I'm Baaaaack!

*Whew* In the words of Usher, "it feels so good to be back" (Spotlight by Gucci feat. Usher) LOL My apologies to my subscribers (all 12 of ya'll - lol). My three month hiatus from blogging and hair care in general was due to two reasons: time and money, both of which were limited at the time. I have a little more of both at the moment which is why you're hearing from me :P

So, how's my hair doing? I'm definitely at a low right now. I ran out of my daily moisturizer back in November and until recently had been relying on 2-3 times a week co-washes and deep conditioners as moisture. Not to sound drastic, but it was either food or hair care. lol And I don't need to tell you which won.

After my relaxer, I started using heat 1x week because I wanted to show off my thick SL hair. Three months later, my hair is a little longer and A LOT thinner to show for it. Which really upsets me because I love thick hair!

Also, I stopped applying castor oil and miconazole nitrate (MN for growth) and I can definitely see the difference (worse)

What's the plan? I have some funds now (holla!) and made a mini-haul today. My mom relaxed my hair today, I made a mini-haul buy at Sally's and by the start of this week I'll be already to get on the road to Bra strap length hair! Here's the plan:

2010 PLAN:
Tuesday: 2 hour no-heat deep condition (shower cap), Co-wash
Friday: Shampoo, Deep-Condition with heat for 30 min, Light Protein

-Moisturize Daily.
-Apply castor oil to scalp on wash days when moisturizing.
-Apply MN to scalp everyday except wash days.
-Baggy for 1 hour after MN application
-Limit heat to bangs, only on wash days.
-Use half-wigs as protective styles until MAY 1 (at least).
-Braid hair under half-wigs.
-Only comb hair on wash days.
-Relax every 8 weeks.

Any suggestions, comments? How's everyone's hair journey coming along? Let's grow!

I lied...

Nursing school, nursing school, nursing school. If it ain't nursing school, it's sleep.

I'm not sure when I'll be able to post a blog with all the pictures and thoughts I want to share, but keep me in your prayers and HHG everybody :)

SA

An update is coming soon...

It's been a minute since I've updated. I took a lot of pics but then I misplaced my camera which put me behind a little. Updates are coming over the weekend, nothing big, but just to show some new things I'm learning and some new products in the mix!

Be Blessed,

Sunshine.anytime

Who wants to get free hair products?!

So, thanks to a lovely young fellow hair journey-er, I was turned on to Swagbucks.com It's basically a way to earn free money for doing what you do anyways --- search the Internet. It's powered by Google and Ask.com, so you're getting paid to search just as you do anyhow.

I signed up last week and I have 14 swagbucks. Swagbucks are like "points" and once you get enough you can either 1) trade them in for gift cards to places like Amazon.com, Paypal.com (i.e. Ebay), or AmericaRx.com, all of which sell wonderful hair products. I'm saving up for Nexxus products and hair oils (avocado, etc).

I generally get about 3 swagbucks a day, one in the morning, one in the afternoon, and one at night.

If that's too slow-paced for you, you can sign up for the Swagbucks blog, newsletter, twitter or facebook. Here, they place swagcodes for instant swagbucks. Yesterday, for Halloween, they had a code for 1 swagbuck --- just to celebrate the holiday.

I was skeptical at first but signing up is free, quick and easy! It's not a scam, I promise! From another hair sister to another, try it out!

Simply click on this link to get started!

Changing the name of my blog

SAHairJourney

is the name of the new blog. I changed it merely for privacy issues, I don't want to get stalked!

"SA" stands for SunshineAnytime, which I've been using as a social media name for awhile now. I know this might cause some confusion since Hairlicious is operated by the lovely Sunshyne but I honestly don't have any other ideas for blog names!

Any other suggestions for me?

No more T-shirt Drying

It's funny how something that you think is going to mess you up helps you!

I deep-conditioned today with Silk Elements Mega Cholesterol, 30 minutes with heat, with oils and honey. I hopped out of the shower and towel-dried my hair and then wrapped my hair up to do the T-shirt drying method. I first heard about it on Hairlicious and I've been doing it for most of this year now.

Then, I remembered I had to go do laundry. I was obviously not going to walk around with a T-shirt on my head, lol, so on my still dampened hair, I put on my normal leave-ins: Motions Leave-In conditioner, diluted V05 conditioner and Phytoorganics Humectant conditioner and then sealed with oils. I combed to detangle, pinned my hair, and rushed out.

Three hours later my hair is still 20% wet. :( But my hair is laying down so flat and smooth, and I barely had to moisturize it. I don't know why I ever traded in this way of airdrying. I guess, it is annoying when you need to be somewhere and your hair's still wet (it only takes my hair 2 hours total to airdry with the Tshirt method).

Here's my version of the T-shirt method: Wash hair; towel dry; put T-shirt on hair; leave T-shirt on for 1 hour or until 40-50% dry; apply leave ins; pin hair up and airdry until 80% dry; moisturize and seal with daily moisturizer.

A lot huh?

Here's my old way of airdrying, the way I did it tonight: wash hair, towel dry; apply leave-ins; pin hair up until scalp is dry; apply moisturizer and seal as needed.

Way easier to do the second method. Only problem is, I can remember waking up with wet hair if I did the old method after washing. That would be a problem if I'm doing a braid out/twist out that requires a fully dry head. I guess I could just sit under the dryer for a few minutes in the morning like I do anyway.

Thought my laundry trip was going to be a waste of a D/C day. Turned out to be one of my smoothest hair days since I started the journey.

"Loosen up, it's just hair!" :)

P.S. Check out P4cm.com, Passion for Christ Movement. They make great shirts (see picture), videos and resources for those wanting to devote themselves to Jesus!

Paraffin Oil = Mineral Oil

The beauty companies did it again! Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.

One of my favorite products has mineral oil in it! Smh...

Hollywood Beauty Castor Oil Treatment (my eyes are tearing up as I type this LOL) has paraffin oil in it. I was looking at the reviews on Walgreens.com and the reviewers were complaining about the paraffin oil being the same as mineral oil. They said this was basically expensive hair grease.

Gross!


I googled paraffin oil and sure enough ... mineral oil! I was just gonna hit up Walgreens on my way home from clinicals tomorrow to pick some up. I love the smell and I love sealing with something creamy!

Until I find a creamy, mineral-oil free oil product, guess I'll pick up Africa's Best Herbal oil (only $2 at DG, and mineral-oil free!)

How was I blinded for so long? *Sigh*

R.I.P. HBCOT. It was good while it lasted, but I'm moving on...

NEXT!