Nubian Heritage and Shea Moisture, winning in the game?

So Shea Moisture and Nubian Heritage is winning in the game. They just released a hair color product to rave reviews, including the art on the packaging.

I feel like this and also the rave reviews and success of Curly Nikki's book Better than Good Hair are indicative of a shift in power as of late. WE can be successfully marketed to AS WE ARE, and not in a way that sells us a version of ourselves we can only "aspire to." It brings me joy, makes me smile, makes me believe we are getting a step closer to my whole "it's just hair" mantra. I love the energy.

I found this interview part 1 and part 2 and I can really respect the whole business model, and the fact these products are available on the ground, at Target and Walgreens for me, and AFFORDABLE.  Walgreens stays having a BOGO on these products :-)

I've posted about their products quite a a few times on this blog and I will some more :-)

Particular favorites of mine are the smoothie, the heat protect leave in (I now LOVE the strong smell, and even bought the lotion) and the wrap mousse gave me the best press yet after a roller set. I'm trying to figure out the gel and souffle and the milk was a little too light for me.  I am also still avoiding products that are primarily coconut oil based.  My skin is not giving me any wiggle room on that :-/

So is anyone going to try the hair color? What are your favorite Shea Moisture/ Nubian Heritage products?

They also make lotions and soaps. How do you like those?

Oh Yeah. The blog. The press.

So I have been active on Twitter and Facebook, but have greatly neglected the blog :-(
It all started with me catching the dog-gone flu for NYE and being down for a week.  So I didn't get the picts I wanted for the press post. And then, and then... I just kinda took a break lol.

I'm catching up though!  I have picts for days! I'll start with what I did have from the press I did before I left for the holidays.  I get better at pressing and maintaining it each time!

This was the fastest and most long lasting press yet.

I roller set it, using Nubian Heritage Honey & Black seed wrap mouse instead of gel, and it dryed in about 80 minutes, which is record time for me! Then as I took out each curler I ran the section once over with my flat iorn on 330. It went so fast! and the curls from the roller set stayed put so I didn't have to sleep in curlers early on to create curls.  I was simply done, and never even had to re-curl it! This is the winning process for me.

The other thing I did was make my own pomade to use throughout the life of the press. I took a small glass jar and combined castor oil, two teaspoons of beeswax pellets, some grapeseed oil and some fragrance oils and microwaved it just long enough to melt the beeswax. I got a nice solid pomade once it cooled, which had the wax I like to keep my hair smooth throughout the press. I've discovered that for my fine hair I need that heavy coating to combat reversion and frizz.  it also seems to lock in whatever moisture I had from the wash and set process.  Thus my hair did not dry out for many many days. I could have gone 2 weeks, but I felt my hair was far too dirty for my liking after 9 days.

I took most of these pictures on day 4.
The 1st picture below is one I took right after I finished pressing it.

Fluffy Wash&Go! Product combo I Like

It's been a rough week for me over here. One of those weeks where you spend a lot of time thinking and ruminating while physically balancing work, home life and social life yet there is nothing really even happening, but nothing... lol.

And there lies the rub. And the energy you thought you had all just goes in that hole with the nothing.
But everything still got done! And it many ways it was a great week, indicative of the changing season.

I have yet to set my hair for a roller set of any sort to kick start the fall.  But I have been doing more Bang and Buffs, and I found a conditioner I love.  Suave Professionals Black Raspberry and White Tea Color care conditioner.  It smells DIVINE, it has a ton of yummy ingredients BEFORE the fragrance and I could really feel a thickening and coating effect.  yum yum yum.

I love the smell of the V05 Blackberry and sage $1 conditioner, and this has that type of scent but the added hair yum effect for $2.50.

I did a co-wash with that and applied some Nubian Heritage Heat Protect Leave-In Conditioning Cream Honey & Black Seed. Now this stuff has a STRONG smell.  STRONG!!  Off putting at first because it's so STRONG! lol.

STRONG.

But it smells like a chocolaty hazel-nutty vanilla sandlewood sweet earthyness..... Not bad by any means... I was out once recently and a random girl was like wow you smell like cocoa butter, and the guy next to her was like... yeahhhhhhh... lol

But the smell has grown on me and a little goes a long way.  It's like the Shea moisture smoothie but is isn't as sticky and yet it goes a little further. It is also absent any coconut oil that I can decipher.  (oh I must tell you how definitively incompatible Coconut is to my skin!) So I used that and some castor oil and then a scant amount of my KMF gel because I wanted my hair to be big.  These picts are of day 2 hair, the morning after pinappling my big fluffy do from the night before.  (the first two picts I shot on a whim, before I put any makeup on, orrrrr took my eye makeup off from the night before lol. Excuse the morning face lol)

I really liked the way this combo of products played out!  It was soft and defined and the pinappling really stretched it out.  I'm back at APL so I get a little hang time.  PLUS, even without heavy gel, I got an additional day of "out hair" and today I have a high buff.

And if you are still with me- I promised a picture of my fancy painting job in my dining room.  I cleaned up in there and did a little decorating. voilà, magic. Or errrr, periwinkle....

Braces Update and coils picts after trim

I swear my visits to the orthodontist sometimes feel like a test of my pain threshold. You know that moment when you know someone is going to do something to hurt you, and there is nothing you can do about it- so you brace yourself?  Then you can stand practically anything for like 10 seconds. A shot, blood drawing, splinter or ingrown hair... whatever.  You can handle it.

SO at the ortho- they go to take the bands off, which always hurts. My bottom teeth are still super sensitive though, as they have been moving all month. (see exibits A and B below.) So I brace myself... ok taking bands off. It extra hurts but it has to be done. cool. cool.  I only flinch a little.

She says I'll get the same wire. Cool.  Then she takes the wire out after looking around a bit... hu?  Then she comes back with a file looking skinny thing, and tells me its like a nail file and tells me I'll feel pressure between my bottom teeth.  My super crowded, can hardly get floss in, sensitive bottom teeth...

I have but a split second to brace myself, and then it feels like the most cruel sandpaper being forced between my aching teeth. I flinched hard and she asked if I was OK- to which I quickly responded YES (part of the bracing of self hardcoreness I was attempting).

So she moves on to the other side of the tooth and, NO I'm not OK, and I am about to stop her and she's like "awww I know these teeth are sensitive, I'm almost done..."  so I refrain.  BUT DAMN. She attempts to go between one more, which I know I won't be able to tolerate, but this time she can't even get the "saw" in between the teeth. She says "wow, some very tight contacts here, this tooth has nowhere to go" and gives up.  Pheeewwwww!! After re banding them- which was a breeze in comparison, she sends me off saying lets watch my bottom teeth continue to "unravel."

Now my whole bottom jaw is aching. Great.

But look how much they moved over the past month. (yep switched to silver on bottom after debating purple for a sec lol.)
May 21st > June 25th


As for my hair...
I had been severely neglecting it over the past few weeks as I dealt with some ailments and tragedies in my family and around home. I had been starting off with a wash and go and then not moisturizing, not protecting it at night as I slept in various places (such as hospital suites, my childhood bed, a chair... standing up lol).  I hardly had time to wash and de-tangle once in those few weeks, not at home, no deep conditioning, no time to protective style. So last week when I returned to work, while drifting off  at my desk I was partaking in a nice hand in hair session when I noticed an abundance of single strand knots and hair that was simply coming off the end of my hair in my hand. Perturbed, I actually took my work scissors and cut away some of the worst offenders right then and there, rather than have them get lost in my hair again and begin to work in more innocent bystanders.

After another day of making the same discoveries knew I had to cut some hair off my ends all over and be done with it. :-(
I cut my hair wet with conditioner, with my professional sheers, practically curl by curl.  I ended up taking off 1-1.5" all over.  Hardly noticable while shrunken, but if I press again I've set myself back a few months.

Now imagine- some naturals never protect their hair at night, and don't know how to properly moisturize or seal their ends.  3 weeks and I effectively knotted up the ends of my hair. There really is something to taking those few extra steps to preserve length!!  At home I have silk pillow cases, and I use castor oil to seal, steam in the shower, a few different leave ins... It doesn't take much, but it takes something. 

My ends look great now! I took a few flicks of a chunk I pulled down yesterday.  I have in it Paul Mitchel's The Conditioner, Eco styler gel and had refreshed with steam and Nubian Heritage (read this! the same thing happened to me in CVS when I picked this up) Heat Protect Leave-In Conditioning Cream Honey & Black Seed. It has a VERY strong scent and I'm not yet sure if I can deal, but I will keep you posted when I am able to try it alone.