Doing my favorite Pre-poo...Amla Treatment :)



So, umm...yeah...I haven't posted in a while as you can see,lol...
But I felt the urge to post today because I am doing my favorite pre-poo treatment...Alma Treatment.  I have the recipe on my site if you are interested in trying this out for yourself.  I haven't had a chance to do my Amla treatments in a while. I'd like to say that I would do these once every 2 weeks but I'd be lying,lol.  As a natural, I tend to want to try other pre-poos or brands in between doing Alma's and most of the time, my results aren't the same.  I like to take pictures of my hair journey from time to time and it really helps me to document what styles or products work.  When I looked back at my log, I realized that the last time I had washed my hair, it was on March 31st...yeah...I know.
I have been doing good things with my twists while they've been in for over a month.  I spritz them at night and seal with either an oil or a Shea butter mixture.  That kept my hair moisturized.  I tell you it takes a while for me to do my hair, which isn't a bad thing because that means my hair is growing...ya!  But it does take a while and since I've decided to add more twists to my hair, it takes even longer.  The end result though is a style that can be done in many ways...up dos, ponytails, crinkly twists where if you braid them up at night after misting and sealing, you have wavy (crinkly) twists in the morning and a new hairstyle.  The versatility of twists are endless, but when you are putting them in, you aren't as enthused about it,lol.

So today's post is two fold...I want to review the new products I'm trying and then show the final result of my twists. 

In my Amla treatments, instead of using my usual cheaper conditioners I added a new one I bought recently called Andalou Naturals Moisture Rich Conditioner Argan and Sweet Orange -- 11.5 fl oz.   Here is a pic...



 I saw this conditioner on sale at a natural grocery store called MOM's Organic Market in Alexandria, VA and smelled it.  It smelled delicious and it had Argan oil in it so I figured I'd give it a try. 

My other purchase of new hair products was a shampoo  and leave in conditioner that I've had my eye on in a while.  Prior to buying the above product, I also got
Beautiful Curls Curly to Kinky Shampoo and Leave-in from Whole Foods a while back.  I looked them up on my phone while at the store and saw some good reviews and decided to give it a try.  I am on the hunt for a shampoo that won't strip my hair so I am going to see if this does the trick.  Here is a pic below...

     

So I am in for a treat and ready to see how my hair will turn out...I will twist with my home made Shea butter mix (also on this site for the recipe) and go from there.  Twisting my hair can no longer be done in one night so this will take a couple of days (I hope) but I'm ready for it.  So stay tuned for my next post on my results...

 

The Natural Hair Diaries

Amla Treatment

(For some reason this post went out without me adding the recipe,lol...ok so let's try this again)

A friend of mine asked recently..."So what is an Alma treatment?"

Amla is an ayurvedic herb, gound into a powder. A paste is when you take an ayurvedic herb, mix it with boiling water, let it sit, then apply it to your hair. I call it a treatment because I add conditioners and oils to my mixture and use it as a pre-poo. Then wash it out and style. Amla is for conditioning the hair. Amla also cleans the scalp as well and in time, contributes to healthy hair and healthy scalp. Also, the more you use amla, the darker your hair will become. It also makes your curls pop which is something I love. 

Here is a recipe that I uses to make my treatment...

First you have to purchase a box of Amla powder like the one you see here. I use Hesh Amla I got mine from an Indian store and you can look for one in your area to purchase this.  You can also look on amazon to buy it as well. 

Your mix will look like this when you folloow the directions below...

• Detangle unwashed hair into twisted sections.
• Place 3 tbsp of amla powder into a bowl.
• Add 4 tbsp of conditioner (no protein)  Use a cheapie one for this recipe.
• Add 3 - 4 tbsp of another conditioner (no protein).
• Add 2 tspn of coconut oil
• Add 2 tspn of another oil (olive oil)
• Add 2 tspn of another oil (jojoba, coconut, olive, etc.)
• 1/2 cup of water (use sparingly as you don't want mix to be runny).
• Your mix should be like a paste.
• Add 6 drops of essential oils : Rosemary and Lavender.
• Mix together and smooth onto hair with fingers. Don't comb through.
• Place a plastic cap on & let it sit for an hour.
• Rinse off, wash your hair as you would normally, and then style.
• Any leftovers can be placed in the freezer for future use.

Your hair will come out feeling softer and stronger. This will also help with less hair shedding over time.  I try to do this every other weekend.  More on my routine in a later post.  Until, try to enjoy this very hot day!

The Natural Hair Diaries :)

Curlformers (My First Attempt)

Ok so in June 2nd (Saturday) I decided to do my first Curlformers set by myself.  I had Curlformers done on my in the past by one of my friends and it took a minute for her to put them in there.  The results were nice and done during the Winter time.  Nevertheless, I wanted to try it myself and see what I could do.  Now luckily, during this weekend, the humidity was low and the temp was about 70 (high).  So I figured, why not.  Prior to this, I purchased the Curlformers pack at Sally's Beauty Supply.  Click on the word Curlformers to learn more about this product or to order your own.
Curlformers

I am also a Beauty Card Club Owner so I did get this product at $63.99 price. I suggest if you love Sally's like I do, you may want to do the same.  The card costs $5 and you can get discounts on the products you buy instore as well as online.  Not to mention coupons.  But I'm getting side tracked here,lol...

Anyway, I figured it was an investment that would pay for itself since going to the salon and getting a rod set costs usually $65 and if I'm doing it myself, I don't have to get mad when the style I paid for doesn't quite look like I had imagined it would,lol...but more on not getting what you paid for later.  So on this particular Saturday in June, I actually co-washed my hair since I had done an Alma treatment the weekend prior (more on this later too). 

I detangled my hair and used a light leave-in on my hair.  I added a little water to my spray bottle and mixed in my Kimmaytube leave-in and then spritzed my hair.    You only need a light leave-in when you are doing a set.  The more products you place on your hair, the longer it takes for it to dry.

After this, I proceeded with the process of sectioning my hair into small sections, I added a little of my shea butter mix and some Eco-styler Gel to each section, then followed the package directions...

Feed the Curlformer onto the hook, with the hook facing upwards. Place the section of hair in the hook then withdraw the hook.

Sounds easy enough right, but it took some time.  I started around 2 pm and didn't finish until 5:30.  In between this I needed rest breaks and lunch,lol.  I'm sure it will be faster as I use it again, but it's not something you can rush through that's for sure. You will need your Saturday free in order to use this product. 
Well once I was finally finished, I looked like this...



I will have to get some longer ones as some of my hair was longer than the curlformer so I had to use rods for those parts.  Other than that, it was cool.

I sat under the dryer for about an hour under medium heat.   You can do this or let it set in your hair for atleast 6 hours if you don't want to use heat.

I let the set stay in my hair until bedtime. Once I pulled it out, my hair looked like this...

And that was it!  The curls stayed in my hair through Sunday to Tuesday and I did get compliments on it.   More on how I extended this style when it began to poof in my next post :).

The Natural Hair Diaries

Shea Butter Mix

Hey Everyone...

School has been keeping me busy but as of June 21, I was finally free to enjoy my summer and go back to some fun things that I had enjoyed doing.   Going back to my writing as well as updating my hair blog.  These next upcoming blogs will update you as to what I've been doing and trying since my last post.  I enjoy using natural products on my hair and I started incorporating some of my old products from the past and added some new ones as well. 

Shea Butter Mix

In May, I had found a shea butter mix on a Youtuber's site (Naptural85) that I had been wanting to try.  It required me to use a mixer to blend together some hair products that I already had.  Here's the link to where I got my recipie from...

The ingredients I used were...

-Unrefined Shea Butter at Room Temperature


-About 1 Tbsp Coconut Oil


-About 1 tsp Olive Oil


-About 1 tsp Lavender Jamaican Black Castor Oil (Tropic Isle Living)


-About 1 Tbsp Jojoba Oil


-About 1/2 tsp Vitamin E

I blended everything together and it was cool because I looked like cake batter, just a little harder to mix since the shea butter was a solid.  I guess it took about 4 minutes to mix everything together and my mix ended up looking like this...

I placed my mix in a plastic container and placed it in the fridge.  But there was not need for this because it just made it hard,lol.  So when I was ready to use it, I had to place it in the microwave for about 10 secs before using it.  Well lesson learned.  Now I just keep my container in my cabinet in the bathroom until further use.  Results on using this mix...coming soon.

The Natural Hair Diaries

My Press 12.22.11

Whenever it's time for a trim, I go and get it done by my trusted favorite stylist who will also press my hair afterwards. I usually have my hair pressed 2 times a year as I am not a fan of heat styling. It's also good to see how long your hair has gotten for growth purposes. So I asked my stylist to take a couple of pics of me and here I am at the top and I am pretty pleased! The back looks nice too :)

The Natural Hair Diaries...

7 years Natural and still growing... :)

My Latest Headband...

Check me out! This was a cool headband that I found at Tysons Mall in Fairfax. I got it at a kiosk but I can't remember the name of it. I plan to go back there again for sure so I'll have to post it when I do. It's sort of like a hat, but not really. It's actually a knitted headband and neck warmer. The back is out but it covered most of my head. I love this band. It was pretty cold this weekend and perfect for it. Can't wait for it to get cold again so I can show it off again.

New Hair Regimen

Hello everyone, I'm back with my latest update on my blog and I wanted to share what I'm doing now with my hair. This weekend I decided to try a honey conditioning prepoo treatment. I like to do prepoos (sounds funny I know) because it cuts down on the in and out of the shower routine. You can also call this dry conditioning, where you are basically putting a conditioning treatment on your hair prior to washing. So for my treatment this weekend I did a Rosemary Honey Moisturizing treatment. I always wanted to use honey as a treatment in my hair so I decided to give it a try. This recipe was one I found at http://www.motowngirl.com/ site. The ingredients are...

1/2 cup of honey

2 teaspoons of warmed olive oil

4-5 drops of Rosemary essential oil.

Mix together and apply on hair prior to washing.

Leave on for 30 mins under dryer and longer with out the dryer.

(Rosemary is good to help hair grow and honey adds shine and softness to natural hair. )

In fact, check out this site I found that talks about the benefits of honey on hair as well as for your whole body at http://honeyfanatic.com/honey-facts/honey-good-hair/

Next I warmed a towel in the microwave and paced that along with a plastic cap over my head for about an hour. I was watching the Kings of Comedy on Comedy central and got sidetracked but it was cool 'cause the longer the better for my hair.

I realized that 1/2 cup of honey is alot of honey to use for a treatment. I only needed about half of that for my hair so I am saving the rest in the fridge for the next time. (Note to self, remind hubby not to throw out my treatment in the fridge,lol...)

Afterwards, I washed my hair in the shower with Curls Creamy Curl Cleanser (from Target).

I liked this cleanser because it doesn't contain sodium Lauryl sulfate, which is a drying agent in many shampoos. Smells great too.

Afterwards, I applied my leave in (mixture of olive oil, aloe Vera juice, Kemi Oyl (old school), and Knot Today's Leave in Conditioner). I liked this mix and I started using it after I heard about it from Kim Love's YouTube site over a month ago. You can check out the recipe for her Leave in on there. Just type in Kim Love on YouTube and look it up. She doesn't use Kemi Oyl but you can use what ever oil you'd like.

Next, I twisted my hair in two strand twists all over. I am doing more protective styling this Winter vs. wearing my hair out. It's time for a trim so I will probably break my routine to go in for a trim and press and curl this month. I'll post pics of this as well.


Results...the pic below shows it.

I liked it! My hair felt soft and moisturized. I am definitely going to do this more often.

Next hair blogs to look for...

• Trim and press at the Salon


• Protien Treatment


• Henna Gloss (Really excited about this one)

More to come later...until then, be blessed and stay natural.