I'm back, this time for good :)

Well, it was a hectic spring and summer but I'm back to blogging about curly hair.

Lately I've been thinking about growing up with curly hair.  And as funny as this may sound, it's hard to grow up in a straight haired world.. I know many people with straight hair might laugh at this comment, but it really is.  From the hairstyles presented in magazines, to the 'ideal' images of long flowing hair.  This isn't our reality.  Our reality is dry hair, fragile hair where the ends break more easily, hair that cannot easily be combed and should NEVER be brushed, hair that can't be shampooed daily, and hair that is costly (we spend $100.00's in products).  It's something all curlygirls must face as they grow and learn to manage their hair.

And Curlygirls hair has really grown lately.  It can now be stretched midway down her back.  And it's beautiful.  I can't get over how amazing her curls are.  We've had a few interesting comments from straight haired children.. this spring curlygirl had a few issues with a boy at preschool who wouldn't stop pulling and touching her hair.  Thankfully the preschool teachers put him into a different group and talked to his family.  Thank goodness for preschools and teachers who understand that touching her curls is not appropriate.  I think their exact words were "he was crossing into her personal space and he shouldn't be touching her hair"- score 1 point for good teachers!.

Curlygirl also had a very good friend tell her that her hair wasn't "good" because it wasn't long.  In reality curlygirls hair is longer than this friends hair.. but the perception of long vs. short hair was hard for her.  She went through a period of time where she said her hair was "poo poo", but I think through positive reinforcement and positive speak, she doesn't think that anymore.

And then there are the comments from uneducated strangers.  I had a woman in a bank ask me "wow, how come her hair isn't frizzy?".  I almost choked.  To me that's akin of asking, "wow, how come her face is washed".  It isn't something special that curlygirls hair isn't frizzy, it wasn't "frizzy" that day because we spent a lot of time defining the curls, and moisturizing them.  And honestly, even if it was, why would someone think they could comment on that.  Totally unacceptable.
I can't even remember what I said, but it probably wasn't too eloquent.

I've been experimenting with hairstyles a bit more, double width cornrows (where you braid braids together into rows).  I really like this look and find it lasts a bit longer.  The one challenge is that her hair still will only hold a style for maximum 4 days.  And now she has opinions about what hairstyle she wants.  Usually she wants beads.  Another sweet little girl at daycare told her that her beads were beautiful jewellery in her hair (love this girl) and made curlygirl feel so special- exhausting to always be putting beads back in her hair, particularly when after 4 days her hair needs to be re-done, but if she feels beautiful it's a small price to pay.

Here are some photos of some of our recent hairstyles:

Thanks for checking in on my wayward blog!

One of my favourite hairstyles.  The braids are braided up on the sides, and then tucked into the top cornrows as we go.  It's finished with a top ponytail that can be twisted into a bun (for ballet).  I love this look on her, and you can have fun with it by adding bows and fun clips to the pony tail.

Consistently one of my favourites.  Braided back off her face, then loose in the back.  Easy for care and washing.  You can do the parting and cornrows straight, or you can do them at angles for something different.

Love this sleeping photo and how you can really see her beautiful curls.  In this one I'd used a detangler/ leave in conditioner, then massaged a shea butter into the hair to help moisturize the cuticles. I finished this off with curly curly cream, and let it dry.  What I end up with is a head of beautifully defined and shiny ringlets.

A different take on the half braid style.  She likes to choose fun coloured elastics.  Her other new favourite style is to have her hair in a "pony tale like mommy".. hmmm.. she doesn't know that mommy does this because I don't have much time to style my hair (lol).  But it ends up looking like a headband of braids/ elastics.  supercute.

A fun and easy summer style.  Using the curly defining and moisturizer I discussed above, I do one simple braid to hold her hair off her face. This takes about 5 minutes and is perfect for busy mornings and summer days.  Her hair does get much more tangled and dry this way, so I don't do this style very often.. I find it's way more work at the end of the day for me.

Another side view of a pony style (day 3).  The side of the hair is braided into a larger cornrow and pulled back.  This was after a day of swimming (and it's in a cap of course).  The shorter fine hair starts to fall out by day 3, but overall this is quite a durable style.

This is not curlygirl, rather a friend whose hair I do.  Older curlygirls have a lot more ideas about what hairstyle they want.  I was asked to do a "side pony with something fun".  So we did side braids over to a pony and then finished the hair in the pony by doing 2 strand twists.  This style lasted for about 3 weeks.  It's partly because the hair is longer, and partly because she has much curlier hair than curlygirl.. so her hair (4b) holds styles much longer.  

It's also way more difficult to part and takes longer.. so for you curly mama's who have 4+ curly hair to manage, kudos, it's way more challenging than curlygirl's hair.  

I love this style.  Was inspired by a friends daughter's beautiful hair.  A series of side braids that end into a side pony.  Love this style, very pretty and looks quite dressy.  I find that curlygirls hair isn't quite long enough at the crown (only 3-4 inches for some strands) to hold the side parting/ braids for much more than 2-3 days.  It's quite time consuming to do this style, so I generally reserve it for special occasions.  

Bad blogger

Well, I've been a bad blogger and have neglected updating this site for a while. Life gets busier the older kids get I think.

I have a bunch of products to review and style tips to post. So I'll try to update this soon.

Curly mama.

More curlygirl styles

So I've been working hard at styling curlygirls hair lately. Ever since our curly hair information session where I was able to practice cornrows with an expert, I've gotten much better.  I realized I was holding the braid too far away from the scalp, so it wouldn't hold the style as long because it wasn't tight enough.  So problem solved!
That doesn't mean that the styles hold for weeks, they still only hold for maximum 3-4 days, but that's actually long for 3b/3c curls.

Some things new curly hair musings I've had along the way.

1. Curlygirl loves beads.  They click clack away and she loves to swing them.  When I put them in her hair she says "I beautiful" and it's true.  So we are big fans of beads in this house. We probably have beads in her hair about 50% of the time these days.

2. Natural and loose hair is much harder to manage.  When I leave her hair or part of her hair down we are struggling more and more with knots and tangles. It also feels much dryer.  Braids and styles really help hold in the moisture (especially when locked in with shea butter) and make detangling and washing much much easier.

3. Angled braids hold better than straight braids.  That is, cornrows straight back off her crown last about 2-3 days, but if I angle them (doesn't matter which angle)  they last longer.  I think this has to do with how so rubs her head.

4. Coils can quickly turn into dreadlocks.  I love coils and they look so beautiful.  But as curlygirls hair gets longer I'm finding that coils very very quickly turn into dreadlocks and create a big tangled mat around the coil, so this style is one that is only used for short periods of time and only when we will have time to bath and detangle it that night.

5. I recently spent a day doing braids for a friends daughter, and her curly little lady has 4a curls.  Ok, for all you mama's (and papa's) with 4+ curls and 4+ curly kids.. kudoos to you.  It was MUCH harder to style and manage.  We did a head of cornrows, but it took 4 hours.  Thank goodness she was patient.


Here are some photos and general comments on curlygirls recent do's.

Here is a photo of finger coils with a side part.  These look super cute and are quite easy to do on her hair.  I find when we use the curly curl cream it seems to hold them the longest.  She loves this style, and it's one of her daddy's favourites.  It's a one day only style, or we have some major dreadlocks starting (and while I love locks, I don't want to commit to that style).

Here is her daddy's absolute favourite hairstyle.  The Frohawk.  I find this style works best when I take larger secctions of hair and cornrow upwards.  The further up you place the cornrows, the more of a "hawk" it will make.  If we don't go swimming we can get this style to last 3 days.  But there is some every day maintenance of detangling, moisturizing and setting the top.  I usually use "The Great Detangler" and the "Curly curl cream".

Curlygirl calls these her "Ethiopia braids" because we were reading a book and the little girl from Ethiopia had hair braided in straight rows to the back, which was left out and natural.  Super cute, but the back does get matted so this style requires every day attention to detangle and moisturize the back of her hair.  Usually this style will last 2 days.  

Curly Haircare Session- Tips from an expert

Yesterday myself and 13 other curly mama's and papa's, spent the afternoon at the Afro Hair Salon on Commercial Drive in Vancouver.  Emy, the stylist put on a curly haircare and styling session for interested families.  It was a fun event and I think everyone took away some key curly hair tips.
Here is a summary of some of my notes from the session.  Some of these tips apply more to 4+ hair types- which I've indicated.  She also had some great ideas for styling short hair and encouraging curly hair to grow more.

Washing Curly Hair: 

1) for 4+ curly hair types, also condition first, then shampoo, and then condition again.
2) Shampoo should always be conditioning shampoo, conditioner should always be detangling conditioner
3) for 4+ curly hair types, section hair off into small squares and really ensure the conditioner and shampoo is worked into each section.  Otherwise the curls stick together and you don't actually shampoo the hair to the depth required.
4) When deep conditioning, leave the conditioner on overnight with a sleep cap then lightly rinse out in the morning
5) Shampoo once every 1-2 weeks, but not needed more often than this

Combing Curly Hair:

1) Always comb from the bottom up
2) Before combing, moisturize the hair with a spray bottle.  The spray should have 2/3 water with the remaining 1/3 containing hair oil (can use olive) and conditioner
3) Comb using a tangle teaser

Cutting Curly Hair:

1) Curly hair should be cut every 4-6 weeks, maximum 8 weeks. Otherwise the damaged ends continue to work their way up the hair and lead to more breakage.  This was a big "oops" for me.  As a curly mama, I never cut my hair.  Maybe once a year if I get up the courage.  And curlygirl has never had a haircut.... we shall be making a salon appointment in the near future.

Sleeping:

1) I know I've discussed sleep caps before, but she really emphasized the importance of these.  Again, here is where we buy our sleep caps and they are great, durable and support a good cause: http://africasleeps.com/

Styling Curly Hair:

1) Rotate your parts.  If you continually part in the same places the hair will break off along the part lines and create little bald spots
2) Emy uses a blow dryer with comb on the end to straighten really curly hair before styling. Personally I'm terrified of using hot air to dry curls so I don't think I'll be using this method, but when she demonstrated it on some of the kids you could see it really made a difference for the styling of their hair.
3) Don't try to cornrow with hair too wet- this is something I can really see I'm doing wrong.  Right now I'm styling curlygirls hair when it's wet, and ensuring I have my spray bottle prepared if it gets too dry, but Emy suggested that dryer hair would help the braids hold.  She also used a locking putty on the semi-dry hair to help the braids stay in place.  I'm going to try this this week.

Overall I think we all learned we were doing some things really well and that we could improve on some things as well.

One of my key take home messages was to choose a hair line and stick to it.  It's easier than having multitudes of products.  As it stands, my favourite hair product line is the Taliah Waajid curly hair line.  Love the scents and performance of most everything I've tried.

Wanted to also say a big thank you to Nandi Kids for sponsoring our event!  They were generous enough to send samples of products to our curly mama's and papa's to try.  It's fantastic we have such a great community of curly families across Canada!

More curly styles- and managing curly hair as it gets longer

I'm finding curlygirls hair is getting harder to manage.  It's quite long now, easily past her shoulders when pulled straight, but it is still a 3b/3c curl.  I'm also finding that her hair is getting thicker- so more little short curls are growing in and keep falling out of braids and styles.

Her hair is only lasting 2-3 days/ style and I thought I was doing something wrong until I ran into another curlymama with hair curlier than mine who said that for 3b/3c  curls you do need to re-do styles every 2-3 days, that this is normal. Only when hair gets past the 4curl mark does it tend to stay longer in braids and other sets.  This made me feel so much better... but now I'm back to the managing challenge.  Because her hair is longer it's taking me much longer to get it styled, 30-60 minutes for a full head of braids and 20minutes for an "easy style".  I can only imagine this will continue to get tougher as her hair grows longer.. but because it isn't curly enough I need to re-do the style in 1-2 days. So it's a lot of time spent in the "Salon chez nous".

So I think I need to come up with a better style regime... how do other curlymama's manage?
Right now I'm thinking:

Sunday: Set a 2-3 day style (Veil braids, cornrows)
Monday: done
Tuesday: evaluate, may need to be re-done
Wednesday: 1-2 day style (ponies, or twists)
Thursday: evaluate, may do an easy style
Friday: Easy style
Saturday: depends on the day.

I'm hoping that once her hair grows in thicker I should be able to maintain a style a bit longer and it will make my styling life much easier...

Here are some photos of recent styles.

The first was one that I saw done on a little ones hair (was a 4b curl).  Her hair was much thicker so it looked really full in this style.  I did like this style a lot, a fun way to do a mohawk (or "frohawk).  Evie thought it was fun and was flipping her beads all day.  The style lasted for 3 days, but by the end of day 3 the hair was falling out on the sides and little pieces were falling out of the braids.  You can see that my parting and sectioning needs to get better (lol), but I'm finding it tough to make the sectioning even when I have so many little hairs to try and pull into the braids.  I guess practice practice practice.
Curlygirl will probably look back at this style and laugh at me.

This second style was one I did for Thanksgiving dinner.  I created a side part, did cornrows that swept up sideways into ponies with beads on the end of the braids.  Cute style, one that we do a lot but only lasts for 2 days.  

Hair photos

I said I'd post photos if the side rows with top pony turned out.. so here they are.
As you can see I had to add a clip at the back of her hair, since it isn't quite long enough to carry up to the crown.  But it looked pretty cute.

Unfortunately, this style lasted only 1 day- her hair all fell out when she was playing.  I did think it looked cute while it lasted.  As you can see, I need to get better at making even parts on her head so the braids are the same width.

What to do with 3b/3c curls..

So while I have found when helping friends whose children have 4+ curls, the texture makes it quite difficult to manage, what I'm finding as curlygirls hair gets longer is that the 3b/3c curls really won't hol some of the styles that I love (such as cornrows) for more than 2 days.  after 2 days it starts to fall out and there are so many fly-aways that the style just won't hold anymore.  Because the curls that fall out aren't really tightly curled you can really see that the style needs to be redone.  Curlygirl also runs around, plays outside and rolls in the grass a lot- which I know also contributes to her styles not lasting very long.
To try and combat this I've tried gels, setting products and making sure the braids are really tight on her scalp.
As curlygirls hair gets longer it's taking longer and longer to complete the braids-which are having to be removed after 2 days.  She's still willing to sit, but more and more the cornrows are becoming a once a week event.
The styles I'm finding I'm using more are: Ponies-with braids or twists, natural (with finger coils), puffs, headbands, and veil braids.  I'm particularly loving the veil braids- as these will last 3 days.

I'm going to try some cornrow crown braids (wrapping the head) and see how it looks with a puff on top.  I'll post photos if it turns out.