It's all in a name

Across the hair boards, there a posts where naturals play the "Name your 'Fro" game. It's always cute and funny. Ladies select their name and explain why. I love it when I see something really original that actually has some type of significance. I tend to role my eyes at the ones saying they name their fro "Sasha Fierce" because it so fierce and they love Beyonce. Yuck! What does that really have to do with you?

I thought about it and decided I would do name my fro. She is official dubbed Jessi Rose. The reasons are as follows: My favorite romance/erotic writer is Beverly Jenkins. She writes a series of novels based in the 1800s about black men and women who accomplish great things. They range from deputies, conductors in the Undergroud Railroad, slaves, business moguels, doctors, lawyers, cowboys, train robbers, madams at brothels and the list goes on. They usually overcome so obstacle and do something for the greater good of thier towns and the black community. She also incorporates historicaly facts into every book. Jessi Rose comes from the book "The Taming of Jessi Rose." Jessi Rose is a woman who is confident, unafraid of what anyone says/thinks of her, unconventional and a bit on the wild side on the days she chose not to be tamed. Those are characteristics that people who know me well have described me as and I fell that my hair is the same way. My hair shows my confidence and gives me more. Although I did care at first, I no longer care of other people's opinions of my hair (although I do love to hear them if they are positive). Natural hair is unconventional. Natural hair can be wild or tamed, just depends on the day.

So, all of that to say, my 'fro is Jessi Rose, whether she be tamed or wild!

Detangling

My hair is getting longer and with that, detangling sessions are getting longer. W-n-g's aren't so quick anymore but are still one of the styles I mainly wear. I've been getting fairy knots for the past month or two. I officialy despise those things! I'm also getting more tangled and knotted hair. They are easy enough to get out but still I worry about breakage and splits because of it.

Currently, I detangle using just my fingers. I prefer that to a wide toothe comb because right now, it's easier and it works. I did use a comb one day and felt like I was breaking off a bunch of my hair. It shed the same amount but I just didn't like it. Plus, I felt like it seperated my curls a little too much and gave me a jheri curl type of look. Lol! I love chunky curls. (Guess I won't be investing in a Denman after all.)

I shed a lot so I'm going to continue to detangle a couple of times a week. Stretching detangling sessions would probably be horrific. I'm going to stick with HE conditioners for detangling sessions. The slip they have is awesome. I'll only stray from this line when I go organic (meaning when I have more $$$$). I will continue to use my fingers as I am most comfortable and less scared about breakage as I have more control over what's happening to my strands. I will reincorporate monthly deep protein condish into my regimen because I'm noticing a lot of elasticity when detangling. My hair has too much moisture and very little strength. Gotta get over that protein fear because my hair is telling me she needs it. I will listen!

Keep it simple

I was reading some hair site, not sure which one, and there was a woman with a fierce w-n-g. She wrote instructions on how she acheived hers. She had a long list of steps that were too much for a w-n-g in my opinion. To me, it's real simple: cowash, shake, moisturize and seal.

One good thing while reading her list was I remembered that my w-n-g turns out soooooo much better if I leave a little of the condish in when I cowash. So, using HETT, I did a cowash. I shook my head (I tend to use a washrag to cover my face so the condish doesn't get on my face). Moisturized with SoftSheen Carson Roots of Nature and sealed with castor oil. I let my hair drip dry so I wrap an old tshirt around my shoulders when I do whatever else I need to do. I've gotten to the point where I don't even blot my hair with the tshirt or a towel. It seems to work better for me that way because my texture easily gets frizzy. But to keep it from dripping too long, I do shake my hair for at least a minute to get rid of as much excess water as possible.

I immediately loved the results. My hair looked like it did when I just get out of the shower. Perfect curls with practically no frizz. And the curls were so well defined. I love it. A couple of people asked if I did a strawset. I've done it a 3-4 times with the same results.

One thing I can say, I don't like how my hair hangs down when it's dry. I fluff when it's 75% dry. I also think it's funny that the front seems to hang down like bangs if I don't fluff it a lot.  

I feel the PJ in my coming alive!!!!!!!!

I've never been much of a PJ (product junkie). I can honestly say I buy few products and use them completely before I purchase something different. But with this list of silicone-free hair products, I can feel my PJ clawing it's way to the surface!

http://ladylonghair.googlepages.com/'cone-freeconditioners


(link from Tia's blog Her Best Hair)

Other random things

Here's a few other random things that happened while my hair was straight.

It rained Tuesday. I forgot that I needed a hood or umbrella. There is an umbrella somewhere in my Jeep. Not sure where. I was literally lol-ing as I ran throught the rain to my Jeep. Luckily, my hair didn't revert.

My supervisor (black woman) is always asking me when I'm going to loc my hair. I tell her at least once a month that I'm not. Apparently one of her relatives when natural via locs and she has it set in her head that I am too. When I straightened, she commented that it looked nice but she preferred my hair the other way. She said that it suits me and shows the amount of confidence I posess to wear it that way. I don't require anyone's approval to wear my hair any particular way but it pleased me that she likes it.

After the bantu knot out, I needed to dc, poo and do a w-n-g before work. I used my new favorite dc mix and let that sit for an hour. One thing I found interesting was the amount of dc I needed to use. My hair was straight and dry when I applied it. I used less than half what I normally use. I was shocked and it felt weird. But the dc took very well and my hair was soft and moisturized as always.

I got tons of happy compliments from family and friends once my hair was curly again. Also got a few request to never straighten my hair again because my natural is so becoming on me and it makes me, me. A few people who really pay attention to my hair commented that my hair seemed even curlier after that first w-n-g. It actually did. Not sure why.

Unexpected

Well, I got some interesting reactions to my straight hair. No one like it. Well except for this black woman at my job but she always gives me the side eye when my hair is in it's natural state. Have to love the side eye. lol!

Everyone else, however, responded with "ooooh....you straightened you hair. Wow. It's long. So...when are you going to wash it and make it curly again." I confided in one coworker that I wasn't too thrilled with it myself and she responded with "good, wash it when you get home tonight. The natural hair had to grow on my at first but now I'm used to you with curly hair. I don't like it straight." I love my coworkers for their honesty. They had me cracking up laughing all night.

The next day, I was still wearing straight hair and was again questioned about how long my hair was going to stay this way. I told them I wouldn't be washing it because it took so long to do but I agreed to compromise and make it somewhat curly.
I orginially wanted to do pin curls because MSatch did some and they looked so great on her. But I tried a couple and wasn't really getting the hang of it. Enter the bantu knot!

This only took a few minutes and was fairly easy to do since I'm used to bantu knotting my single strand twist. Some of them didn't come out to well so the left side was tigher and looked way better than the right. The front right was real funky looking so I had to pin it up a little bit.

Wore this for one day but the curls had fallen a lot by the end of the night. I washed the next day.

Time on my hands

I got bored and decided to straighten my hair. I used low heat to blow dry, Palmer's Coconut Oil Hair Milk to moisturize (and strengthen as it has a lot of protein) and pure shea to seal. The shea butter seemed to really help with straightening. It got a lot straight the first time around, not looking very frizzy.

One thing that I found interesting, I was less than half-way through flat ironing when I decided I didn't like it. The only reason I kept going was because I'd already put so much work into it. I did love the bangs however. I've always loved bangs and mine were long and hanging in my eyes. For some reason, I like that.

Picture time! Oh, and please excuse the pissed off expression in the picts. Someone was annoying the hell out of me and wasn't getting the hint that I wanted them to go away. lol!