HIDDEN DANGERS OF PROTECTIVESTYLING

Now that’s a title we all thought we would never see right? Well after an interesting experience I had with braids, I have to say long term protectivestyles are hot but they aren’t on fire! Lol in English that means that there are problems with protective styling, and its not perfect.  Let’s jump in, shall we?

Dryness, when you have your hair in a protective style like braids, weaves or even corn rows, you tend to forget about them and let your hair strands beneath fend for themselves. When you don’t wash, condition or moisturise your hair even while its in a protective hairdo it will get very very dry, and as I always say dry hair breaks. Also, even if your hair is conditioned, moisturised etc while its in a protective style, the fact is conditioners and moisturisers can’t penetrate your strands while its underneath a braid or a weave as well as they would if your hair was loose.

Damage to your edges, tight braids and tiny braids damage your edges.  When the braids/weaves/corn rows are too tight, they put too much pressure on your scalp and ruin the blood flow to your follicles, this in turn causes hair fall or baldness. When braids are too tiny, when you take them out it usually leads to you losing your edges. So my dear Nigerian sisters, never ever do one million braids as a means of protective styling, just say good bye to your edges if you attempt them. Also, when you leave some hair out in your weave and you are constantly using heating tools to blend your leave out hair with your silky straight or European curly weave, that also causes breakage for that part of your hair, as the heat will literally burn of your hair and weaken your strands.

They weigh down your strands, when you use 20packs of expression or 50 packs of kinky braids on your hair you put excessive pressure on your scalp and strands. This leads to baldness, that’s why you find that sometimes your braids just fall of your scalp, with your hair in tow (lmao this used to happen a lot when I was a child). Avoid anything that puts excessive pressure on your hair and scalp.

Tangles, leaving protective styles in for too long can cause the tangles of a life time!!! Oh I need to do a separate post on how my hair endured some very serious untangleable (if that’s a word) tangles!!!! It was terrible! I left my braids in for 8 weeks, and on top of that transgression I took them out and was too tired to detangle the huge knots at the time, so I left them tangled for another 2 weeks before detangling!!! Oh it was a terrible nightmare!! While washing and conditioning your hair is great while it in a long term protective styles, it also causes build up near your roots, where your stylist picks your braid to attach it to your hair. That build up clumps together and creates amazing knots, that are difficult to untangle!!!

So there you go, the hidden dangers of protective styling, to avoid these horrible realities, always wash, condition and moisturize your hair while its in a protective style and never leave your braids and weave in for more than 6 weeks!! Also, remember to dilute your conditioner and shampoo with water before your wash your hair will its in a protective style, this reduces the build up that cause those massive clumps in your hair.

Have a blessed day 😉

 

 

 

 

 

How to Flat Twist!

Hello,

This post is for those that might have missed the brief tutorial I did on my instagram page.  Sometimes styling our natural hair can be daunting, from not knowing what to do, to just not being gifted at creating wonderful styles! So I am part of the “not so gifted with hair crew”, so here is my go to style of life, and it can be used to achieve other styles. It’s also extra super low manipulation. The amazing flat twist! See video below! Please let me know if you try it.

  
Hope this was helpful! Have a blessed evening xxx

Caring for your hair while it’s under a weave

   

  
Holla, 

Okay you are a natural and you still want to rock those weaves right? Not everytime crochet, braids and wigs sometimes weaves. I hate weaves, but most people don’t, so if you are going to keep your hair in weaves, here are a few things you can do to keep your natural hair healthy.

First thing’s first, Do not neglect your scalp! As you know from my previous posts ( see HERE) a  healthy scalp equals healthy hair and steady hair growth. Unlike braids, you don’t have as much access to your scalp with weaves, so invest in an applicator bottle with a narrow tip, this will help you apply shampoo and oils to your scalp. Every week or every two weeks, you must wash your scalp, dilute a cowash or shampoo with water and pour it in your applicator bottle, lift each track and apply, use your fingers to massage the dirt out and rinse. Thereafter, apply a diluted conditioner in the same manner leave for 2-5 mins and rinse. Make sure your weave as been detangled before this process and woven into bigger plaits to prevent it from becoming a tangled mess.

Afterwards, you need to moisturize, dry hair breaks, that’s the long and short of the matter. You still have to moisturize and seal adequately, for healthy post protective style hair. Lift your tracks and spritz your leave in conditioner in your hair, you can also put some of your leave in conditioner into your applicator bottle and apply it to each braid. Thereafter, apply oils to each braid on top of the moisturizer to seal in the moisture, massage it all in with your fingers. This process is time consuming and its totally worth it, so you can have strong beautiful hair when you take out your weave. The process of sealing and moisturizing should take place every other day, depending on what your hair needs, at least twice a week.

If you have dry skin/hair, then I recommend that you oil your scalp, nightly, you can use a light oil like coconut oil which will help with protein retention as well as moisture. Fill an applicator bottle with this oil and apply it to your scalp only, do not apply it to the weave, as the sew in weave will get greasy.

Deep condition your hair, after shampooing your hair and weave, apply a deep conditioner on both the weave and the exposed hair and sit under a hooded dry/steamer/ plastic cap for about 30mins. Afterwards rinse out thoroughly, this helps keep the hair moist.

Take care of your leave out, if you are natural I recommend you do a closed weave or a weave that blends in well with your natural texture. However, if you do a straight weave or you are relaxed and you decide to leave out your hair, do not excessively use heat and straighteners to try and blend your natural texture into the weave. Always continue to wash, condition, moisturize, seal and protect your left out hair. Try heat free methods of blending your leave out hair with your weaves, you can use a scarf with gel or cream instead of straighteners, use flexi rods instead of a curling wand to give curls etc.

Make sure you protect your hair line, weaves and braids destroy your hair line if you are not careful. They contribute to thinning of the hairline immensely, as a preventive measure massage your hair with castor oil or a good growth oil as often as possible.

For some of my favorite products and oil to care for your hair while it’s in a weave see HERE

Dos and Donts of child hair care

  
  
Okay, I know the title sounds judgmental, but no, I am not telling you how to style your little angels hair, I am only suggesting things you could do differently. However, not every hair style is suitable for a little girl or boy’s (if you are growing your son’s hair) hair, this is because some of these hair styles damage your kid’s hair before they get a chance to damage their own hair. To be honest, these types of styles damage anyone’s hair, but I feel especially bad when little children’s hair lines are already being ruined and they are being submitted to a life of stunted hair growth before they get a chance to complain.
 

Too heavy

 
 The scalp on your little one’s head is still fragile and so is the hair that comes out of it, especially in kids below five. Don’t use heavy extensions in your child’s hair, and Don’t do tight braids, these put too much pressure on their delicate scalp and will lead to a receding hair line and stunted hair growth. Essentially, you are setting your child up for short hair, right of the bat, this is the reason why many black women feel their hair can’t grow, because permanent damage might have already been done to their hair follicles while they were children. The hair braiders in the market and in most salons are quite brutal, I remember once threading my hair and it felt like my forehead had been shifted into my scalp! She pulled my hair so tight and I just had a horrible headache and I was already about 8 years old then, I can only imagine how a 2-year-old will feel. Your little girl/boys hair should still be in nice bubbles or should be woven without any extension, so there is little or no tension on the scalp. Your children don’t need extensions; in my own opinion it just makes them look grown up! So if you can, let go of that bob hairstyle with “attachment”,that will be great!

Too tight

Do monitor what is happening to your child’s hair, does it look pulled at the roots? Then its probably too tight and should be loosened immediately. It just breaks my heart to see kids with receding hair lines. Don’t let the hair stylist give you any excuse as to why they are pulling your child’s hair, some even claim its not tight at all, ask your child or look at the hair, tight braids/weaving look tight and pulled at the roots ( like the picture above). Don’t do tight buns or any other style that make creates excess pressure on your child’s scalp or pulls on their edges.

 Don’t relax your baby’s hair! I implore you!!!! There is a limit to these things, gosh the burns I used to get at the salon! Your little one’s scalp does not need that kind of hair stunting drama. I know she/he cries when you are combing their hair, but that’s not an excuse to relax it, the chemicals in relaxer can strip the color of boots and burn plastic, please let your little one decide for themselves whether they want to put something so harsh in their hair. Relaxers disturb the hair PH balance and break down bonds that hold together the proteins in the hair shaft. Relaxers, ruin hair, and cause scalp irritations. I can go on forever about how horrid relaxers are, but that for another post. Speaking of combing, Do comb your baby’s hair with a wide tooth comb, gently from tips to roots, Do make sure your child’s hair is either damp, or has a conditioning agent in it before combing. Do divide their hair into sections throughout the washing, combing and styling process.

Do monitor your child’s hair products, look at the ingredients of the products you use. I beseech you! My next post is going to be on this, simply turn the back of anything you buy or want to buy to be certain the product is what it says it is on the front. There are several products out there that claim they are organic and are not! I have seen products claim pure coconut oil and yet they have petroleum products in them. So you need to avoid the sulphates, MEA, DEA’s , Petroleum, Parabens and other harmful chemicals when choosing hair products for your little one and for yourself. For healthy hair product suggestions for you and your kids see Here

If you are a DIY mum, during styling Do make sure your child is sufficiently occupied, make them comfortable with food/snacks/Video games/ Cartoons etc, anything to distract them from what you are doing and encourage them to sit steal. When your child is hungry/tired/bored they become restless and upset during the styling process and making the process very difficult.

 

Finally, Don’t do too much, your child is probably impatient and cannot sit through a 10 step conditioning method. The only thing they really need ( if their hair hasn’t been previously damaged) is a good cowash, or a shampoo and rinse conditioner, a leave in conditioner or some oil.

Do let me know your thoughts in the comment section!! Have a blessed day guys xxx

Madam Bose my hair “plaiter”

  
Holla, So I was going to do a post about how wonderful my wool braids are, and how they are an awesome protective style, but I decided not to. Why? Because you already know wool is great and its lighter than any other hair extension, there done in less that five lines!
I want to talk about my stylist, or ‘hair plaiter as well call them in naija, I decided to do some free marketing for her, because I think she is awesome, it’s my way of supporting her. I hope with this post she gets more business. I don’t know her full name, I have always called her madam Bose, she is a very cool lady. If you do call her after this and she asks where you got her number, say you got it from Rachel or Esione (not sure what she knows me as). She is really patient and she does exactly what you tell her! Isn’t that amazing? A stylist that doesn’t think she knows more than you!

 

These days we natural girls know that the general public does not cater to our hair type, and we have to run from one natural hair specialist to the other (if we can find them) and they charge us some serious money. I don’t knock the hustle of these popular natural hair stylists, I love them, especially when they do my hair right, plus you can’t blame them for being prices, natural hair is a lot of work. However, frequenting these places can sometimes get expensive and you have to leave the comfort of your home.

 

I do not recommend madam Bose to wash your hair (I do not recommend anyone but you to wash your hair), but I recommend her to do your braids, she comes to my house and charges N7000 for butt length braids!! This to me this awesome, as some salons on the island natural friendly or not charge nothing less that N10k for this and I have to go to them!!! Madam Bose, handles my hair very gently, she uses her fingers to part my hair, I have taught her to spray water on my hair before the attempts to finger detangle (yes she finger detangles), she is happy to treat your hair exactly the way you want it to be treated, she is willing to learn about your hair so she can serve your better!! She is very natural hair friendly and her braids are never ever tight.

  

 So yes I endorse Madam Bose, she is a very nice lady and has an awesome personality, so if you are in Lagos and you can’t be bothered to take a trip to the salon call Madam Bose on 08054107072. I hope I have convinced you to call her! Please let me know in the comment section if you eventually try her. 

Excuse the frown it was late at night. Have a blessed day xxx

Friday Style Ideas

Holla guys,

I never put up my own styles up here because well I sort of randomly style my hair with no real plan. However, here are some cute dos I have recently come across! Enjoy xxx

Curly Mohawk

Faux Bun

I have done different variations of this a few times!

Protective style ideas

Hey guys, while searching for some stylespiration I found some videos that I thought I should share. If you guys try them do post pictures in the comments section! Enjoy

 

Have a blessed day. xxx

Simple Frohawk for short Kinky Hair

 

Hi guys! I know I am a bad blogger! I have finally gotten a break from school! Hurrah!! This is a simple hair style for both short and long hair. There are so many tutorials on styling long hair, so I think I am going to be posting videos on how to style shorter hair, to give all you beautiful ladies in that short/ awkward length phase some inspiration!

Enjoy and have a blessed day xx

Styling Adventures: Finger Coils!

It’s like this is reblog week for me lol!! I have just gotten inspiration from so many beautiful Nigerian Naturalistas!! If you have short hair and you don’t know what to do well our beautiful TheKinkandI has you covered!!

The Kink And I

Hey guys!

Have you entered the Natural Nigerian Product Giveaway? If you haven’t, see this post.

Today I’m sharing my current hair style: Finger coils!

Simply put, a Finger coil is achieved by twirling and twirling a section of hair with, and round your finger. Stay with me.

What You NEED:

• Spray bottle filled with water
• Gel [I used Pink EcoStyler]
• Wide tooth comb + Denman brush + Rat tail comb

I Also Used:

• CeCees Curls Whipped Shea Butter
• Jamaican Black Castor Oil (Sunny Isle) from The Kinky Apothecary. 
  

Considering how humid these parts are, I was advised by twitter curlfriend @PharmNikki, to avoid products with glycerine. Glycerine is a humectant, it draws moisture into your hair which is mostly a good thing, except when you’re trying to avoid frizz.

The only gel I have (Eco Styler) contains glycerine, so I didn’t want to use any of my humectant-packed…

View original post 556 more words

Easy protective style for both natural and relaxed hair

I was rushing to school this morning and I did this style in 10mins!! Its really simple and its done by a naija sister as well with natural hair!!  Also, if your hair isn’t long enough for you to make it as full as you want you can always add kinky twists to create a fuller look when doing the hair. Sorry for not posting how I wash my hair after I takeout my braid guys, but I promise I will post it this week!!! Okay back to school work for me!

Have a blessed day guys xx