Wash Day Sort Of & Reviews

I shouldn't say sort of.  I did wash my hair today.  I didn't take my hair down on Monday night as planned because I wasn't going to get my hair cut until tomorrow.  Plus there was no time to sort out what to do with my hair while I still got two workouts in before the holiday.  I took it down last night, well I started out right after I finished running around but because they were so small it took me almost six hours to wrap that process up, but was so tired that all I did was did a brief fluffing out and then went to bed.  I noted a few spots that were knotted but nothing that couldn't be addressed after some conditioning.

I woke up this morning and grabbed almost ever deep conditioning mask and treatment I had (Dr. Miracle's, Moroccan Oil, It's a 10 and an Organix blend) and took some time to fully cover my hair.  Then I did my first really good detangle and covered my hair with a plastic cap and the Hot Headz (I think that's the name, don't hold me to it) cloth cover and went about my day.  I cooked breakfast and the turkey for lunch/dinner, almost took a nap and then had my only two meals of the day thus far.  Then I figured I should wash this out because I wasn't sure how long this was going to take to wrap up.  My hair felt like it was okay but I detangled again just to be safe.  I washed it out and felt a little place where it could mat if I wasn't careful but fingered it loose and then went for the post poo deep conditioner which in this case was just Shea Moisture Deep Treatment Masque and a store freebie that I can't remember lol.  I only left it in for like an hour and washed it out in the sink to hopefully prevent any kind of post love matting.  I finger detangled until I put in my leave ins following the LOC method with an added bonus of an Aveda Smooth Infusion treatment to help the hair straighten.  And then I fired up my new hairdryer.

I will say I had massive reservations about how this dryer would hold up with all of the poof that was my almost five month and change post relaxer hair.  I knew it was more powerful than my other one which was supposed to mean it would dry faster but yeah life could super suck if the comb attachment and dryer didn't live up to its billing.  This was the only time ever that my hair felt like butter when a dryer hit it.  It worked quickly and really just made the entire process super easy.  I had to stop for a while because my other dryer I could hold like a big brush versus this one.  But the comb and dryer moved through all of the poofiness with not a bit of trouble.  I stopped short of flat ironing it since I'm going to have it trimmed tomorrow and her flat iron skills far exceed my own.  I'm going to tie it down at the gym tomorrow morning if I can wake up on time.  Hair appointment at 2 and then new photo when I'm not quite looking homeless.  I don't now just like dang have you EVER put a relaxer on your hair.  Now onto the reviews.

New Products: I have used Shea Moisture products before and my hair super duper did not like them.  I was hesitant to buy them as part of my transition but Carol's Daughter discontinued their transitioning line and Shea Moisture was recommended as a good alternative both online and by my old stylist (hey Keshia).  First it took a while for it to lather but when it did my hair felt clean and fresh and a few finger curls through stopped any major issues.  After I figured out how to open the conditioner it worked equally well and I probably could have stopped with the two of them but I added parts of my old staples just to keep it balanced with protein and moisture.  I will give a total thumbs up to the Raw Shea Butter and Argan Oil product line (I didn't purchase this kit because it's not available in the store but it shows you all the products I used except the finishing elixir which they didn't have in the store).  Maybe they aren't great for super straight hair but for hair in need of some love and moisture they were well appreciated.  For those of you that like numbers better 9/10, I do like more lather but it seems to do the job well so far.

New Dryer:  Hot Tools Professional Tourmaline Tools 2000 Turbo Ionic Dryer.  I played with about 6 dryers of varying price points before I went with this one and I'll admit a large portion of what I made my final decision on was that was red lol.  I was worried because when I have purchased dryers like this in the past the comb attachments weren't sturdy enough to handle the thickness of my hair.  They frequently broke and just left me irritated about finding a replacement.  My Gold N Hot was a god send when I found it but really after almost abandoning heat altogether over the last few years I hadn't noticed how ineffective it had become in working through my hair.  So yes it was time but no I wasn't confident.  As I mentioned earlier though it was amazing.  Watching the heat shift smoothly along with the fan speed was new.  On full blast though it would fry my hair so medium to high heat and no more than medium speed and I had dry soft poofy hair in a fraction of the time it would take with my old dryer.  I'd say really like half the time and that was with my old dryer being on bake your skull heat.  I highly recommend it especially if it keeps holding up with the wash days as the hair gets less and less relaxed.  Plus it's on sale right now and if you get it at Ulta (the link directs you there) then you can get a free styling tool with it and not the cheap stuff they are trying to get rid of either.  I got a 1 inch barrel curling iron (in purple no less lol) that was normally 52.99 for free.  So yeah it was 70 bucks but I got both products for 35 at that point plus the random coupons that Ulta gives out lol.  Thumbs up here as well.  For those of you that like numbers better 9.5/10--there's a knock on comfortability in the hold but it's good.  I'm pretty sure the Ulta model is missing the focused blow attachment but I wouldn't use that one on my hair so it wasn't a major loss that it wasn't in the box.  EDIT my box has all the attachments--I still won't be using the focused blower lol.

UPDATE: So I went in and got my trim today and the flat iron is so randomly foreign to me now that the smell of my hair is slightly maddening.  Regardless it wasn't as traumatic to do as I thought it might be so I'm going to just let the hair grow out slowly under a series of twists, braids, weaves and what not.  Here are updates of my barely neck length hair that will be hidden again in a few days.  Made it to the gym before the trim too--yippee!

Updates

Okay everyone.  I realized I haven't updated things in a while.  My last relaxer was in June not April lol.  It was a few weeks before my trip to Amsterdam because I got my hair twisted before I left.  The workout count is SHOT.  I won't try to fix that right now but I will keep a count some kind of way for the workouts till the end of the year.  FitOrbit which I loved so much has gone kaput but my trainer and I are still working together through Total Coaching now.  We'll see how this platform compares as my new plan starts tomorrow.  I am over my not sure I want to be smaller thing as well.  So life is okay.  My last hair detangling process was more complicated than I wanted it to be but it was because I left my hair up much longer than it should have been.  These will be out at the latest by mid November.  I'll relax my hair then OR whack off everything but the new growth.  There's lots of it, really lots of it.  How goes things with you all?

Wash Day: Lace Em Up

So I didn't have swim classes yesterday so wash day was confined to a late night prepoo and early morning wash.  Wash day went mostly like it would normally:

Prepoo with my Organix and Moroccan Oil deep conditioner with scalp coverage provided by the Strong Roots.  I slept with that on my hair and got up about 9 and started my wash day.

I did one wash each with Organix Macadamia Oil and Moroccan Oil moisturizing shampoo.

I mostly follow time directions with the Moroccan Oil and Aphogee 2 minute conditioners and my hair was feeling pretty good. I let the Mizani MoistureFuse stay on a bit longer as I was showering at that point but everything went off as normal.

I deep conditioned with Dr. Miracle's for about 90 minutes then rinsed it clean.  I t shirt dried from about 11:30 to 2 when I stopped being lazy.

I have been meaning to try new styles but have been too distracted to do so.  I saw these new rollers a few months ago and bought two packs when I caught them on sale at Folica.  You could think of them as less bendy flexi rods but they tend to give a different curl pattern and after having laced my hair through them are dramatically lighter than the flexirods.

At least for this first time I didn't need both packs but this is a test run so we'll see how it goes.  Here are photos.

 

Me after the hair was all good and detangled

The lacers.  They come 20 to a pack.  As you are working your hair through them it kinda sounds like you are playing with foam rubber.  The longer your hair is the more this will feel like a massive chore to do but it was actually not too bad for me.  Mizani recommends pinning the end of your hair with bobby pins.  Another hair blogger was using rubber bands which I think I like better but I need to grab some.

And this is me before the bonnet went on and the hair was pinned as well as I could get it.  Taking the photo let me know where one bobby pin had come undone.  All in all not bad and not much longer than a flexiset to do.   I will try to take a photo tomorrow when I take my hair down.   How was your wash day?

Update:  So I managed to not rush out the door today and took photos, albeit not the best ones lol, of the results of the lacers.  I can say I loved the shape of the curls and how much easier it was to sleep on them than the other rollers I've used.  I may use more setting products next time for the comb out process cause it felt a little loosey goosey but surprisingly for me, considering the rain today, the curls are still holding well and they feel pretty defined.  I am thinking about making the sections bigger next time just to see how that turns out but we'll see.  Here are some photos.  What do you think?  Side note, I look slightly deranged in that first photo lol sorry.

The Weekend Just Won't End & Other Jokes

So this has been one of those standard there is no down time to be had.  Friday night I just needed to let my brain decompress but since then I've been on the go.  Let me just start this by saying I didn't even get closed to the gym before yesterday.  But as I had planned I got up a little earlier and climbed four flights of stairs to go to yoga before swimming.  The twisting wasn't as bad as thinking about my breathing.  I tend to always breath the exact opposite way people tell me to do when I am learning something the first time.  Turns out I started out that way again.  But I caught on soon enough and started to enjoy the stretching and the new challenges my body was trying to respond to.  I was glad there were fans in the room (and that the woman next to me turned the on) cause it felt like I was out in the Texas sun for a bit based on the amount of sweat that came off of my forehead.  Got a makeshift massage towards the end of class which was nice and was told I had done a great job for my first class.  I took her at her word because really I had to scoot on down to the pool.  It was a good lesson.  We spent most of the time in the deep end and trying to swim around without feeling like I was going to drown.  I enjoyed myself and did a few laps in the shallow end before coming home to start on my hair and promptly falling asleep.



As I alluded to before my brain was tired as hell.  My body joined the tired ranks after my workout.  I did manage to coat the length of my hair with conditioner and my scalp with Strong Roots before covering up my hair in a plastic bag and bonnet.  My intention was to wash it out quickly and then get to the other stuff I had to do.  No such luck.  I woke up a few hours later and just got to work on my grading after I grabbed a bit to eat.  Seven hours later I was done reading two classes worth of painful reading and giving feedback.  I nodded off a few hours later after debating washing my hair at 2 in the morning.  I woke up around ten, washed my hair including my chlorine stripping combo before letting my hair deep condition for about 90 minutes with the Dr. Miracle's.  I rinsed my hair out and t-shirt dried from about noon to 5 when I finally finished grading all tests, another class's writings and given them feedback along with doing early alerts for school.  5 is way too late to do anything with my hair except let it air dry so I got up, LOC'd, detangled with my 4 combs lol, took a few photos and am now relaxing.  My dinner is marinating now and sooner or later I'll get up to cook it lol.  Depending on how my hair dries I may blow it out slightly and then flat iron it before work.

 The hair loss for this week.  Seeing a lot of gray in there lol.

This is me with freshly dentagled hair

Modified Wash Day

Hey folks I have to say that I noticed when I'm swimming I do different things with my hair when I'm done in the pool.  This go round of classes is going well and my hair has grown quite a bit since the last set of classes so I have been more motivated to take care of my hair when I get out of the pool.  The last two weeks I have been putting JOICO reconstructer on my hair as soon as I get to the locker room and take off my swim caps (yep I wear two).  I comb it through a little and then pin my hair up with a clip.  I leave the Y with a wet ponytail and usually grab a bite to eat and head home.

The last swim sessions I tried to keep my wash routine as normal as possible with the addition of the chlorine stripping shampoo.  Neither last week or this week did I come home and do wash one and then set up for the next twenty four hours of prepoo and washing.  Instead I went through the rest of my wash routine and deep conditioned for a while yesterday.  After I rinsed it out I t-shirt dried for a few hours because I couldn't decide what to do with my hair.  When I did I got up and ended up doing an LCO instead of LOC basically because my brain was tired.  Wash day note here, the last two weeks I skipped the It's a 10 Keratin leave in and noticed that my hair was much softer at the end of the week.  With that knowledge in hand I returned my giant unused bottle of Keratin leave in for the regular version.  I used it for the first time yesterday and I'm interested in seeing how it works for the upcoming week.

After I LCO'd my hair lol and detangled it, I tied a scarf around my edges and let the length air dry for a few hours.  Eventually I roller set the length at the back of my head so I may have a funky bun tomorrow when I finally take it down.  Saturday wash days ensure my hair is dry before work on Monday but it somewhat throws off my mental plans.  Oh well.  The swimming is worth it and next week I may add in a yoga class.