Weekend Hair extended through the week with updoes

A few weeks ago my home girl in the front of the pic below (she's sporting a nice twistout BTW) had a birthday party at a club and I wanted to wear my hair out big and curly. I did a wash and go, but went easy on the gel, which means I had volume, but usually I have to de-tangle and start over after 3 days.  The frizz and knots take over if I don't use a lot of gel to keep the curls defined as separate.

Here is a documentation of the wear of this lightly set wash and go over the days.

Here is day 3. The frizz has begun to set in but in this super cold weather I wasn't ready to wet it again so soon.

The end of day 4. The frizz has taken over.

The rest of the picts are various updoos I did on days 5-7.  I let it get damp in the shower and then did loose flat twists to create a way to pull the rest of it up.

 

A Twistout

I have not done a twistout in a long time and having gotten a little bored with my wash&goes = Ta-da! Time to revisit.

I twisted it wet with KMF gel, castor oil and KMF mistreated conditioner as my leave in.

Of coarse it was not dry in the morning so I had to wear my ropey twists to work. I decided to put them into an updo.  I used pins and just made circles all over my head.  The front two twists were dry so I took those apart and looped them backwards... like so... (I wish you could hear how I just said that in my head lol)

So then I took them apart that evening and I was a bit disappointed.  They were super tight and the ends were not uniform.

SO I took them apart very carefully and didn't separate them many times, trying to keep the frizz down, since then ends weren't coming apart cleanly.

So still meh... It was unwieldy and the shape wasn't quite right. I decided to use my blow dryer to streatch it out and I used gel on the worst of the ends to get them back under control.

So I kinda fixed it :-) I was able to enjoy it for a few days. But ultimately the inconsistency of the pattern and the ends took over. By day 3 it was pretty done for :-(

I'd have to make the twists smaller, and I have to re-examine the KMF gel for twists.  It really takes the volume out of them by removing most of the frizz factor, then the frizz that does exists looks inconsistent.

All said, I prefer my wash and go coils better, and its much faster to set it with gel and just let my pattern do what it does.  However I do want to maintain my ends this summer to keep some length for once.  I'll have to figure out some more styling options like this one.

Buff with a twist, possible protective style

I have been a wash and going fiend, even throughout the winter.  My dingle coil method works so well I just can't stop!

The trade off is that I may need to trim a bit more than is optimal for growing my hair out.  I am on the fence whether I really want to let it grow crazy, or keep it at a controllable bra-strap length.  I don't even really know that the fairy knots won't win out, as my hair is very fine and splitty and knotty as it gets older.

But meanwhile, I know the wash and goes need to be bunned or twisted as they get a few days old.  I have been defaulting to a half back look or something like in the picts below. The good old BUFF, with a twist or two in front.  The twist is necessitated by the fact I was even letting my bang grow out (alas, I trimmed it this past weekend in a fit of blindness).

It's a quick style I can leave in for a few days, getting me 7-8 days between washes.

Its just a big flat twist on both sides.  By placing the twist a little further back, the sections that create it are visible and create extra detail as you see below. 

So onto product real quick.  I decided to try out the Nubian Heritage Repair and extend Shine Gel.  You may notice that bit of extra shine in the pictures.  That stuff is shiny indeed.  But its very much like the Shea Moisture Souffle.  It's Sugar based, sticky and greasy and I feel like although there is potential, I can't quite figure out how to use it. The shine is excellent, the hold is medium, but it is moisturizing. Has anyone had any use mixing or using one of these products?  Let me know. I will continue to try things until I run out. I'll post shortly the experience I had mixing it with KMF gel.