Saturday, 17 April 2021

Blogging from A to Z challenge: O is for Oils

#AtoZChallenge 2021 April Blogging from A to Z Challenge letter O 

Yesterday I wrote a whole lot about Nightblooming and how I'm generally not big on DIY or kitchen witching. It also extends to using oils in general.
It's weird, because using oils seems to be such a must, or even the norm among super long hairs. But nope, I never really got into it.

I have a few oils I always keep at hand, but I'm not really good at making it a routine to use them.
I have a bottle of hemp oil at my massage therapists place instead of using her standard oil, but that's about how much routine my oil usage is.

For skin I always have: Argan and hemp oil. 

Hemp oil has a bit of a special place in my heart: Many years ago, I was outside on a hot summer day in some new slippers. I don't know how or why, but it was like the slippers caused a chemical burn or something on the bottom of my feet. I have never experienced that before or after. It hurt and burned! No matter what I did with cold water and creams, it just kept burning. I whined on LHC and someone recommended hemp oil. Hemp oil soothed the pain immediately! Since then, I've always had hemp oil at hand, but I haven't figured out a routine with it.

For hair: Coconut oil, argan oil and Nightbloomings Jasmine Green Tea mister.

Coconut oil has some solid science behind it as being good for hair, but unfortunately it immediately clogs up my pores, so I need to be very careful to keep it away from my skin.
Argan oil is generally good for both skin and hair.
The Jasmine Green Tea mister just smells really nice and is good for keeping my ends from drying up when I braid it or put it up.

Friday, 16 April 2021

Blogging from A to Z challenge: N is for Nightblooming

#AtoZChallenge 2021 April Blogging from A to Z Challenge letter N

It's no secret that I were never much of a kitchen witch. I think it's cool that some people can whip up all these awesome potions for skin and hair in their own kitchen, but I honestly could never really bother.
 
Since my allergies to aloe vera pressed with skin and sea buckthorn have only become worse, I'm good with leaving it to everyone else and sticking to things that are properly labelled by people in lab coats, thankyouverymuch. Basically, at this point I can't trust anything that is an "extract", since I never know if the material used to extract with is aloe vera pressed with skin, or some other nasty I react to.

The only exception I have to this rule, is Nightblooming. Who I know and trust well enough to use her products. (And who is generally an all-around cool person and wrote some classic hair literature
So whenever I post pictures of myself with cassia mud smeared all over, it's always from Nightblooming.


Writing about this made me want to do a cassia mud treatment. I haven't bothered to do those for a long while by now. 
I keep a batch of boiled and frozen Rusalki Strawberry Blonde Herbal Henna Hair Color and Conditioner ready in the freezer for this. Supposedly boiling and freezing the herbs makes the plant cells break down to release the "actives" in them better.


The Rusalki is a mix and doesn't dye a whole lot, but since I want to get the can-only-spot-it-if-you-know-it effect and vague watercolour from it, I felt that three little chunks of 17 grams would be enough. 


Some people do their cassie/henna mud with just water, but I like mine as a conditioner base, so I get a good, regular conditioning at the same time. It seems to work, but of course the herbal purists always tell me I'm wrong. Meh. I'm okay with that.
I added a bottle of (ridiculously overpriced) Olaplex to it. Olaplex never really "did" anything for me, but if the science is right, it's a good product and a good choice for a long conditioning. 


100 gram of Organic Cassia Obovata to the mix. Mmm, smells like fresh peas and green vegetables.


And then I pretty much "filled up" until it had a nice, thick muddy texture. I reviewed the OGX Biotin & collagen a while back and thought it was the best choice for deep conditioner out of the four OGX I tried. So it will serve as the base for that again.


A good rinse and letting my hair semi dry again. 
Also, a before-picture. Not that I expect to be able to spot any colour difference. I actually hope I can't. 


Henna-cassia mud sexiness.
Getting it everywhere is kind of hard to avoid!


Cling wrap, bandage and... Hmm, something missing....


Doing the eyebrows too!
This mixture was surprisingly less drippy than usual. I don't know if it was the OGX Biotin & collagen or just that since cassia is a natural product, it's never 100% the same. 
I usually spend the first hour in the bathtub just because the unavoidable dripping is so much less annoying there, but I ended up cutting it a lot shorter and getting out.
I will definitely use the OGX Biotin & collagen as base again if it is what keeps the damn dripping down.


The heatcap, which mr Igor had named "The Smurf" for obvious reasons. I think I managed to kill four hours like this before I got bored.


Rinsed clean and can't see any colour difference. Good!


Still moist, braided and still can't see any colour difference. Maybe a little in the eyebrows, strange enough?


Fully dried and up in a braided Nautilus bun. Maybe it's the contrasting, green hoodie, but now I actually think I can see a little bit of a tint. Not at the length, but at the scalp it seems a tiny bit more red than normal. But this is the can-only-spot-it-if-you-know-it tint I wanted, so I'm happy. 
And my hair felt generally happy. It looks shiny and nice. 


Melissa/Nightblooming is found the following places: 

And speaking of Nightblooming, her Etsy store is turning 14 years old this week!
She usually has a sale going on around her store's birthday, so it's worth checking out.

Thursday, 15 April 2021

Blogging from A to Z challenge: M is for Music

#AtoZChallenge 2021 April Blogging from A to Z Challenge letter M

On a whim, I decided to go for "music" for M for a fun little break from all the text. But once I started looking, I found a lot. Like, fascinatingly much.


Andrew Bird - Music Of Hair


AOA - Short hair


The Beatles - Lend me your comb


Bright Eyes - Pull My Hair


D.A.D. - I Won't Cut My Hair


India.Arie - I Am Not My Hair ft. Akon


The Cowsills- Hair


Hair - The Hair song


Julie Brown - Cause I'm a Blond


Kelly Rowland - Crown


Lady Gaga - Hair


Led Zeppelin - Long Brown Wavy Hair


Niki and Gabi - Hair tie


Nina Simone - Black Is The Color Of My True Love's Hair


Little Mix - Hair ft. Sean Paul


MAGIC! - Let Your Hair Down


Pavement - Cut Your Hair


R. Kelly - Hair Braider


Sesame Street - I Love My Hair


Solange - Don't Touch My Hair ft. Sampha


The Vamps - Hair Too Long


UFO YEPHA- Op med håret
("Put your hair up", literally "Up with the hair")


Willow Smith - Whip My Hair

Okay, the last one is about beards but still...


Natalie Portman's Shaved Head - Beard lust

Wednesday, 14 April 2021

Blogging from A to Z challenge: L is for Leave in conditioners

#AtoZChallenge 2021 April Blogging from A to Z Challenge letter L 

Back on the 3rd I mentioned the three most important tips for growing hair long, that I encountered with I first found the longhair circuit.

Blogging, Conditioner-based washing methods, and number three is using leave in conditioners. 

Leave in conditoners are awesome!
They make hair so much easier to manage by both adding slip and grip depending on the product. They add some hold and control to your updos. They add shine and a nice scent. They protect your hair from wear and weather. Some even have UV protection!
(And if they don't, you can usually get away with adding a tablespoon of regular SPF to a 200 ml bottle without messing too much with the product)

Depending on your hair type and what you want from them, there is something for everyone.

In short: They are awesome and everyone should use them.

Tuesday, 13 April 2021

Blogging from A to Z challenge: K is for Ketylo

#AtoZChallenge 2021 April Blogging from A to Z Challenge letter K

The Ketylo hair stick is something I don't think gets enough credit in the longhair circuit.
Although there are other hair tool makers out there who have tried to copy the idea, Ketylos have the best shape from what I've seen.

Why do I find Ketylos so brilliant?

Simple. The vague corkscrew shape. Not too much, not too little.


For someone with as much hair as me, it helps me with two important things:

1) Inserting the hair stick. Instead of pushing into a single, stuck track, you can screw the hair stick in. It helps the stick to find the path of least resistance through your hair instead of being forced in a pre-set path. You can never get the strain on your hair 100% uniform, so you want to avoid the high tension spots that can hurt you.

2) It helps ease the load of holding up the updo. If your updo doesn't feel completely comfortable, simply rotating the Ketylos can pinpoint a position where your stick is more comfortable than another. For someone who absolutely hates messing with her hair once it has been put up, this is an important point.