Products

End of the world.. what do you take?

 

I love the show The Walking Dead. I love the whole zombie genre. Sad as it may be, my husband and I have a disaster/ zombie plan in place for it all.

So here is my scenario/question for you: You have a plan in place, and the day finally comes:The Zombie Apocalypse! Because you were prepared, you are either safely tucked away in a remote area with your supplies, or well on your way there.

Do you have hair products with you? If so what do you have!?

Hair Care Organization.

I know that there are some people out there, who THRIVE on organization. The container store is the epitome of excitement for them and they can’t watch hoarders. Kudos to them. I wish I had that kind of love for it.

For me, organization is a chore. A hard one at that. A friend once pointed out to me “You like to have everything you own in view.” I’ve come to realize this is true. But when you have to work at being organized, this is totally not a good thing. Stuff just ends up in piles.

Same with my hair supplies. I would love for it to be out on my bathroom counter, but there isn’t enough room. To top it all off, I rarely do my hair at the bathroom counter. I am usually in front of my computer or plunked down in front of the television watching Toddlers and Tiaras something informative.

Clips, headbands, flowers, butters, gels, etc, it is a lot to keep track of. How do you do it? Me? I throw everything into a medium sized tote that has a lid. It makes sense to me because it is big enough to hold all of my stuff, but small enough that I can drag it where I need it. If I was going for super organized, I would band my clips together, get a smaller container for my flowers and headbands to place within the container, but…I’m not that organized. I take something out and I throw something in. It works for me!

 

So what do you do to keep organized?

Product Review- Honey and Oats Shampoo Bar

 

Good afternoon! After yesterday’s mini-rant, I am coming at you today with a product review.

Today’s review comes from the Etsy store Bobeam- Natural Products by Laquita. This is what she says about her shop:

Bobeam's specialty is shampoo bars made with all natural ingredients and they can be used on all hair types, including locs. The shampoo bars contain no SLS or SLES, detergents, surfactants, or sulfates. They are all-natural, 100% vegetable soap, non-comedogenic, hypo-allergenic and biodegradable. Feel free to check my ingredients on www.cosmeticsdatabase.com/
Bobeam from the Ghanaian language Twi means 'the way it was created' and it characterizes all of the shop items - they are all handmade.

The product I am reviewing is the Honey and Oats Shampoo Bar

Taken from her Etsy store

This is what her shop says about this bar:

Pamper your hair with honey and oatmeal :o) This 4oz shampoo bar is made with oatmeal and honey, and will leave your hair super soft!
It's packed with honey and smells good enough to eat!
Oatmeal - There are several DIY oatmeal hair shampoo/rinses for your hair - here’s a way to use oatmeal without the mess or trial of rinsing it out of your hair.
There are traces of tiny grains of oatmeal in the bar which gently exfoliates your scalp and rinses away clean.
Honey adds shine and is a humectant, which means it holds moisture. It is a natural antiseptic full of antioxidants. It also provides softness and shine.
It is packed with vitamins and minerals such as magnesium, potassium, calcium, sulphur, iron, zinc and vitamins B1, B2, B3, which aid in hair growth.
*Shampoo bars can be used as body soaps as well*
*Shampoo bars are unscented unless specified*

Packaging: This bar came in plain cardboard colored packaging. It was also wrapped in saran wrap, which I greatly appreciated.

First impression: No scent (On her site it tells you that unless it is stated, everything is unscented), which, I am not sure how I feel about this. I love pretty smells, but I understand the draw for people that are allergic to such things. I really like how this bar looks. It is layered with a solid layer, then an opaque layer.

First use: When I use solid shampoos (only kind I pretty much use now), I break off a piece and using a downward motion, I rub the shampoo on my hair. I would say this bar has a medium lather. I also used it instead of my normal body wash.

First use thoughts: My hair felt clean, and didn’t feel stripped. It cleared my hair of any buildup I had (and I had a lot; thanks a lot Cantu Shea Butter! *coughs*), and my hair felt good afterwards. It doesn’t really add any additional moisture to my hair, but retains what I have.  My body felt good as well. My body (as well as my hair) dries out really easily, and this didn’t strip any moisture and make me feel as if I have scleroderma like some washes do.

Continued use thoughts: I like this shampoo, I like it so much, I threw out the bottle of stuff that I purchased a while ago (Skala I think it’s called). This works much better for me. Sometimes when I am rinsing my hair, shampoo gets in my mouth. With the Skala when it got in my mouth, it was this nasty chemical taste. Horrid. I don’t get that with this shampoo bar. Yay!

One thing I would want to see with this bar is maybe some sort of scent. That is just me though, I know there are people out there that would appreciate the fact that this has no scent to it.

Other than that, this is a good product. It lasts a long time, a little bit goes a long way, and it is good for both your body and hair.

Hair on a trip.

 

 

Most people when they travel take one of two modes of transportation; car or plane. While gas prices are steadily going down (at least in my part of the world), they are still pretty high, making an extended car trip possibly as expensive as a plane ticket.

Our solution? The train. You win some and you lose some with the train. The last time we were on, I had a massive headache due to the fact that there were really stinky hippies. Our train last time also was like 5 hours late due to the fact that there was a mudslide in the Pacific Northwest. AKA: Nowhere near where we were, and nowhere near where we were going. Every little thing just went wrong that trip.

We are currently on a train. It is actually going rather well this time, and this leaves me optimistic. We’ve had no issues, except for a rather annoying squeaky voiced child that “loves everyone!”

The last time I was on a train, it was winter time, and my hair was in two strand twists stuffed under a scarf, stuffed under a knitted cap. The knitted cap is no longer an option in the mid west summer (the idea of it in this heat makes me gag a bit). Also, in the interest of not looking like the crazy ass ghetto black lady, I do not have a scarf on my hair. The result? I still look like the crazy ass ghetto black lady.. My hair is just out and looking a wee bit wild. I wanted to learn how to French braid my hair before this excursion, and that just didn’t happen.  On long trips how do you protect your hair without looking crazy as hell? There are enough crazies on this trip (Mullet anyone?) I don’t need to add to the atmosphere.

Product Review- Kyah Alexandria Shampoo & Shower Bar.

 

One of my natural hair idols is Chary Jay. She has a channel on YouTube that I subscribe to. She did a product review on several things on Kyah Alexandria’s line, but this bar stuck out the most to me. She said something along the lines of “it made my hair feel like it had lotion in it.” I am always looking for a product (shampoo especially) to put moisture back into my hair, so I scooped this up along with a leave in conditioner (to be reviewed at a later date).

The packaging.

What the packaging says: Kyah Alexandria Shampoo & Shower Bar- Coconut Paradise with Shea butter for all hair types. Full size All Natural.

Ingredients: Glycerin, Di (deionized) water, Coconut Oil, Sorbitol, Sodium Palmitate, Sodium Stearate, Soybean Oil, Almond Oil, Safflower Oil, Jojoba Oil, Aloe Vera Gel, Shea Butter, Coconut Milk, Vitamin E, Olive Oil, Honey, Tea Tree Oil, Fragrance.

When I watched the initial review of this product, Chary Jay was able to break the bar with her hands. When I received mine in the mail, there was a note in there, stating that because it is getting hotter out, they have added an additional ingredient (jojoba oil I think) to make it more solid, so that it does not melt in the mail. So I had to use scissors to cut a piece off.

It' wasn’t difficult at all.

The Smell: I really enjoyed the smell of this product. You get the coconut smell, which isn’t overpowering at all, and then you get a sweet floral undertone. I held out the chunk I had cut off for my husband to sniff and to get his opinion on it. His response? “It smells sort of like a coconut candy.” The smell was really pleasing

Initial Tryout: I scrubbed my hair with the product, it doesn’t create a massive lather, and that is okay for me. I washed my hair and rinsed it out and paused for a moment before dumping conditioner on my hair. I felt my hair. It felt incredibly moisturized. It does feel like there is some sort of lotion on your hair. it is amazing. I love it.

Further Testing: With further testing I realized that it is easier to slice the bar using the scissors with a knife like motion instead of sawing. Also, while my hair luxuriates in the feel of this shampoo, the shampoo combined with conditioner, combined with the rest of my product line up equates product buildup rather quickly. I can use it about 2 or three times before I need to reach for a clarifying shampoo.

Bottom Line: I really liked how this shampoo made my hair feel. It was soft and manageable. I can’t wait to see how the rest of this product line feels!

Where you can purchase: http://mynaturalcare.com/index.html

Clearing things up.

 

Happy Tuesday everyone! I hope you had a great Memorial Day. I had a decent time, but as I get older, I start thinking more and more about troops. Do you realize we are coming up on the 10 year anniversary of 9/11? I was 19 when all of this went down. I remember staring at the news, wondering how this would change things. I bawled when the news came on yesterday. They were talking of soldiers going to their friend’s funerals. It was sad. Then I read the news and had a o.O moment. You know how the Westboro Baptist Church are a bunch of douche canoes? Well, the KKK came out to counter protest them. Then Westboro got all righteous on the KKK saying that God doesn’t hate people that are different colors.. only the gay ones. Is it too much to hope that they blow each other up?


My hair this week has been weird. Lately it has felt like the product that I apply has been sitting on top of it, rather than absorbing in. The result is my hair feeling dry, but when I touch my hair my hands are all greasy. Ew.

So last night, when I got into the shower, I sprayed my hair down with apple cider vinegar. The apple cider vinegar then got in my eye, which I had to howl for my husband to come take the bottle, because I couldn’t see where to put it. As he walked away I heard him mumble “so many food products in her hair.” LOL. After that debacle, I shampooed and conditioned my hair as normal.

When I got out of the shower, I dried my hair slightly and applied my Belle Butters (which I am running incredibly low on *Sniffle*). I twisted my hair in huge chunky twists and wrapped with a scarf. Since I have just gotten up, I haven’t taken my twists down, but I will keep you apprised of this development.


This weekend, Yelp.com held an event in my area. The Indy 500 was going on (did you guys know that because I live in Indianapolis, they don’t televise the race? Grumblings were had from my husband and his family. I could care less.) so Yelp did The Yelp 500. It was really neat. There was all sorts of different foods to try from different companies. There were supposed to be camels, but not a one in sight! There was music, that wasn’t really my cup of tea, and a very angry and vulgar clown. He was just screaming out “TITS!!” and all sorts of other nonsense. There was a woman with a beautiful natural hair style. She was a photographer for the even though, and I didn’t want to get in her way. There was an old school photo booth as well. Jeff and I got our pictures taken! You can kind of tell I wasn’t really ready.

scan0002

The rest of them came out okay for the most part though LOL.

scan0001

Well, I have some chores to do, some puppies that want to go out, and I have a date.. WITH THE GYM!

Product Review- Cantu Shea Butter leave in conditioning cream

 

After a brief hiatus (in which at one point my husband had to come home for lunch from work because I was crying so hard he couldn’t understand what I was saying, because I was SURE I got a D in my math class, and I couldn’t take that class anymore, and it turns out I got a C and cam move on.) I am back with a product review for you.

I bought the Cantu Shea Butter from the weird hair place around the corner from my house. It is ran by a family. I once went in there asking if they had the crackle polishes. The woman told me no, and asked me why I would want that, as it is ugly and unkempt! I just kind of goggled at her and left. Their nail polish looks old and scary for the most part, so I guess it is a good thing they didn’t have it.

Anyway, I heard of Cantu ever since I had gone natural. I always wanted to try it, but I never really saw it when I was out and about. It wasn’t something that I sought out either. However, when I was buying flower hair accessories in the local hair shop, I saw the leave in conditioning repair cream for $4.99 and decided to pick it up.

The front of the product says the following:

stops and mends hair breakage

leaves hair soft, shiny, and manageable

formulated for severely damaged, dry, or coarse hair

 

Here is the first issue I have with the product; The grammar on the front of the product. There are no capital letters in the previous statements, no periods, however, we have commas. Just looking at the statements drive me batty. Meh.

The product gives you three sets of directions based on what you wanted to do with it. You could use it for daily styling, a leave in treatment, or for frizz free hair. I used it as a daily treatment for the better part of a month

Snapshot_20110516

As you can see, I used about half of the jar. The first thing you notice when you open up the Cantu leave in conditioner is the smell. Oh man! It smells like fruit punch. I had Jeff do a sniff test, and he enjoyed the smell too.  It is a water based leave in conditioner, so it is kind of runny. I liked the fact that it seemed to revive my hair. It made it moist so that I could style it however I chose. A lot of times in the morning, I would put this on my hair and add a little of my Belle Butters and go. When I did two strand twists at night, I would slather this on, and add Belle Butters on top of it, twist my hair and cover it. In the morning it would still be slightly damp and pliable, so I would put it in a poof and go.

After a little bit, I noticed a slight problem. You see, when I do a twist out, just using Belle Butters, My twist outs can last about a week. They get bigger and bigger, and they are fully moisturized. With the Cantu stuff, It would get bigger, but my hair was incredibly dry after two days. The ends of my hair would look crispy and frizzy. It was not cute. When my hair would get like that, nothing could revive it. I would have to co-wash and start over again.

So yes, I don’t think Cantu Shea Butter leave in conditioning repair cream is right for me. It took styles that normally last up to 5-7 days, and made them last only 2-3. It made my hair feel dried out and crispy. I wouldn’t recommend this product.

Have you tried anything by Cantu? What were your results?

Some things to do.

So.. School has started back like I said. IT IS KICKING ME IN THE HIND QUARTERS.
I am tired all the time, I have no focus, and I just ran out of clean underwear.
Damnit.

So, while I am working on some things, I have a website for your to check out!

YAY websites!

While i am studying, I am usually on the twitter. Occasionally you can find my witty comments on the #naturalhair  hashtag on twitter. While I was there, this woman was advertising her amazing website.

http://www.lolasgreenhair.com/

Are you a product junkie that has partially used bottles of product lying around knowing you arent going to use it?
You can use this site to trade or sell it.
I thought this was pretty cool.
Check it out!

She is also a pretty funny blogger. Read about her and her husband "folding the laundry" here

Product Review: Pooka Pure and Simple Shea and Olive Hair Butter

Editors note: While this review is all of my own and my beliefs about the product, Pooka was nice enough to send me a sample of their product.


So, when my sample of Pooka Pure and Simple came in the mail, the mailman actually delivered it to my door. Our mailman is kind of lazy and will cram any package he can into the mailbox, so he doesn't have to get out of his truck, so this was a surprise.

Turns out, it wasn't because he was being nice. We have three cars. Two are kept in the garage. One is on the outside of the garage. We live in a cul de sac, and don't have the room to park that other car out on the side or anything. So that it is easy for Jeff to get out of the driveway, we park the other car at the tail end of the driveway. The bumper juts out into the cul de sac just a touch. Well, it sort of interfered with the mailman getting by and he wanted to know why it was parked like that. I explained it to him and just looked at me like i was stupid. Lazy Mailman.

Anyway, he handed me my package, and the first thing I noticed was the package had a scent. The package itself smelled.. wonderful. It was floral and uplifting and I just wanted to sit there and sniff my package. I opened it up and there were fake flower petals in it, which were delivering the scent. The actual box sat on the ledge near the door for a couple of weeks, so the air was scented. I loved it! I found that the Pooka Girls had sent me this:

Before I talk about the product, lets talk a little about Pooka Pure and Simple. Pooka was an interesting name, and I was tickled pink to find out it was a family nick name! 
(From the website)
The name Pooka actually came from my mom.
She always calls her children her “Pookalitas
(We still haven’t figured out why or what it meant but it was definitely a term of endearment!)

When thinking of a name for the company, that was the first thing that came to mind. Pookalitas was a little too long for the labels, so we just shortened it a bit and came up with....POOKA!


The story of the Pookalitas itself is interesting. It sort of comes from the old adage "necessity is the mother of invention."


With Dawn Fitch, founder and creator– POOKA became a lifelong pursuit when she became mysteriously ill. After numerous visits to doctors and specialists and no sound diagnosis she began to explore alternative therapies, it was here her interest in aromatherapy and its healing and relaxing attributes was born.

She began reading the ingredients of EVERYTHING and became painfully aware of just how much of what we consume is saturated with unhealthy, unnatural ingredients. In an effort to combat illness and stress and the realization that so much of what goes into the body is not good for you, she changed her entire health regime.

Combining her love for aromatherapy and the need to take better care of herself inside and out she began creating her own bath and body products. Just for fun, she took a few of her hand made products to sell at a local festival and sold out! The response was tremendous. That’s when the realization hit that she had an incredible business idea and Pooka was born! 

She knew she couldn’t achieve her Pooka dream alone so she enlisted the help of those closest and dearest to her. Together she and her girlfriends formed Pooka Pure & Simple and today the 4 Pookalitas manage every aspect of Pooka from sales and marketing to finance.

With all this in mind I started testing the product. The first thing I always check for is the smell. I LOVE the smell of this. It kind of smells woodsy. Kind of like a pine tree to me. My husband however, did not like it. He can kick rocks though, I enjoyed it. 

One of the main problems I have with Shea Butter products is the spreadability (I know, it is not a word, deal with it! lol). It seems as if you are sitting there for hours trying to melt the product in your hands unless it is whipped. Pooka's product is spreadable right out of the jar. I wonder if it because of the additional oils added. 

It goes on easy and is well absorbed into my hair. My hair feels thoroughly moisturized with it in. This is a product that I do have to apply daily, but I am okay with that. It is thick enough to be used in twists, twistouts, and any other styles that require major moisture. I would recommend Pooka Shea and Olive butter as a great heavy duty moisturizer.

The ingredients are (listed most to least): Shea butter, olive oil, rosemary oil, and lavender oil.

This product can also be used as a moisturizer for your body. I did try it as a moisturizer, but my husband complained about the scent again. So I had to cease and desist on the body moisturizing

Helping out a friend.

Hi everyone. This, is my friend Shannon

(I had to put a pic on here with her drinking pepsi! LOL)

Shannon is a transitioning natural. She usually wears sew-ins or braids. She has straightened her hair twice in 9 months. The other day she got bold and decided to attempt a twistout. Something didn't go according to plan. 
In Shannon's own words:
"My hair was damp, I used water and a conditioner mix with the TCB Naturals hair and scalp conditioner." 
This was the result of the twistout:
How she ended up wearing it:
And this is how her hair turned out looking by the time she made it to work:
Yeah, wow.
Shannon and I both took a good look at her hair (well, as good of a look as I can take from pics..she lives in NY, I am in Indiana) and her curl pattern when she is natural is slight. She is more wavy than anything. So, I am asking you my Naturalistas, to help a sista out! What can Shannon do to produce a better twistout? This is the TCB Product she used. I know nothing about this. Do you think it is the way she twisted? Is it the products? Do twistouts not work well on wavy hair? Let us know!