Friday, March 9, 2012

Thoughts on Lil Love Bird's Hair Journey

Nia's hair has been on my mind lately as I still am trying to get better at braiding. My mom's been great about styling Nia's hair when we visit each other - including our visit this weekend - and I do all I can to make Nia feel proud of her hair. I ask her all the time, "Where are Nia's curls?" and she lightly touches her hair. I also tell her how much I like her curls and have let her watch Sesame Street's "I Love My Hair" video which she adores.

Right now we're using Shea Moisture products as recommended by Christina at Being Mrs. Jones:


{Image source}
 **These are each on sale for only $8.99 at Target as of March 7, 2012**

The souffle (it looks like they call it "smoothie" now) makes her curls so defined and shiny, but I'm not a fan of the stickiness. If she happens to roll around before it's completely dry, the products will leave behind residue which happened to our sofa.

Prior to using these products I was using Tropical Traditions coconut oil which I won over on Marlie & Me when Nia was an infant. The lavender scent I chose was nice, but the product left Nia's hair looking very dry which was surprising seeing that it's an oil. I still love coconut oil though for hair and skin so I won't completely abandon it but for now, I'm sticking with the Shea Moisture for Nia's hair.

Now switching gears a bit . . .

Compared to Chris Rock's documentary Good Hair, I've found the following trailer to already be light years beyond his documentary - which as I've shared before, could have been much more than it was:



I look forward to seeing it, but you can catch a review here.

Finally, Madame Noire had a fantastic piece entitled Mommy Are We Born This Way Until We Get a Weave. In it the author discusses the notion of getting a perm before getting your period. I had never thought of the two being linked, but I was reminded of a friend in college who told me that with puberty hair texture changes and that it's important to go as long as possible before getting a relaxer, if at all. That was very interesting to me especially coming from a family who repeatedly liked to remind its girls that we had "difficult hair."

So those are the recent thoughts floating in my head lately about Lil Love Bird's hair journey.

What thoughts are you having about hair lately?


   

6 comments:

  1. I am in search of products that can help my natural hair go to the next level. I have been trying the Shea moisture too but I find it greasy. It's awesome for twisting thought I must say. I am now on blue magic..im hoping going back to basics will help a little! Glad you are keeping Nia's hair away from the creamy crack...I think about where my hair may be if I never used the white stuff!!

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  2. i love that you are instilling that pride into your little girl. it's as if we have to be de-programmed at times. many of us grew up during the whole good hair/bad hair days. so happy to see us breaking that cycle and loving the skin and hair we were given.

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  3. I only like the shea moisture smoothie is I am letting jas wear her curls down and free. If I am doing ponytails I find some sort of pink oil( I use just for me brand) or hair milk works best for that. I also use IC palmade to hold her edges in place. I know some people are against rubber bands but I use them for my baby. They break before the day is over anyway because of the oil in the products I use and to me that's a good thing. I also leave in conditioner when I was her hair.

    Figuring out what works best for your baby will be trail and error. Just make sure you keep her hair moisturized and she'll be great and have healthy hair. :)

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  4. I am also on a journey to find something that is going to work for my daughter's hair. I tried hair milk ny CD but that heft her hair feeling hard, so its going to be trial and error.

    I think the documentary looks very interesting, as well as the atricle you linked.

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  5. Sorry the commenting was wonky on this so I'm replying all in one:

    @Mrs Pancakes - I completely agree about wondering what my hair would've been like without relaxer and I'm looking forward to the day that I can go back to natural.

    @Cam - thinking of it as breaking the cycle is so true! I admit it's easy to be hard on those that did these types of things blindly to us but at the same time it's so bizarre that it was the same people who rocked fros and went through the "Black is Beautiful" movement.

    @Krissy - I definitely need to find something to keep Nia's edges down - we tried a little stocking cap but she pulls it off. Her styles don't last very long and it's extremely time intensive to style then take down her hair. Just gotta keep practicing!

    @bloggingwhilenursing - I wish you the best too in your journey with your daughter! Conversations like this and sharing information is definitely the way to go.

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  6. I love Nia's hair, especially when it's out! It looks like she has a head full of fine curls. I love it. I was going to ask in an earlier post what you use. But since I stumbled across this recent one, I now know. I see this product all the time in Target and thought to buy it. I ended up going with It's a curl for Princess. Her hair is fine, so I don't want to put too much in it that may way it down. On my journey to find products for her, I've decided to go natural. So far it's been about 5 weeks since my last relaxer. Are you transitioning too?

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