Picture: Hair Today

Blurriness aside, I love how the pin curls create these bouncy waves. And yes, that is Obama on my bulletin board.

Pin Curls...Again

11:10a

Last night I did pin curls again. I'm falling in love with them. They are so easy and turn out amazing results. This time I did them smaller and tighter and they look amazing. Been getting lots of compliments on my hair today.

My plan for the weekend is to wash {paying special attention to my itchy scalp}, deep condition with heat and then try the twist out. It's going to be a major trial run for me considering I haven't done a twist out at this length and I'm not sure how it's going to turn out.

I'm not going to be discouraged about my lack of styling skills. Instead I'm going to go for it and know that practice makes perfect.

Protective Styles on Texlaxed Head

12:05pm

When my hair was a longer length, I found it super easy to do protective styles that looked nice and didn't take much effort. Now that my hair is shorter {shoulder length} it's harder for me to achieve styles that look great and don't require alot of time.

I've been extremely bad this winter with blow drying and flat ironing every other week. I have been deep conditioning, but not the way I should and I have noticed that my hair is dry, brittle and I have seen breakage. I freaked out.

So, for the rest of the winter {which here in Philly may very well last into April or May}, I'm going to wash weekly, deep condition weekly and incorporate air drying protective styles as much as possible. I still want to flat iron, but I will see how this goes first.

Pin Curls!

9:25a

Monday of this week, here in Philly, was a balmy, humid 60 degrees. Such a weird phenomenon when the temps have been in the 30s. But that humidity really did a number on my flat iron. It got puffy and it began to revert so since then I had been wearing my hair in a pony tail.

Anyone who knows me knows that I LOVE my pony tail. That hasn't been what I have found to be true since I cut my hair back in September. So I had to do something.

I saw something on Youtube about pin curls and I knew that was the solution for my problem so last night I finally tried them. I have to admit, I was afraid of pin curls. I was afraid that they would come out looking crazy and then I'd be stuck with jacked up hair in a pony tail. I was afraid of how long it would take to do them. I was afraid that it wouldn't work.

But I pressed forward and decided that I would do several large ones since I was short on time and tired as I don't know what. I started with totally straight, flat hair with no curl whatsoever.

First, I moisturized my hair really well with my Elasta QP H-Two leave in, also used a bit of Herbal Essences Long Term Relationship leave in as well and then sealed with a bit of castor oil. I went a little heavier on the moisturizing that I normally do because my hair was dry and I wanted to make sure that my hair had moisture to set with.

After I moisturized I started curling. I loved that my only tools were a comb and my fingers. I combed my hair into the style I was going to wear it into then grabbed large sections and began to curl them around my fingers.

Once I had all the hair wrapped around my fingers, I slid my fingers out and continued to curl the rest of my hair until it reached my hair. I laid the curl flat and pinned with a hair pin. I had to use two hair pins for each curl since my sections were so large. When my whole head was finished I tied down with my scraf and covered that with my bonnet.

This morning, let me tell you, I was terrified of what I was going to unveil but I really was pleasantly surprised with the results.

This picture shows my hair right after I had taken all the pin curls out. What I learned is that I will need ample time to play with the curls to make sure they come together well.

I ended up pinning up the top half of my hair with a large hair pin and leaving the bottom half down. I really love the results and that I got them without heat. I will definitely continue to pin curl my hair.

Stretching

9:53a

I stretched my last relaxer for 14 weeks and I was surprised at how easy it was. I could have never imagined stretching 3 1/2 months before now, but I had no problems at all. I actually felt that I could have gone longer, but really wanted to relax before I went home for Christmas.

I have been wearing my hair straight (flat ironed) consistently and that really helped to aid in stretching. I didn't deal with a ton of shedding as I normally do when I need a relaxer and my new growth was managable.

I would venture to say that I am close to being fully texlaxed and I really want to see how my texture will be as I can't really tell since a lot of my ends are still relaxed. I know that being texlaxed helped in regards to being able to strech because of the strength of my strands, I didn't see much breakage at all.

I have found a few products that are my staples and currently are the only things that I am using right now. I will update my regimen for 2010 tomorrow, including the products that I use. There are only a few products that I want to try that fit in with my regimen and I will update as I begin to acquire those as well.

My next texlax is scheduled for the very end of March. I think I will try 15 weeks as my goal.

It's been a long time...

9:10a

It's funny how life can come in and take you away sometimes. I must say that 2009 was a rough one and I am so glad it's over. The end of last year didn't allow me much time to focus on my hair as I was focusing on the loss of a pregnancy and the gallbladder surgery. I did mention that it was rough.

But it's 2010. The start of a brand new year. I don't know that this year will be any better, but I do know that I have a positive attitude about it.

I'm looking forward to getting back to talking about hair and putting into practice all the things I learned in 2009 {the start of my HHJ} and looking for new things that will take my hair care to the next level.