Flat Ironed Hair

Hey guys, it's been a while, I know.
I've been really into fitness and hair styling + fitness = reversion. As a result, I haven't really done much because it's been like 'Well, I'm just going to sweat it out in a few hours and I could use this time to actually work out.'
Before my most recent thing, I wanted to say that I tried to start using cones to see if  I could reap the benefits a few people have received. Nope. I clarified and went back to my routine.

Now, my hair's happiness has been suffering because I tried washing it then using ridiculous amounts of gel to get it to stay. Spoiler alert: that doesn't work. The hair near my crown reverted and the rest of it was stiff and hard. I ended up bunning it forever until last night when I finally realized I couldn't keep it like this. [I'm sure my friends were unamused as well...]
Last night, I cowashed my hair with VO5 then deep conditioned with ORS Hair Mayo [I know, I know, but I hadn't made any gelatin and I was literally just getting out of the shower and didn't have much of a choice. :( I ran out / have VERY little left anyway, so it won't happen again.] I left that in for a few hours while working out to get a DEEP protein treatment, and then I rinsed it, semi-dried my hair under a turbie twist, then finally applied coconut milk which I left in overnight under a shower cap.
I woke up the next morning and my hair was only mildly wet, as I'd hoped. I set it with Curlformers while applying my oil mix, and went to one of my awesome jobs where no one would see me, MUAHAHAHA.
After work [only two hours], I got back, made a ton of pastries [none of which came out well] and then took out the now dry set. I flat ironed on about 270°.
Out of the set, my hair was already much better looking than it had previously been. Almost every piece was very smooth, it was moisturized...I could have just left it like that if I weren't trying to test this out.
Anyway, here are the results:

My hair is still the same it's always been, right below the bottom of my bra. It's about 3/4 natural, or more...

Bentonite [Calcuim] Clay washes and the Denman Brush [and the Hercules Sagemann]

So, I've had Moroccan Red / Rhassoul clay for a while, but it's mildly expensive so I mostly use it on my skin.  I got Bentonite because it's cheaper and doesn't stain [I actually have two red towels just for the red clay! Sigh.]
I use it for hair and skin care, actually, but I've taken a break recently because clay is a little harsh and my face hated the stage makeup I've had to wear.
Anyway, I've been using the clay in my hair because some people use it instead of shampoo or as a cleansing conditioner.
Calcium Bentonite Clay:
It's absolutely amazing. My hair feels clean but not stripped, and is a little darker/richer and much shinier than before. The only problem is that it's a bit hard to wash out completely. Incidentally, it's also difficult to get off your face.
I use several [plastic, do not let metal touch clay!] tablespoons of Bentonite Clay, a little Rhassoul Clay [a spoonful or maybe just half of one], a few spoonfuls of raw honey, some grape seed oil, coconut oil, castor oil [not measured, but not much either] and a lot of coconut milk, followed by enough Apple Cider Vinegar to get it to the right texture. I've actually tried white distilled in it's place and while it's good, I don't like it as much, but I'd use it in a pinch, definitely. I applied it to damp hair and left it in for a few hours. When I rinsed it out, my hair was soft, didn't have many tangles and just much healthier looking and feeling. I use it after my weekly gelatin protein treatment and my hair feels full. In fact, applying more coconut milk to my hair actually makes it feel too full, (weighed down even!) so I don't do much afterwards other than setting it.  This is a great way to cleanse and really condition hair deeply, adding moisture and shine while getting rid of all the previous buildup.  I'm planning on keeping this up whenever I have the time to clean up after it, because it is a bit messy and the rhassoul clay can stain if you let it sit.

Denman Brush:
Buy this at Sally Beauty Supply
My Hercules Sagemann comb broke backstage! No idea how, but it's very sad, so I decided to try using my modified Denman again.
Ok, this does rip my hair out, so I have to use it when my hair is as detangled as possible. Due to the exaggerated ripping, I've learned when optimal combing conditions are for my hair; very slightly damp. Not enough to revert so much [enough to look like a blow-out] and not dry either. I lost about 75% of my normal hair from detangling with that. It's still way too much hair, but now that I only comb once a week it's slightly less horrifying.
Well, it definitely smoothed my hair quite a bit. Denman brushes do not define my curls like they do for some people, even when using the antistatic pad, but my hair is so smooth after the set that it's seriously like I flat ironed it. It's smooth, detangled and the cuticles are flat, which to me is the entire benefit to flat ironing.  It's a shame I had to lose more hair than with my Sagemann, because if not I'd used this every single wash day from now into the end of time and space.
Notes on Sally's / Denman: I wish my Sally's stocked the D41 because I bought the D4 and it's bristles are closer together. I don't like that, and whenever I have extra money [ha!] I'll buy the 41, which is made for curly hair [unlike the ones that don't end in 1, which are for straight hair.] Maybe it'll rip out less hair and I can use it more often. Also, make sure you're getting the Denman and not one of the many knock offs offered at Sallys. I had to look around for a bit. Unless you want the knock off, then just buy one of the ones that doesn't specifically say Denman on it. I figured, first time, I'd buy the brand. [Did the same with Curlformers and now I'm very glad.]

My hair after the Denman, set, remove, and one night of sleep.

[I know, my CF sets still only last until I go to sleep :(]

See the smoothness of mini-buns / crown, even one of them was shining from the no-light in this room, which is saying something. Anyway, I'm just going to do a big bun after my comb arrives. Speaking of which...
Hercules Sagemann:
Buy this at HotCombs
So this is a wider-tooth comb, but not one of the huge ones like you'd expect. I've reviewed this before, I believe, and I thought it was good but I didn't have much to compare it to. Now I realise how incredibly amazing it is. This is by far, the single greatest comb I have ever used to the point that I do not even want to try another comb and risk it.  I lose no hair to the actual comb; nothing is stuck in it, everything I lose is from prior strand weakness / manipulation. The hair in the sink from this comb is the same amount as I lose from finger detangling. It's smooth, it doesn't tug, there are no horrible steams to slowly chip away at my hair and it's two combs in one.  I've only used the fine side for flat ironing and back when I was doing the 3 Comb Smooth thing, but I think I'm going to use it next time I need to smooth my hair out and compare it to the Denman in terms of detangling, smoothness, and hair breakage to see which I should use for the best set.  I mean, other than the mysterious breaking [into THREE peices :(], I have nothing bad to say about this comb at all! The only thing I could hope for was a rat tail at the far end so I could make parts. Seriously...I just... I just love it, okay? I take it everywhere I'm staying over a night. When I have money I'll buy another so I don't have to live even a day without this bad boy, even though I only comb once a week. Best hair tool besides Curlformers.
Notes on HotCombs / Hercules Sagemann: So I'm pretty sure hot combs is the exclusive retailer, but I've ordered from there twice, [my new comb is coming today!] so I trust them. I also enjoy that the writing is etched in along with being white. When it fades [quickly] due to oil, the etching is still there! Whoo~

Bunning!

I was in a play the last two weekends, and yet did not do anything to my hair because I just didn't have the time, unfortunately. Luckily, it just needed to be in a bun [I was Mrs. Trent in Murder's In The Heir, a murder mystery where the killer is chosen by the audience.]

Nurse Withers on the left, Mrs. Trent on the right.

It was a sock bun, so less big than I'm used to, as seen here:

Here is a closeup of that sock bun from two different showings:

 Incidentally, in the days before the play I had time to do my hair every day, so it looked like this for a few hours before going back to being a bun:

Fun stuff, right? Anyway, my hair doesn't actually appear to have gained any length, and I'm thinking it's because my old and relaxed hair is super weak, because I have sections with no straight hair left, but the natural hair is the right length [so it's not actually breaking, but I will trim it just in case during my BC at the end of the year.]

This is how long my natural hair was in the beginning of January:

 Middle of February:

It's at my chin now, actually, so I guess the castor oil is working.

I know I haven't taken any texture shots, but it's because I don't like how thin and wispy my relaxed hair is compared to my huge, bouncy, shrunken coily 4b hair.  I adore my texture; even my mom was like 'What did you do to your hair to make it look like that‽' when I showed it to her. It had clarifying shampoo on it, and this Ion Clarifying Shampoo defines my hair something fierce. I was cleaning my bang to see if I needed to shampoo. I don't ^_^.

Anyway, stay tuned for a post about Bentonite [Calcuim] Clay and the Denman brush, if you please. Either way, have a healthy hair journey!

Curly Girl Method and Tightly Curly Method and Natural Hair Routines! Oh my! [HAIR RAMBLE]

So I don't use shampoo unless my hair feels really coated.  I co-wash almost every time I wash, and I leave in my deep conditioner.  I make almost all my products and at this point nearly all my remaining products [none of which I will be repurchasing, as I have home made recipes I like] are all natural.  It's weird how this happened, because I just wanted to save money!
My hair loves natural things: I've never used a store bought DC that worked better than coconut milk, I've never used a leave-in better than EVCO/EVOO/Grape seed oil mixed, I've never used a sealant better than shea butter [if I need hold] / castor oil.  While silicones never seemed to really mess up my hair, they didn't do much to make it look or feel better either.  Sulfates just make my hair rediculously frizzy, so I stopped using those as well. Leaving in my conditioner is the only way for me to have hair that is moisturized for more than the first 24 hours after I DC and still not even more than 48 hours! I ended up inadvertantly doing CG/TCG with natural hair products without even knowing what they were until about 2.5-3 years into my journey!
It's not like my hair is great, and I sometimes use shampoo and silicones. I'm not officially doing any of this, but it's usually to correct a problem and then I usually have to correct whatever problem was caused by using those products -____-.
I will say, though, that these practices have finally started to show some results.
My hair never looked wet when it was until this week. It always looked dry even when soaking wet. Using coconut milk and [this new product I just got] as well as cowashing with VO5 without having shampooed at all for a few months seems to have improved my hair's ability to absorb water.  This is great! I thought it was just a textural issue and not a moisture one, but this is actually defining my curls [they even CLUMPED FOR A FEW MINUTES last night!] and improving my moisture.  My hair's feeling and appearance is more constantly good as well; my hair is now flat iron glossy from roller sets!  I can consistantly make it soft every day, so I don't have the 'oh crap' moment in the morning when my hair feels horrible and I have no idea how to fix it.
Shine/Gloss/Sheen: The absolute most I could get before was light sheen, after a set or flat iron.  I would say a shine is when your hair is reflecting bright white, and a gloss is when it looks 'done' but not necessarily blinding.  I will say that I'm okay with sheen, I actually prefer it because it looks healthier in my eyes, but I never realized my hair could actually be like this without heat. I'm going to BC at the end of this year [that is a definite "Yes," I'd previously been struggling with cutting off my relaxed hair, because I care too much about my natural hair and I wanted the relaxed hair to take all the damage, LOL. That's horrible, isn't it?]  I know that my hair will be long enough for me when this year is up, so maybe I'll do it on NYE or something. [Assuming the castor oil doesn't make it grow so fast that I can just cut it on my b-day or something. That'd be really cool, but I don't know if castor oil will really make my hair grow any faster and I'm not counting on it.]
I played with my natural hair during my wash last night—no sections since I left my clips at school—and I really love it: I loved it poofy, defined, whatever, it was just great all around!] I want my natural hair to be as healthy as possible when I BC, so I'm very glad this natural no-unhealthy-products thing is working.
So I'd recommend people try the CG/TCG methods, if they can't happen into working products like I did, because those methods are tried and true, and obviously for good reason if I accidentally started them!

Coconut Milk - My Official Natural Conditioner

I just realized I never posted this...
Coconut Milk is a natural, very moisturizing, light protein conditioner.  I used Trader Joe's version because it was $1 and...I was there.  This stuff really defined my curls in a way I never thought possible.  Once again, I believe I might be 4b instead of the 4c I originally thought I was was, and this product is a lot of the reason why.  I used approximately 1/2 of the can, and it was fairly thick / creamy and went on like any store bought DC.  I left it in under a shower cap for a few hours and washed it out to reveal glossy [well, in comparison to the utter and complete dullness that is my normal wet texture], moisturized hair.
This stuff elongated my natural curls because of how moisturizing it was, and though I'm not too big on the importance of this; it actually made my edges soft and flat. Seriously, this is the best deep conditioner I've ever used and it's just coconut milk.

I swore I was going to buy more of this and DC with it every time, and then that totally didn't happen for months, because I forgot. I recently bought more [Thai Kitchen's version, though] and have decided to also use it as my water based leave-in [as opposed to the oil one, and the cream, but I don't do LOC that faithfully anymore do to my 7 inches of natural hair waiting to revert from a set, lol!].

Anyway, this is my DC now, barring any crazy result from the light protein [my hair loves protein, so honestly, this is probably best since I keep forgetting...]
Healthy hair!

EVOO and Castor Oil: my two new amazing staples!

Over winter break, I finally got my hands on some extra virgin olive oil and some castor oil.  The olive oil was just the best looking/price one at the store I was at when I thought abuot it, but the castor oil I specifically went to the natural store near my house to obtain.

EVOO is one of the three oils scientifically proven to have a small enough structure to actually penetrate the hair strand. This is a type of moisture.  Most people argue that moisture can only be obtained from water. I completely disagree with that, but I do think hydration can only be achieved through water.  Of course, I don't think hydration is necessary in all cases, but I do think some form of moisture are necessary for healthy hair growth.
Because of the penetrating property of EVOO [which is shares with coconut oil, another oil I adore as you all know, and avocado oil, which I have never used] I decided to add it to my leave-in.  My leave-in used to be coconut oil, for moisture and grape seed oil for its reported ceramides and sealing properties.  Now, I have added EVOO to the mix.
My last post was about flat ironed hair—and I apologize for the lack of pictures [my phone is...broken, driver-ly speaking.]—but I could never keep my flat ironed hair moisturized. The cuticle was just too closed for anything to penetrate.  This mixture not only moisturised my hair, making it softer, silkier, shinier and more well defined, but it also made my hair weightier.
I said at least a year ago that I love it when my hair feels full and weighty, because it seems like the moisture has been trapped within my hair and it just feels healthy. Well, when I got home, I put the new mix on 1/4 of my hair, and just castor oil on 1/4 of my hair.  When I came back a few hours later, the ponytail with the EVOO on it literally fell, hard, out of the holder. It actually surprised me, and made me jump a little because I expect my hair to be molded to the shape of the holder. I'll get a little swing/bounce, yes, but my hair, especially at the root, does not like to fall.  This fell like it was actually wet.  My hair clearly loved the EVOO and I will continue to use it every day that I need more moisture.

Castor Oil is packaged in one of two forms. Black, and...whatever non-black is called. Black castor oil is castor oil where the ash from the bean was also added to the mix.  It is believed [though not proven] that the ash from the plant is also helpful for hair, so many like to purchase black castor oil.  I had no such ideas about the ash, and honestly, it sounds like it smells bad. Do not get me wrong, I will definitely try JBCO or something in the future, but I simply did not feel like it was necessary. Castor oil is naturally yellow-ish and smells very nutty. I'm not a fan of the smell, but it fades quickly. Since I use it at night, I don't have to smell it after putting my scarf on anyway.
The paragraph above mentions me putting castor oil onto 1/4 of my hair.  That part of my hair felt a lot softer than the 1/2 control and 1/4 EVOO mix. It felt smoother and was much shinier.  I loved the results, because it seemed to really help my cuticles flatten properly. While it felt better than the mix, I knew it wasn't actually penetrating.
So my new routine for when I do not want to add water to my hair is to use my mix and follow it up with castor oil to seal. My ends look healthier and healthier every day.
I also use Castor oil as a scalp massage. I've heard it can help growth, but most importantly I have no oil in my scalp, and I've realised that dry scalp could be causing some of my issues. Now, every night I do a very short scalp massage with a small amount of castor oil, and my roots are seriously loving this new attention. They're much softer and more malleable now, and I have a lot less flakes than I did before.  I plan to add castor to my face wash in the future, and I might let you guys know how that works as well.

Overall, though I didn't think this would happen, both of these oils are now my staples and the sheer amount of moisture they've only contributed to my hair makes me much happier with my progress.

I have a new hair product that I will write about in possibly a month, it is a DC and I got amazing results last night, [my mother bought it for me] and I also repurchased coconut milk [Thai Kitchen] and used that. I know that together they resulted in just the best hair ever, but I don't know if one of them contributed more or less, so we'll see!
Have great hair days, lovelies!

Flat Ironing Once a Month!?

Firstly, sorry for disappearing.  I honestly haven't been doing much of anything with my hair since starting to use home made products and being swamped with classes. Even over Winter break I didn't do much to my hair. :(


So you guys know how lazy I am and the fact that flat ironing simply takes me way too much time. I decided to change it up, though, because I knew I wasn't going to do anything to my hair the last month of school [loads of things, including finals] and flat iron.  I knew it would probably only last until I got home because, as you also know, my hair gets REALLY dry a few days after flat iroing and I just DC it.

It didn't! So, I DC'd per normal [which for me was shampooing with ApHogee Shampoo for Damaged Hair → I have now used all of this! It was really good but I'm going poo-less [except my clarifier for if I do something crazy, but that should be a few times a year as opposed to once every two weeks.] so I will not be repurchasing. I DC'd with Silk Elements, added a ton more as my leave in [I either do this or simply don't wash out the DC.]

I flat ironed with a medium amount of heat protectant, instead of the loads I used to use [paranoia, man!] and did it at 220°-280° in the sections my CF set came out in. All in all I probably did slightly more than those 42 sections, and my hair felt and looked amazing. It had slightly more swing than just a CF set and was much shinier. You know, normal flat ironing stuff.
At night I applied generous amounts of coconut oil before my various sets, which included headband curls and bantu knots.  As it turns out, this generous application of coconut oil really helped my hair stay moisturized.  Instead of being afraid of weighing my hair down, I allowed it to finally take in what it so desperately wanted and I ended up going the full month before washing my hair again!
This was about a week into break, when I decided, what the heck, I'll flat iron again and see if my new oils  [next post will be about these] will work even better, or if this was a fluke.  I flat ironed again, same temp but even less [still probably too much, you guys have NO IDEA how much I was using, lol] heat protectant, right after a DC with Hair One Argan Oil [I will not rebuy HO! I know, this was my only HG product, but I've realized now that my home made products are good enough that I will not need to repurchase this. It's a great feeling!]
My hair had less swing than before, and was just as shiny as when I took it out of the CF. In fact, I almost didn't flat iron because my hair already looked and felt great from the intense moisture. Once again, I didn't care about weighing down my hair [and I've learned that my hair doesn't actually get 'weighed down' in the less movement/stiffness category, but it does actually weigh more, causing it to move more and be less stiff! Amazing!] and I used my new oil mix.
Wow. Once again, this oil will be my next post because I feel like it deserves it's own topic. They're two oils you've probably [almost definitely] heard of but I only just got them.
Halfway through, my hair was great, but I thought something was missing. I realized it was protein, so I did a really ghetto version of a protein treatment and my hair literally got softer every single day until I reached this weird peak of amazingness that was so awesome I could not keep my hands out of my hair.  Unfortunately, I couldn't sustain it, but I remembered how much my hair loves the protein [this was mostly hydrolysed wheat] and I'll use it more often. I need to buy a protein treatment, since it's so difficult to naturally make products with small enough protein molecules to penetrate, but I couldn't find what I wanted [Aubrey Organics GPB].
In the end I only went two / three weeks with this hair because I just really wanted to play with my natural hair texture again, but it looked great, and I got tons of complements every time I went out.
I will not be flat ironing again any time soon, but it is great to know that I can do it without causing dryness, especially with the time it takes to flat iron my hair!
Have great hair days, guys and gals!