My Buttercup’s Regimen

After much thought and analysis I have decided on a refreshing regimen for my 4 year old. It’s very simple but I feel it will be the most effective thus far.  As I tried something similar in the past and I did see growth when I used this method for her. The Burts Bees, Nature’s Baby, and Goin Natural Rare Moisture Butter are all new products.

Week 1
Apply 4 sections using butterfly clips
Shampoo twice  using Burts Bees Baby Shampoo

Deep  condition using  my DC mix minus all the essential oils and vitamins

Rinse

Apply leave in conditioner, kinky curly not today

Apply Goin Natural Rare Moisture Butter ( started using this for her because of its all natural ingredients on Sunday January 11, 2015); prior to that I was using my homemade moisturizer.
Seal with coconut oil
Style

Weeks 2,3 and 4
Cowash using nature’s baby organics

Deep condition with coconut oil

Apply leave in conditioner, Kinky Curly Knot Today
Apply moisturizer
Seal with coconut oil
Style

I plan to give this routin some time to see if it works if it does not I am going to try what I did with my oldest daughter: not wash her hair as much. I washed my oldest daughters hair maybe once every 2-3 months and it was very healthy and long. I’m not sure if this is because “dirty hair grows” or because you are not removing the naturals oils that is produced on our scalp. I’m even struggling with the idea of greasing her scalp with some good old fashion hair greese… either Blue Magic or Burgamont.  Time will tell. I will give it two months to see if I notice any progress.

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Regimen Update

One of the most important things about hair care, natural or not,  is a maintenance schedule or regimen.  You don’t sporadically bathe or just happen to take your car to get an oil change. You plan on regularly doing things. And the same is true of your hair, it must be maintained.  It doesn’t have to consist of an enormous amount of products  or  a specific product. It may take some experimentation but at the end of it all its about what your hair needs to be healthy. Figuring it out is part of your hair journey, below is what I will start with based on what I already know about my hair: primarily 4c with 3c or 4a in the rear, fine (as opposed to course), and low porosity.

My Post loc regimen 

As Needed

If I wear my hair straight I will oil my hair to retain moisture and sheen and will try to make the straightness last for a month.

If I wear my hair curly I will spritz with aloe water mixture

Week One – protein (strength)

This will always be done when I flat iron ( no more than once a month)

• Apply protein treatment to dry hair for 20 mins –   LeKair cholesterol or  Aubrey  Organics GBP Conditioner
• Rinse and then wash with sulfate free shampoo – Elasta QP Creme conditioning Shampoo (stop here if flat ironing and apply heat protectant)
• Apply moisturizer conditioner –  My DC Mixture
• Rinse

Apply leave in conditioner Kinky Curly Knot Today

• Do L.C.O using Miss Jessies Babybutter Creme or Goin Natural Rare Moisture Butter as my creme and jojoba oil or EVOO as my oil
• Style

Week Two – Moisture

• Cowash with V05 conditioner
• Apply leave in conditioner
• Do L.C.O
• Style

Week Three –  Clarify

• Wash w/ clarifying shampoo – Naturalioius Rhassoul 5 in 1 Clay or Giovanni 50:50 balanced Hydrating Clarifying Shampoo
• Hot oil treatment for 30 min – Jamaican black castor oil, EVOO, essential oils and vitamins
• Rinse
• Apply leave in conditioner
• Do L.C.O
• Style

Week Four – Moisture

• Cowash
• Apply leave in conditioner
• Do L.C.O
• Style

Moisture Sealants

One of the best things we can do for our hair is to keep it moisturized. This is a vital part of having a good healthy head of hair. It’s a vital part of retaining length. It’s a vital part to make our strands healthy. It’s a pretty big deal. So we know how to moisturize our strands and this post will talk about how we can keep that moisture in the hair.

OIL, Oil, oil is the key to keeping the moisture locked in our hair. Oil is a natural sealant. It coats the strands so that the moisture is trapped in and will not be released into the air. Some of these are also carrier oils.

The primary part of the hair strand that you should seal are the ends, however depending on what type of oil it is I will normally coat my entire strand from root to end because oils are also good for our scalp. Some oils that have work wonders for my hair are below.

EVOO – one of the first I tried…it was poppin among youtubers…lol. Extra Virgin Olive Oil is a great moisturizer and useful in homemade deep conditioner. It helps to strengthen hair as well. It is not apart of my regimen now but it does work. I started trying other things and stuck with those I felt my hair needed most.

Coconut OIl – my first love with oil. This is also great for moisturizing and deep conditioning. Others use it to pre-poo…I’ve never tried it for that purpose but I’m sure if so many swear by it that it works. I presently use it as part of my deep conditioning

Jojoba Oil – helps with split ends, it’s a fabulous in a deep conditioning mix, and it is good for dry scale. Almost forget that it moisturizes as well. I use this to seal with presently.

Grapeseed Oil – moistuizes and helps the hair shine. I presently seal with this also, I rotate between it and the jojoba oil.

Vitamin E Oil – This is a SUPER oil! It has so many benefits for hair, such as hair growth and loss prevention, it repairs split ends and it helps with moisture. I currently use it to seal and to message scalp.

These are the only ones that I have tried thus far, in the future I plan to try others such as sweet almond oil, carrot seed oil, and avacodo oil. Shea butter is also used as sealant, however I’ve never used it for that purpose.

9 month Hiatus

My last post some 9 months ago was tracking my progress. Well while I have fallen off the map or should I say blog (haha), my hair has been doing good for the most part. I must add that its been doing most of it on its own. 😦 Because of school and my internship I have slightly neglected my regimen. Notice I did not say my hair! Until February I was still keeping up with my regimen. Then I found out that my close cousin (more like my brother) had been murdered. It was a rough time for me and I just stopped caring…for lack of a better word. Through God’s healing time and comforting love, I now feel much better but my heart still hurts for my aunt, who lost her only son. Prayers are always appreciated.

So during that time through May (which was when I graduated with my Masters in Counseling Psychology) I would spray my hair with a mixture of water, aloe juice, kinky curly conditioner and then seal with oil. I did not deep condition my hair but maybe once a month and I still have not. Terrible I know BUT and I can tell the difference because I have had a lot of shedding and a small amount of breakage.

May, right before graduating I had twist put in my hair and kept that through my cruise in June. I continued to spray my hair with the mixture above and oil…that was it. I took the braids out as soon as I got back from my cruise cause I missed my natural hair (we have a bond :)). So end of June the braids were no more and it was back to my fro. I washed it with Castile Soap, conditioned it, and rocked a wash n go.

More recently, when I got tired of my fro (yep we have a bond butttt at times I get bored…more often than not), I put in two strand twist after being inspired by youtuber ritamayjune (her’s were fierce). YEP, did it all by myself. It took me 6 hours to do with many small two – five minute breaks. (Hubby took care of baby and cooked dinner…I love that man :)). I did it on dry unwashed hair. I conditioned each section using kinky curly leave in conditioner and The Mane Choice hair Butter. They turned out very nice and I kept them in for seven days. They started looking raggedy at that time, so I took another five hours to take them out. I will be installing more. And soon.

So that’s the catch up, below are some pics to confirm my stories 🙂

What I was rocking prior to graduating.

My graduation/cruise do

Two Strand Twist install and length check

attempting to band so I can have more length

The finished product 🙂

RIP Con…ILY and miss you.

BHC

My catchy title is abbreviated for baking soda, henna, and castile soap. No relation. So I will not be using baking soda to open my cuticles because , through research, I found that it can be damaging to hair. And I just don’t want to add a typing unnecessary yo my reforming to be totally honest. So I will rely on heat and an old friend of mine – castile soap- to open my cuticles to allow moisture and other good nutrients in 🙂 I,ve had an on-off relationship with castile soap but I think I am sticking with my initial good vib about this product. It turns out that the reason. Y hair was so well moisturized earlier in my BC days was because the castile soap was opening my cuticles and allowing the moisture in. So I’m going back to those days especially since I have been experiencing dry scalp recently. So my regimen will change by adding this step back into my wash days. I will wash my hair weekly with the castile oil mixture that I made.

So, henna huuuummmmmm where to start….well imma make it short. I tried henna before. It was very hard and messy to apply. Then the end result did not work. Well turns out that I used the wrong type of henna, I should have used body art quality henna instead of the $4.00 jar I purchased. So this time I was in. Y favorite neighborhood natural store and saw another jaw of henna priced at $6.00 🙂 so hopefully thesis a better grade. Hahahahaha!!! Yeah right! But I a sitting here with it in my hair now so we will see shortly. I followed the direction and used a cup of boiling water and because I have a few (wink wink) gray hairs I added two tablespoons of ACV which is supposed to help it attach to the grays. The consistent at that point was terrible and was not sticking to my hair. I remembered watching a video on YouTube about adding oil to it to change the consistency to allow it to adhere better to your strands so i added a good amount of castor oil. OMGosh it worked out so
much better.

So while the consistency was better and I could smooth it onto my strands the henna did not take to my hair. It did take to my hands though. Yeah I forgot gloves ..hahaha jokes on me 😦 my next attempt will be with online brought henna!!! Going to order right now…stay tuned for review.