Curly Nikki Wash Method

If you follow this blog, you probably know that I LOVE rhassoul clay and get stellar results every time I use it. However, as a new mother, I don’t always have time to prepare my rhassoul clay wash. When I’m short on time, my product of choice to cleanse my hair is Giovanni Triple Treat Shampoo. This shampoo is sulfate free and while it doesn’t leave my hair as soft as rhassoul, it certainly does a good job of cleaning my scalp and hair. It doesn’t leave my hair with that stripped, dry feeling. It’s also a great relaxing shampoo, because it contains tea tree and peppermint essential oils– it’s like a mini scalp massage.

Typically I wash my hair in 4 sections, but I tried a method I read about on Curly Nikki: I simply put my hair in two pigtails. After shampooing each side. I saturated conditioner and detangled under water for added slip. The CN method advocates using practically an entire bottle of conditioner. Since this blog is about being cheap, economically savvy, I diluted 4 ounces of conditioner (Tresemmé naturals) with 4 ounces of water. I soaked each side with 4 ounces of this mixture, massaging the conditioner into my strands then rinsed and detangled under water. Detangling was a breeze with this method and my hair felt great. After this, I put on a deep conditioner, continued on with my shower rituals (voila time effective deep conditioning).
Finally, I tried something new for styling:
1. I applied my leave-in almost dry hair (t-shirt wrapped around my hair 5 m then air dried. I noticed this really help my leave-in penetrate my hair. Sealed with oils on my ends per usual.
2. I sprayed a little mixture of water and setting lotion on my hair, then twisted it. For more hold and definition.
3. I dried my twists for 10-15m under a hooded dryer.

When I undid my twists my hair felt über soft and moisturized.

This is a great method for those little on time.
What’s your rushed routine? What are your favorite shampoos/hair wash products?

Low Porosity Hair Care Giveaway!

Hi Everyone,

Tomorrow is the last day for you to enter the giveaway. This weekend, one lucky reader will receive a bag of organic rhassoul clay and my favorite leave-in, Kinky Curly Knot Today. I’ll enter all your names into a hat and select the first name drawn as the winner. Remember, to be eligible you have to leave one comment on this post. Once the winner is selected, I’ll contact him or her per email and request their mailing address.

Good luck!

 

Rhassoul Clay 1st love

Happy Valentine’s Day readers!

I know it’s a Hallmark holiday, but I just love love. So anything that celebrates friendship, love and happiness is all good by my standards! It’s also a special day for me, because my husband I married 6 years ago from today on Valentine’s day.

Speaking of love, why do I always go astray from my first lo-po love rhassoul clay?? I keep trying to find something that rivals it as a moisturizing cleanser, but nothing does.

After my flop with my homemade castile shampoo last week. This week it was back to my beloved rhassoul clay. Oh and how lovely it was to reunite. My hair felt soft, clean and my curls were bouncy and breathed new life. The only downside, which I didn’t miss was the dirt slinging all over my shower. It’s quick to wash down, but it would be nice to have a slightly less messy version (…still working on a formula).

Any way, for now I’ll stick to rhassoul for my weekly cleanser and Giovanni Triple Tea Tree Shampoo as my monthly clarifier. It’s not drying and is pretty effective.
After applying my mud wash I decided to put my hair in Curlformers (per usual). I’m getting a lot faster at installing them and as usual I let them dry under my hooded dryer to cut down on drying time.

What products are you loving these days? Any plans for V-day? I’d love to hear about them.

Real talk: Beauty

This is a new feature on my blog. I’ll be discussing different themes in relation to hair (of course) and life and hope you’ll join in on the conversation. This week’s theme is feeling beautiful.

When do you feel most beautiful?

Personally, I noticed for my very definition of beauty evolves with age (like most things). In my teens, it was whatever magazines and peers said was beautiful. I’d study Seventeen magazine for hours hoping to experience my “she’s all that” movie moment. You know, the one where you go to school one day and suddenly the homecoming king realizes you're a supermodel — yeah never happened. In my twenties, particularly early twenties, it was compliments I received from friends, boyfriends and strangers. Now that I'm in my early thirties (eek, writing about three decades make me feel so old), it's when I feel happiest. When I'm laughing uncontrollably with friends over a tea, while reminiscing on our youth. When I do favors for others or surprise loved ones. When I'm doing anything outdoorsy. When my baby boy looks up at me a smiles and coos. Now my definition is all the positive energy I try to put out and feelings of joy that make me feel beautiful. Research shows the most beautiful people are the happiest. I'd have to somewhat disagree and say happy people are truly beautiful. Happiness radiates from within like a lighthouse in the fog. Never let anyone dim your light or define your beauty.

How do you define beautiful? When do you feel beautiful?

Homemade castile soap review

Last week I tried to be a little kitchen chemist a whipped up my very own castile soap. Wonk, wonk, wonk. I found this hair wash was too drying. My hair felt a little stripped. So I don’t think I’ll be using this anytime in the future for a hair wash. This even makes me think I’ll skip ever trying Dr. Bronner’s. Well it wasn’t a complete failure, I’ll use the remainder as a body wash– so not a complete bust. Basically, I’m coming to the conclusion that nothing compares to my mud wash. It’s the only thing that keeps my hair clean and moisturized. I do occasionally use Giovanni’s Tea Tree Tingle shampoo to clarify and that does a decent job. Not nearly as drying as my wash. Next week I’ll be dabbling in the kitchen again attempting to whip up a rhassoul clay conditioner.

Here’s my hair after washing it. as you can see it looks undefined and dry. After I styled it in a braid out. It was defined, but felt a little crunchy and hard.

Have you ever tried castile soap on your hair? What was your experience?

Give Away: Low Porosity Products

Today is the 1 year anniversary of this blog. Looking back, it’s been an amazing journey. I’ve connected with people from all over the world, received amazing feedback and support.

Some of my new goals for this blog is to give it a face lift, to increase communication and exchange with readers (i.e. more comments and contributions from readers).

To celebrate, I’ll be doing my first giveaway. I’ll give away a couple of my favorite low porosity hair products. To qualify to win, all you need to do is comment on this post. I will randomly select a winner at the end of the month. Please note, you can only comment once to qualify. This giveaway will only take place if this post gets at least 20 comments (from individual readers) by the end of this month #workingtowardsgoals. So pass this post along to friends and have them comment away.

UPDATE: this giveaway is open to readers from around the world.

Kitchen Chemist: Low Porosity Castile Shampoo

This morning I attempted to whip up a low porosity shampoo that has a PH above neutral. The goal is that it will  open my cuticles, clean my hair and leave it  moisturized, but not stripped. Here are some pictures of the process. I haven’t tried this shampoo yet and will report findings once I use it tonight or tomorrow. I’ll follow-up with a conditioner to get the moisture in my hair and close my cuticles (as conditioner has a naturally acidic PH).

I won’t share the recipe for now as I will be the guinea pig first and test the results. However here are the ingredients I used: distilled water, shavings of organic castile soap, black strap molasses, argan and sweet almond oil, vitamin E, essential oils. It looks like a mud wash because of the molasses. This soap has a PH of 9 (about the same PH as my rhassoul hair wash).

Look forward to reporting findings!

Face Talk

A reader emailed me and requested I share my skin regimen and tips on achieving clear skin.

I do believe that genetics plays a huge role in our skin, but the environment and our regimens contribute greatly as well to the health of our skin.

Here are some things I do that do not relate to my wash regimen:

• Eat clean and healthy — lots of veggies, fruits and drink tons of water.
• Move around and exercise to stimulate cell regeneration.
• Try to keep my hair off my face.
• I don’t wear foundation, if I do I only wear it on special occasions.

Now here’s my skin regimen. I’m not beauty expert and my skin is not flawless. However, I used to break out a lot, and since implementing this regimen, I no longer suffer from acne nor do I get pimples (except for one around that time…).

Products  (products in bold are what I use 100% of the time):

• jojoba oil – same PH as the skin, extremely gentle and moisturizing, even for the most sensitive skin. Great make-up remover.
• warm towel – soothing, opens pores and removes dirt and oil.
• cold water – wonderful to close pore and increase circulation
• witch hazel – closes pores, refreshes skins (and I think it fights wrinkles, but I have no scientific proof, besides my grandmother who used it her entire life and never wrinkled).
• tea tree – fights acne and antimicrobial
• black soap – removes oil and build-up without stripping the skin, even skin tone

AM/PM Regimen

1. Put a drop or two of jojoba oil* on my hands and rub face in circular motions (if I’m wearing make-up, I add a few more drops to really loosen up the product).
2. Place a warm towel on my face and let it sit one minute, wipe my face with the wash cloth to remove oil or buildup.
3. Rinse with cold water.
4. Place a few drops of witch hazel astringent and one drop of tea tree oil** on a cotton swab and gently wipe in a circular motion over my face and neck.
5. If my skin feels dry I will add another drop of jojoba oil.
6. (In the summer or if my skin feels oily I use a small amount of black soap to cleanse it. I don’t do this so often in winter.)

*Other great light oils are extra virgin olive oil and sweet almond oil.

**I only add the drop of tea tree oil at night, because of the smell.

These products will probably last you 6 – 9 months and only cost about 5 – 10 dollars in total. The best part about this regimen is that the products are 100% clean and natural.

What’s your healthy skin regimen?

Curl Formers and Buns

The title of this post pretty much sums up what I’ve done with my hair since the birth of my peanut.

I use Curlformers once or twice per month and once the curls fall, I transition into a bun or pony tail. That’s it. Pretty simple huh?

I love Curlformers and am still amazed at how straight they get the roots of my hair — it’s almost scary. I never let the Curlformers set air dry, because I don’t have all day to sit around looking like an octopus nor do I want to venture down the path of sleeping with them. Under my hooded dryer they take about  40 – 50 minutes to dry and since it’s not really direct heat, my hair still feels soft and healthy after I remove them. I do miss braid outs, so will probably be revisiting this style at some point, when I have the time.

My birthday is coming up this weekend, so I’d like to get a little fancy with my hair and pamper myself a little. What style would you recommend? How are you wearing your hair these days?