Sunday 20 April 2014

DIY Shea Butter Hair Cream


Ingredients:

150g Shea Butter
50g Coconut Oil
14-28g (1/2 - 1oz) Beeswax (depending on how stiff you want it to be)
1/4 cup of oil (I use a mix of Macadamia Nut Oil and Castor Oil)
10-20 drops of Fragrance oil (if you want)
An empty pot (just clean out one of your old hair cream pots that you no longer use)

I know some people prefer to whisk their Shea Butter mix, but when you whisk any mixture you mix air into it. When I used to whisk my hair mix, it quickly became rancid and I would find mould growing in the cream - not nice! I decided to melt the cream instead, so it would last a lot longer. If one person is using this mix it should last about 6 months. 

I added beeswax so the mix wouldn't be too greasy (Shea Butter is quite greasy) and because the wax really helps to seal in moisture when added to damp hair. You have to make sure you cool the mix with the lid off for a few hours so any steam that builds up will be able to escape or you might end up with bubbles of water in the bottom of the container. Finally it will two days to fully harden to a butter-like consistency (but you can use it after a day) and store it in a cool, dry cupboard.

I bought the Shea Butter, Macadamia Nut Oil and coconut fragrance from Freshskin, the Coconut Oil is the KTC version from Asda (it was a 500g jar for £1.99!) and the beeswax I bought from eBay.

Maz x

Sunday 6 April 2014

Three Styles For That Awkward Length Of Natural Hair

Hey guys, we all know that when you get to that awkward length you feel as if there's not much you can do with it. But I'm here to help! Here are three easy styles to do for short/medium length hair. The first two are especially nice for transitioning hair.


Zee xx

My Puff Crème!

Hey y'all! I’m hoping you’ve seen my video on three hairstyles for short 4c hair, if not, why don’t you check it out here eh?
In that video I created a puff (one of my best yet) using a mixture I created quite a while back at the start of my natural journey. If you’ve ever had a problem slicking down your edges and products such as Eco Styler Gel don’t work, then my puff crème is definitely something you should try out.  It’s a very moisturising equivalent to gels which can typically leave your hair feeling crunchy, dry, brittle and not to mention flaky! 

With 4C hair, allowing our delicate edges to become brittle alongside our already tight curl pattern can lead to breakage and loss of our edges. Yeah... I’ve been there before :/  So try this out if you’re looking for soft, moisturised and slick edges. 

You will need:
  • 2 tablespoons of Vegetable Glycerine 
  • 4 large tablespoons of Eco Styler Gel (I use the Moroccan/Argan Oil version)
  • 1 and a half tablespoons of Sweet Almond Oil
  • A large empty container
  • A spoon to mix the ingredients together
It’s pretty simple… just dump all of the ingredients into your clean pot and stir well! The mixture should become a white colour with a slightly heavier consistency than the Eco Styler Gel you’ve used. That’s it!

I normally spray my edges lightly with water before I apply this, but if my hair is well moisturised, it can also be used on dry hair. It leaves no flakes, smells delish and dries clear. I hope you find this useful. Let me know how it works! 

Zainab xx

Saturday 5 April 2014

End Papers - Yay Or Nay?

Hi guys! I do love my old twist-out but now that my hair is a bit longer I've decided to become a bit more adventurous style-wise. I thought I 'd try something with a little more va-va-voom, so I decided to try out a Twist & Curl! There's also been a bit of hoo-ha about end papers and whether they're any use so I decided to test them out, and being the poor student that I am, I found a suitable alternative that is in your kitchen cupboard - greaseproof paper!

The perm rods have tiny bumps on them which sometimes grab on to strands of my hair so I first wrapped all of the rods in paper for protection.


I twisted about three quarters of the way down the twist and then rolled the endpapers on to the end of the twists on the left side of my. All the twists on one half (in the picture I am facing you so it's the right side) have endpapers on the actual end of the twist. The other half have the untwisted ends left bare (in the pictures the left side) and I wrapped them around the paper covered rod. The side without end papers took me about 30 minutes to do. Putting the end papers around the twist was quite fiddly and difficult at first so it took about 20 minutes longer to do that side, but once I got the hang of it it wasn't too bad. It ended up taking an hour and half to put 24 twists in my hair.

My L side
My R side


When I finished the twists

 I then left them to dry overnight and the next morning removed the rods...

Removing the perm rods from my left side

R side with no rod
L side with no papers

So the left side with the end papers was a lot sleeker than the R side and had better curl definition. After I had removed all of the rods and before I had separated, this is what my hair looked like:


Then I separated the pieces (I split each segment into two or three) and fluffed out my roots, here is the end result:


Both ways have their pros and cons. I would say that with end papers you get much more curl definition but it's a lot more fiddly to put on the papers so takes longer to do. On the other hand without end papers you sacrifice curl definition and end up with a fluffy airy 'fro look but obviously it's quicker to do as it's less fiddly. Of course you could just have fewer twists which would significantly cut down your time.

I prefer the fluffier look (but then again I'm quite lazy and want everything to be done asap). The style lasted for about one week before I had to put it in a puff, however the curl definition at the ends really lasted, it remained for about 9 days.

I'll probably be doing this again and I'll film a tutorial so I can show you guys exactly how I did it.

Maz xx