New Jeans using Dylon Machine Dye

Hi guys! This isn't a hair related post, just a little clothing DIY that I'm pretty happy with. Finding a good pair of jeans takes forever for me, I like my jeans to have a bit of stretch in them otherwise I get that huge gap in the back caused by my waist measurement being smaller than my hip measurement. In fact for a long time, I stopped wearing trousers altogether as I could never find a pair that properly fit. So when I finally found jeans that fit me a bit better (Topshop's Leigh Jeans) I was so excited! Unfortunately the price tag didn't excite me - Leigh Jeans are £38-£40 a pop - and for a poor student such as myself, buying several pairs would be out of the question. So when my old ones developed a rip in the thigh that I couldn't mend, I couldn't buy new ones. What to do? What to do? DIY of course!

Instead of buying a full price pair of blue Leigh Jeans, I decided to I buy these jeans for £15 in the Topshop sale and dye them blue:

I looked for a pair of jeans that were quite light in colour and already had dark blue, black or brown stitching. The stitches are made from polyester and therefore can't be dyed to a different colour so if you want the jeans to look like you bought them blue check the stitching on the outside and the inside (because the inside may peek through to the outside). The inside of these jeans use pink thread but it doesn't show through so I was good to go!

I bought the dye from John Lewis for about £5. The process is easy, the packet dye (rather than the box) comes with the salt and dye already combined and you don't have to do so many washes to rinse out the machine afterwards. I just popped the jeans and dye into the washing machine, used 2 normal spin cycles and I was done.

The colour is more of a grey-blue rather than a jeans blue, but I'm still pretty happy with the results. Because of the two washes, the jeans can come out of the machine feeling a little stiff initially but after a few wears they do soften up and go back to normal. So all in all a new pair of Topshop Leigh Jeans for £20!

Maz x   

Mariama's Hair Regimen

I’m sure none of us have days to waste doing our hair, so I’ve had to reduce down my regimen so I spend as little time as possible during the week doing my hair.

I was...

• co-washing once or twice a week, but who has time for that?! When you have kinky-curly Type 4 hair, your hair can take hours to wash and condition. I tried washing my hair once a fortnight/ once a month but it would get too dirty and dry. Now I try to wash my hair once a week with either the full prepoo-shampoo-deep condition or I co-wash with a deep conditioner (Yeah that’s right, I said deep conditioner!)
• detangle three times, THREE! What a waste of a day! I used to finger detangle, use a wide-tooth comb and then use a Denman. But to be honest, once your hair is detangled, it’s detangled. Doing it three times is just pointless. I tried just finger detangling for a while instead of combing but didn’t notice any difference in the amount of hair I was losing, it took FOREVER and my hair was more knotty than when I was using combs. Now I detangle my hair wet once a month with a Denman and the rest of the time using a wide-tooth comb.
• have a lot of conditioners (…in fact I still do, heh) but I’ve decided to stop experimenting and stick with two or three conditioners. But I have allowed myself the pleasure of experimenting with leave-in conditioners, but I am only allowed to buy one at a time!
• buy expensive oils because everyone was raving about them. Now when making my own products I use only a few ingredients and I cut out the more expensive oils like jojoba oil, argan oil and vitamin E oil. Instead I use much cheaper alternatives that were already high in vitamin A & E. Macadamia nut oil is a much cheaper alternative to jojoba oil, and like jojoba is similar to sebum. If you’re allergic to nuts and would rather avoid them then you can use the even cheaper apricot kernel oil. Altogether I have a collection of six oils that I buy in bulk and use to make my skin oil, hair oil and hair butters. 

Products I use (this list isn’t here to make you run out and buy these products, it’s more to encourage you to find products that work for you.)

Prepoo, Shampoo & Deep Conditioner

L’Oreal Expertise EverSleek range + my hair oil. There are two sub-ranges: Smoothing & Intensely Nourishing or Smoothing and Moisturing, what the difference is I’ll never know. I just buy whichever one is there. I tried the EverRiche line for dry hair, but I prefer these ones instead. 

Co-wash

Depending on which one is on sale (because I like to save my pennies) I use Herbal Essences Hello Hydration, Beautiful Ends Intensive Mask (the conditioner was kind of meh, but this I like) or Dove Nourishing Oil Care Hair Therapy Conditioner.

Styling Products

I make my oil mix and hair butter myself.

For my edges, buns and puffs, I use aloe vera gel and sometimes Zainab’s puff cream (which she told me she’ll tell you about soon).

Phew, all done. Tell me about your regimens!

Maz xx

How I Shampoo & Deep Condition my Type 4 Natural Hair

Hi guys! Here's part 2 of the video about washing my hair. You are now members of the small group of people who have seen me first thing in the morning. Gah!!! Anyways, watch away :D

Our first YouTube video!

Hi guys! Finally after months of promising we've finally done our first Youtube video. Sorry for the lack of voiceover but I started doing one and realised my voice is booooring (I'm so used to peppy American voices, so my South London voice sounds dry in comparison). This video is about detangling my hair, enjoy!

  

Bon Annivers(h)aire!!

One year's worth of growth

So guys, it’s been a whole year since I went natural! There have been many highs and lows but overall I’m so glad I did this. Unfortunately, I don’t have any pictures from when I did my semi-big chop (I know… How annoying?!) but I started my natural journey with about two and a half inches of hair. It’s been a huge struggle to get used to my kinky texture, and to be quite honest, I’ve only just started to accept it and care for it the way I should have a long time ago. This has come through writing the blog (which has acted as a record for the way I look after my hair) and also through slowly building a regimen. I know a year sounds like quite a long time but my hair regimen is only just being created. Prior to this, I was just watching YT videos and attempting to copy everything I saw. It was fun but the routines didn’t last, I was growing poor and my arms began to ache from two-strand twisting every 5 seconds. Through reading natural hair articles and picking Mariama’s brain, I’ve been able to build the basic layout for a regimen that is unique to my hair type, texture and length (I need armpit length hair for graduation - 2015 baby! Woop!) I’ve only just entered that awkward length phase but here are some of the things I’ve learnt over the past year and some things I’ve added to my hair care routine:

• Finger Detangling – It’s made such a difference to my understanding of my texture. When you use a comb, you don’t really get to feel what your hair is like. I’ve been able to really get to grips with my 4c hair (hey! An accidental pun!)  and I’ve discovered that it's a bit 4B as it has a couple of clumped kinky-curls tucked away in there. 
• Co-washing – I’ve started washing with conditioner once a week which is slowly improving my high porosity hair and adding moisture. I need to dabble with the products I use but it’s working slowly! I started this at the beginning of my journey and even though it was working so well, I couldn’t keep up with it. I’m a lot more determined now :P 
• Shampoo – I now only wash with shampoo once a month and then detangle thoroughly with my wide tooth comb and my Denman brush. Finding a shampoo that is moisturising is so essential! I use the L’oreal Elvive EverSleek which always works wonders and… it’s sulphate free! 
• Braids and protective styling – I braid my hair all the time now and attempt to keep them in for a maximum of six to eight weeks. I’ve found this is the best length of time to prevent that gross oily clump at my scalp and also to minimise breakage and unnecessary shedding. 
• L.O.C method – Mariama pointed out to me that I never stick with products and see them out ‘til the end! Using my own advice, I have to see this stuff through. My hair has been pretty dry recently so hopefully using a leave in conditioner, oil and then thick cream/butter will make a difference. I started this method a while back and yeah… I gave up (rolls eyes vigorously).
• Blow-drying – I’ve been loving my blow dryer for adding stretch to my afro texture. It makes it a lot easier to do up do’s and protective styles as well as allowing me to see how much my hair has grown. I’ve noticed that where my hair had a lot (and I mean A LOT) of shrinkage, the blow-drying has helped it to stretch permanently but without heat damage. 

This year, I’ve also given up on twist outs and braid outs for definition. It was a sad day but I just realised they weren’t working for me! I’m waiting for my hair to grow out a bit more before I attempt a defined twist/braid out but I will continue to use them to add stretch to my hair before I do a style. My next goal for my natural journey will be moisture retention (in particular for my edges and ends). As I mentioned above, my hair has just been super dry. As I build a cupboard of staple products, I’ll let you guys know but for now, I’ll continue to search!  

Obviously I'm a bit too pleased with my growth here...

Are there any products you use that work amazingly? Spill the beans – comment and email with your questions and suggestions! 

Until next time… Zee xx

What separates a great shampoo from a poo shampoo?

While some shampoos can leave our hair squeaky clean these same shampoos can also strip our hair of all moisture - a big no-no for already dry afro hair. A good shampoo merely cleans whereas a great shampoo cleans, retains moisture and prepares your hair for the next step: conditioner. So what’s in a great shampoo, I’ll explain below!

Over time hair becomes dirty and smelly due to our old friend sebum. Sebum is great at lubricating and nourishing the strand but attracts absolutely everything it comes into contact with: perfumes, smoke, dirt particles, sweat and man other yucky things. All this and more is trapped on your scalp. The basic function of a shampoo is to break down the smelly sebum and stop it from reattaching to the strand during washing and this is done by surfactants. Surfactants are small particles that weaken the bond between your dirt and the hair, allowing your fingers to rub off the dirt and there are three types: anionic, amphoteric and non-ionic. During the rinsing stage the surfactants also prevent the dirt from reattaching to the strand and voila… clean, fresh hair! 

Anionic surfactants have an overall negative charge and are the harshest type of surfactant. The original anionic surfactant was just plain ol’ soap, which actually isn’t that great for hair! Soap causes skin and hair damage by causing an increase in pH and by causing the calcium found in hard water to be deposited onto the scalp. These two things result in dry, brittle hair.  Synthetic anionic surfactants were developed to solve these two problems and include anything ending in: 

• Sulfate
• Sulfonate
• Isethionate
• Sulfosuccinate
• Sarcosinate

These synthetic ones are still pretty harsh, but they’re cheap, cheap, cheap! Why is that bad news? It means big companies tend to use them the most so any shampoo/soap product you have in your house most likely contains mostly anionic surfactants. Even worse, the two most common anionic surfactants: sodium lauryl sulfate and sodium laureth sulfate, are designed to work in hard water (like the water here in London) so strip away all the sebum on your scalp and hair leaving it dry and unprotected. As I’ve said before, sebum stays on the scalp and upper parts of the afro hair strand so the lower (and older!) parts of curly/coily/kinky hair have no sebum to wash away, instead they become damaged by the harsh detergent. Imagine someone who washes their clean hands over and over again, eventually their hands become super dry and the soap causes the skin to break. That’s what happens to your hair! 

On top of all that (!) your hair needs sebum for protection and lubrication, so when you wash it all away your hair is left open to damage until your scalp produces more. Even conditioners, which are meant to ‘replace’ the lost sebum post-shampoo are only synthetic sebum mock-ups, so it’s best to leave some sebum behind when washing. 

Amphoteric shampoos contain both negative and positive groups on the end of their chains. They are the betaines, sultaines and imadizinolium (aka Miranols) derivatives and are much more milder than the anionics. Usually they are combined with the anionics and stop them from adhering to (and therefore cleaning) the strand as strongly.  

Non-ionic components are the mildest cleansing surfactants and aren’t usually used as they don’t foam as well as the others. In actual fact these types of surfactants are very good at breaking down oils, proving that a cleanser doesn’t have to lather for your hair to be clean. Non-ionic surfactants include polyoxylethylene, polyglycerol and ethanolamides.

So when looking for a shampoo, what you want are more of the amphoteric and non-ionic surfactants rather than the anionics. It’s unlikely that you’ll find a shampoo without any anionic products but you want the betaines and sultaines to at least be in the top 5 (and because ingredients are listed from most to least the amphoteric ingredients should probably be listed before the anionic ingredients).

Next time, I’ll tell you about the most important step of hair washing – conditioners! 

Information from:
Bouillon, C (1988) Shampoos and Hair Conditioners. Clinics in Dermatology, Volume 6, Number 3, pp. 83-92
Gray, J. (2001) Hair Care and Hair Care Products. Clinics in Dermatology, Volume 19, pp. 227-236

Natural Hair Product Review: Dr. Bronner’s Magic Organic Hair Crème

Ingredients: Water, Organic Coconut Oil, Organic Ethanol, Organic Jojoba Oil, Organic Fair Deal Hemp Oil, Organic Lavender Oil, Organic Avocado Oil, Organic Quillaja Saponaria Extract, Xanthan Gum, Tocopherol (Vitamin E)

Uses: Leave-In Conditioner.

Packaging:  There are two versions: lavender and peppermint. There is writing all over the packaging that informs you about how eco-friendly and fair the company is to its employees. The lavender comes in a purple bottle and the peppermint in a blue bottle. Both have a pump mechanism, which is very handy when your hands are slippery with hair oil. It can also be pushed down and locked to prevent leakage. The downside of this is that once you get close to finishing the product, it's difficult to get it out (and you can't decant it into a pot as it hardens when exposed to air). Another negative is that the label wraps around the entire bottle so you can't figure out how much has been used.

Scent: It smells like lavender yoghurt! The lavender is the strongest scent then there are tiny hints of coconut, which to me combines to smell more like Greek yoghurt.

Price: The cheapest I found this online for was £7.99 + £3.99 P&P from the Dr. Bronner site (in the US it’s $7.99, the UK is always getting ripped off!) and the same price from feelunique.com (but with free delivery). I bought mine from ASOS using my student discount, but they’ve either run out of stock or stopped selling it. For that price you get 177 ml (6 US fl. Oz.), which is not a lot, but you only have to use a small amount. Mine has lasted me for the last 4-5 months and I’ve been using it weekly.

Slip: Despite it containing so many oils there is very little slip (it may be because of the ethanol) so you can’t use it to detangle after you wash your hair. It took me about 3 or 4 uses to get used to this, now that I’m used to it I don’t mind. Unfortunately it also means that it doesn’t really help to control frizz.

Moisturisationess: Even though it has no slip, my strands stay moisturised for ages. I don’t even have to use oil and shea butter on top to keep the moisture in. I simply seal with oil and twist up my hair and I only have to spray water and apply oil every 1-2 times a week (as opposed to everyday) now that I’ve been using it.

Consistency: It’s very thin and watery, not sticky at all. Because of this it dries quite quickly compared to other heavier creams.

Overall Score: It loses points for the lack of slip, but wins me over because it moisturises and lasts for so long. It also helps that it supports Fair Trade and is eco-friendly. I give it...

 Mariama x