taken a look at my ends and it was pretty clear they needed to be trimmed, but I didn't trust anyone else to do it.



Scraggly. So I decided to straighten my hair and trim it. I had never done this before, but I figured what the heck.

On Friday night I came home and did my amla oil treatment. Let that sit for an hour, then did my Cherry Lola treatment over top of that. Let that sit for an hour. When I got into the shower to rinse, my hair just unfurled like a flag. There was no detangling. I deep conditioned with an Olive Oil Pak (found it in the drawer) for 45 minutes. Then I covered my hair with Garnier Fructis Triple Nutrition and Giovanni Direct Leave In. I plopped for about 15 minutes.

I did the roller set with holding cream I made from some shea butter, coconut oil, Organix Healing Mandarin and Olive Oil Conditioner (smells fantastic!) Giovanni Direct Leave In, and honey. The cream worked great, the roller set, not so much. I used really big rollers and I couldn't get them to fit properly on my head. Also, it took me a couple of tries to get the placement of the duckbill clips right, so some sections weren't pulled tight enough. It wasn't too too bad, though.

When I woke up the next day I took the roller set out, then flatironed with shea butter and this heat protectant from Sally's:

I was afraid to turn the flatiron up past 280, so it took me three or four passes on each piece of hair to get it straightened. My hair does not like being straight, and I am cool with that. So then I went through and trimmed 1/2" off the front, crown, and sides, and a full inch off the back, because the back is much longer. Here is a sleepy-eyed pic of my hair after it was flat ironed and cut. You can see how big and poofy it has become already, maybe 40 minutes after being straightened.



Yeah, it was like 8AM on Saturday and I had to get my hair done before I went out for the day, so disregard my face.

I wore my hair out for the whole day. My mother almost fell to the ground she was so happy that my hair was straight. I can't take the way people act different to me when my hair is straightened, and I will tell you honestly that it makes me extremely salty. So when I got home, I decided to do a braid and curl. Also, my hair was brushing against my face all day and it made me break out. I can't.

So I did the braid and curl with flexis and the same holding cream (I made a bunch) on the dry, straightened hair. It turned out okay, but not great. I wore it Sunday and today. I am going to try to make it one more day before I restyle. I am supposed to be doing low manip.

I am utterly amazed at the photo of the braid you posted on Nov 16th...Is it weird to say that that's the healthiest looking braid I have ever seen? Sorry, I'm late...I know that was so last month, lol!

--Reese

Thanks Reese! It's the henna that makes it so shiny.

Can I just say I love your hair in your avatar? The color, the style -- hot to death.