22"

That's my first measurement ever. I don't think it's very long compared to most of the other women at this forum. However, it's the longest it's been in a long time. I've been growing out blonde color (and then a failed attempt at light brown over that) since July of 2002. I keep getting the blonde ends cut, but I think now I can pretty much let things go as they are. The blonde isn't so blonde anymore and my brown isn't so very brown, so it pretty much blends.

My hair is in the best condition it's been since the sixth grade. That's when I got my first perm. After that it was perm after perm (and it always came out like Brillo, since I'm a 1bFi) and I could never understand why it didn't turn into beautiful, silky spirals like the women on the commercials.

Then it started going from blonde to dirty blonde to almost a sort of light brown. That's when I started coloring it--at the end of high school. I was always blonde from that moment forward. I could never understand why brown colors would never take over the blonde. I truly didn't know that coloring was taking color OUT of my hair (peroxide) and that my "quick-fixes" (all of this was over-the-counter) weren't going to fix anything.

When I was about 25, I went through a phase where I tried on a different color every 2 weeks to a month. My hair was FRIED. I can blow hard on my hair and it will break because it's so fine--take that and put a lot of color on it, and you've got hair that literally breaks off with every brushing.

I had finally had it in 2002, which is good since I got pregnant that September and it wouldn't have been a good idea for me to color my hair at that time. I had been coloring for about 18 years. I let it go and looked like a Jerry Springer guest star for a long time--half dark and half light. My most recent haircut was a month ago. I had them take off three inches. By now my hair seems to be in pretty good condition. I did do a semi-permanent color (red) about two months ago but it doesn't seem to have done much damage. The other day I was in CVS and my hand was fairly trembling over a box of blonde. I just kept thinking of two years of torture waiting to have hair that actually felt like hair, and in the end I decided against it. I'm glad I did.

My hair has never been long-long but I want to try now. Everyone tells me I should cut it. I'm 37, yadda, yadda. But I've always dreamt of long, princess-like hair. I've come to understand that I will never have very thick hair, but I CAN have healthy, shiny hair. I'm going to take a picture of myself if I can find the battery for my camera but right now it's about the longest it's ever been, at least that I remember.

All for now! Wish me luck!

Shopping trip!

I took Colin along--we went straight from the daycare. He was a sweet angel, as usual. He jabbered in his baby-talk the whole time. I asked his opinion on everything. (I jabber right back at him most of the time.)

I tried a boar-bristle brush on him and he liked it, so I bought that one. I couldn't find any waters, essences or oils (but after all, this was CVS :lol: ). I bought a conditioner instead (no quats!). I also bought two spray bottles: a tiny one for my purse, and a bigger one for at home. Unfortunately the conditioner I bought was VERY VERY VERY thick (didn't realize this when I bought it...I thought it was a leave-in...it's called Biolage Detangling solution...hello, SOLUTION? Isn't that supposed to be a liquid?). I think I'll try it anyway, a tiny little bit of that mixed with a whole lot of water.

Will spritz and NOT WASH tonight. :smile:

A few disasters, a few successes.

The big mister I bought at CVS SUCKED. It doesn't mist--it shoots, kind of like Febreeze. I shot it directly into my ear. I really hope I don't get an ear infection now between that and the fact that Colin and I got caught in the rain on our walk. We were soaked. I hope he doesn't get sick, either. Poor little guy, he was so good about it, though. Dave got in the car and came and found us, LOL. He drove us home.

Anyway...I also bought two "toys" at CVS--cheapie ones--and I'm glad now. One was terrible--a hair stick w/an elastic that goes around the bun to "hold" it. It looked silly, messy and it tore at my hair, ouch! It hurt my head. But the other thing is kind of a barrette, fancy-looking tortoise shell knockoff, with a stick. The barrette has a hole on either side. The hair is caught up in a bun, then the barrette is placed on top. Then the stick goes in through one hole, under (through) the bun and then out the other hole. IT LOOKS AWESOME. It holds really well! My hair was good and damp first (courtesy of the Power Sprayer...um, I mean "mister"). (I'm going to try the pocket-sized mister next time!)

So tonight was fun and enlightening and I found a new way to wear my hair between washings. Yay! :lol:

Well, this morning I got up VERY late because it was Dave's turn to get up with Colin and he didn't realize I wasn't up until 8:00. When I did get up, Colin was just in his diaper--not dressed--and I had to get both of us dressed and out the door in 10 minutes. It was a disaster. He cried the whole time.

Through it all, obviously I wasn't thinking about getting my hair back up in my hair slide to try it out. I did remember to grab the boar bristle brush on my way out the door, though. It's in my car right now. When I use the BBB it doesn't seem to go all the way "through" my hair. I wonder if my hair isn't as thin as I've always thought it was.

I had spritzed last night with a conditioner/water solution and was surprised to find this morning that my hair actually feels fuller--not lank like it usually does after a day of not washing. So maybe spritizing is the secret after all. It does feel a tiny bit on the "bushy" side but then again, maybe I'm just not used to having any volume in it at all. It has a very slight wave, too. It's not too shabby!

Tonight I guess I should wash (with shampoo, not conditioner only) because I have a whole lot of stuff in my hair, including the leave-in shine stuff I used the other day.

Hmmmmmmmm.

Well, I washed my hair the "right" way for the first time tonight. I did have to use shampoo because there was so much product buildup in it.

I let it hang straight and untangled and I got it wet (in the shower). I smoothed a little bit of shampoo on my scalp without rubbing it in or messing the hair up and I rinsed straight down that way. I then conditioned it. Used Dove "weightless" products.

Then I Turbie-d it for about half an hour while I bathed Colin, and then I let it down and the bangs were all akimbo, so I combed the length straight and the bangs to the side.

I don't know. On the down side, it looks awfully thin, and for some reason I was envisioning mounds and mounds of full hair just waiting to escape from their prison of heavy conditioners and maltreatment.

On the up side, it feels like hair. REAL hair. It's never felt this way before, at least that I can remember. Well, not in my adult life, anyway. It was so smooth. It was also "slippery". I put it up in a hair slide with the stick. It was actually hard to twist and twine, it was that slippery. I did it all gently. Then I spritzed it very lightly with mostly water and a drop or two of Biolage conditioner.

I guess I'll see how it comes out. I'll only have it up like this for an hour or two because then I need to go to bed. On the other hand, I could always keep it in this bun and just remove the slide and put in bobby pins. We'll see.

My hair is down today. My bangs are clipped off to the side.

I think my hair feels a tiny bit dry. But that could also be because it's not "slick" from excess conditioner. I have to say I like the way it looks fuller on top ("framing" my face rather than tight against my head). It does feel as soft as feathers. The shine is quite decent, especially considering I have no "shine" products in it.

I gave it a nice, soft but thorough brushing upside-down and then right side-up this morning in the Ladies' Room at work because I didn't have the time to do it before I left home. It falls very nicely after I do that. I like the way it looks today. I'm looking forward to seeing it grow!

p.s. Do I dare try CO next time?

ETA: You know, I just figured something out. It's not my HAIR that feels dry. It's my SCALP. Dry and almost a little itchy. I wonder how come I've never noticed this before? Maybe all the cones, etc. were coating my scalp?

I really do think I'll try a CO next time.

Okay, I thought my hair looked very full today (compared to the usual), and I was happy with it, but I couldn't seem to stop fiddling with it. I was gentle but...still, you know? I had it up & down, up & down, trying to fix my bun with my cheap-o hair slide. Then tonight in CVS I got these sort of mini knock-off Ficcares (sp?) just to try out the concept before I spend any real money (these were only $2.99 for a pair). They're very short.

So tonight I tried to "dust" and it was hard...I couldn't really see anything...why is it that they all seem to pop right out at me while I'm at work looking down at my keyboard? I should keep good scissors there but I don't know if it would be too good for me to chop away at my hair at work. Anyway, if I keep up with the dustings I should eventually start getting a fair amount of them, so it should end up okay, I hope!

After the dusting I put my hair up yet again, twisted it into a bun and put these fake Ficcares into it. They're holding it up exceptionally well. It looks pretty cool. I really hope I haven't damaged my hair by messing around with it so much but this is the experimental stage...how will I ever know something works until I try it?

I'm also going to start combing instead of brushing, I think. In any event, I did brush/comb my hair A LOT today through all these machinations. I was gentle! :lol:

ETA: Later I did a scalp massage. Too lazy to re-write the whole thing but here's my description of it which I posted on the Mane Board: Joy: No, it didn't tangle up my hair. Then again, my hair is mostly straight with just a tiny bit of wave, and it isn't overly thick, either, so I didn't have as much hair to deal with as some people might. The one thing I did differently from what was instructed on the links was that I did lift my hands and move my fingers when I had to go farther up my scalp. I was starting to feel like I was going to tangle. But other than that, it really wasn't bad at all and in fact it gave a great "lift" to my hair.

Okay, I really do have a tiny bit of a natural wave to my hair, and I'm going to stop fighting it. For years it's either been a ball of split frizz (when coloring or perming), then later, I thought it was just residual damage from past colorings that made it "bend" on the ends, but this morning, taking it down after having been in a bun & combing it out & watching it sort of bounce back up a little, I realized, it's not damage, it's not coloring, it's just a natural wave that developed after I was a child. (There's no way for me to know exactly when, since as soon as I entered my teens, I started messing badly with it.)

I'm going to stop fighting it. I think fighting it is what's causing the damage! Anyway, it seems to be in pretty nice condition now. I'm not slicking it down with stuff anymore...it was either shine and stringiness, or fuller hair but less artificial shine. I'm going to leave it alone for now and just see what it does without all the masses of 'cones.

Okay, I just did CO, hopefully the right way this time. First I wet my hair thoroughly in the shower. Then I coated it from roots to tips with Herbal Essences conditioner (some Hawaiian scent) and then I turbaned the hair while I washed the rest of me. I'll tell you, I'm probably cleaner than I've ever been before in my life! I actually counted up to fifteen minutes. It wasn't easy keeping track of what minute I was on while I counted the seconds.

Anyway, after that I rinsed and then I got the water as cold as I could stand and sort of back-bent into the water, because I mean it was FREEZING. I'm not used to cold showers. When I got out and combed my hair, it actually squeaked. I couldn't believe it. I've heard of "squeaky-clean" hair before but actually feeling it is a new experience for me!

So now it's air-drying. I don't know if it will feel silky or too-conditioned or just right or what. I'll report back later.

Okay, I just noticed that most of my entries start with the word okay, so I'm not going to say okay anymore, okay? :jestor:

(Hey...they spelled "jester" wrong on that Smilie.)

Anyway, my hair felt incredible this morning, nice and soft and slippery but not limp. I put it up in my hair slide (bun) nonetheless as I want to protect the ends and I want to get used to how it feels to wear it up, so it becomes second-nature. Then I can wear it all different ways...down, up, whatever. (I've mostly been letting it just hang down in its lank icky cone-treated state all these years except for the occasional pull-back-the-top-and-pouf-it-up nonsense.)

My scalp also still feels really good from my massage last night.

Even though I swore I'd skip CO'ing entirely tonight (am trying to go a day between any type of washings), I mowed the lawn in 80 degree heat and was dripping...I mean I was positively rank. I just had to wash it. It was covered in sweat. Sorry to be so gross.

So this time I started while Colin was still awake and I wet it in the sink, put on plenty of conditioner from roots to tips and turbie'd it and then went around straightening and stuff like that. Then I hopped in the shower after 15 minutes. It's still wet but it squeaked when I combed it, just like last night.

Tomorrow is Ren Fest. WEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE HAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!! :rockerdud

No Ren Fest. :( We're going tomorrow. The reason we didn't go is that Weather.com was predicting thunderstorms, and boy, were they ever right! I took Colin food shopping and when we walked outside, it was so blustery the automatic door was blown open. We got drenched--literally drenched--in the space of seconds. I rushed Colin into his car seat and toweled him off with Joey's clean shirt (sorry, Joey). When I got into the car I had to towel my entire face in order to be able to put my glases back on. My bun got drenched. Literally drenched.

I thought, Now I have to comb it all over again! But no, my bun (slide-held) stayed right in place. I couldn't believe it. I think it might be dry by now...perhaps a hair (har har) damp. (This was about seven hours ago.)

I lay down with the slide in my head this afternoon, and it held, so I might wear it to bed instead of trying to shove bobby pins into it. This might be tough because of the stick going through the slide, but I'll just try to lie the way I was lying this afternoon. I wonder what it will look like tomorrow.

I plan on wearing my hair rolled on the sides, but I might just bun it as we'll be in the sun all day. We'll see.

Copying & pasting parts of my posts because I'm too lazy to recount the whole thing.

Saturday:
I had mentioned a few days ago that I wanted to go to RenFest and needed something really cool for hair that's not-so-long. Somebody put links up (I'm so sorry, I don't remember who it was!) and one of the sites showed hair that was "rolled" on the sides. You take a tiny piece from the front, turn it one full turn, add another piece, roll that in with it, and on down. Almost like French braiding, except you just roll, instead of braiding.

Well, I did that on both sides and I couldn't figure out how to get them both into one barrette and stay there, and eventually I took the two rolls, grabbed another piece (unrolled) from between them and just braided it a few links down, then tied it off with a little ponytail holder.

It looks SO COOL. Now I can't wait for RenFest. Do you think being in the sun all day might lighten/damage it if I wear it basically "down" like this?

Sunday:
Well, I went to RenFest today and it was great...but...I slathered, and I mean slathered my hair with Baby Magic sunscreen and yet after I washed and conditioned it tonight (had to...I was a real greaseball), it is definitely, beyond a shadow of a doubt, lighter on the ends (last remnants of permanent color 2 years ago).

I put SO MUCH sunscreen on my hair. You could have fried dinner for five on it. What happened????

Banging my head against a wall. I mean, in a way it looks cool...and in another way...I know that esp. once winter comes, and darker hair grows in (as it always does before the sun lightens it once again), it will just look, well, stupid.

My Little Pony :grin:

I used a clarifying shampoo (Tresseme...sp????) plus Dove Weightless conditioner last night b/c of all the Baby Magic in my hair. And let me tell you I LOVE MY HAIR today.

I'm going to leave the sun-bleached ends for now. I mean what the heck. They're not hurting me any staying there. I'm going to dust tomorrow at lunchtime if I remember my scissors b/c I figured out that the sunlight coming through my windshield is the perfect light for detecting split ends.

My hair is full, smooth, bouncy. I put it up in a pony today and why haven't I done this before?????? A high-ish pony, I mean. I always hated ponytails but I always did them low & I looked like a farmer's wife (no offense to any farmers out there). But higher up it gives the illusion of much longer hair and it no longer seems to be frizzy for some reason. So I must be doing something right. 8)

I think I might need shampoo after all. :( Used Dove for CO last night and my hair took forever to dry...I knew that was a bad sign right off the bat...went to sleep w/it just slightly damp, and it looks AWFUL this morning. Feels like straw. What a drastic change from the last several days!!!! It is so weird. I just hate it. It's up in a ponytail. I could barely drag a comb through it and heard little "snaps" the whole time.

I'm going to try the Tresemme tonight plus conditioner. I hope to heck it fixes this. Ugh. Right now it looks like a ball of frizz and splits and it's just a horror...I so feel like getting the scissors out.

Used a deep-cleansing (Tresemme) and then Suave conditioner and my hair seems to be bouncing back. It's soft, sleek and it "moves" once again. I think I may try to find a good gentle shampoo and use the Herbal Essences conditioner b/c that one really did seem to do the best for my hair so far.

It's been a few days since I posted and I had trouble finding this thread! :lol:

Okay, I'm giving CO another try. Vernie at work gave me Nature's Gate Tea/something else (can't remember!) shampoo and conditioner and I used it the other day (just the conditioner). My hair came out pretty nice. After a couple days, it's feeling really good. I wonder if I should CO tonight? It's really not greasy or anything, but isn't it a little bit weird to not wash your hair after two or three days?

I figured out how to use a hair stick, and I only need one, which is great. I do have to "weave" it once or twice between the bun & scalp on its way to the other side, though. However...it feels really nice, secure but not tight & uncomfortable, and when I took it down last night, BOY did it have luxurious waves. :smile:

Later: All right...I CO'd b/c when I took down my bun, it was finally getting rank after all. But going 3 days is great, IMO. I used Nature's Gate tea/pear conditioner, left it on for 10 minutes, rinsed really well and then used a little more just on the length, then rinsed that out, including one more scalp rinse when I did so. I used cool/cold water. I'm getting used to cold showers now! After that I wrung it out gently, used the Turbie Twist for about 15 minutes & then let it out and it's drying now. I didn't comb it again--I just finger-combed it. Results to come later!

Midnight: WOW. My hair looks and feels just beautiful. It's silky but not flat. It moves beautifully. And it has a great shine. I only finger-combed it after it dried (not comb-combed).

Oy! My hair is great following that Nature's Gate CO'ing and finger-combing yesterday, and just finger-combing this morning, but I COULD NOT get the hair stick to stay in my hair. The ladies on the board told me it might be better to do it with damp or wet hair. That's definitely what I'm going to do next time! Wow, when is the last time a toy wouldn't stay in my hair because my hair was too healthy? 8)

ETA: Fia's great...she posted step-by-step instructions that were really understandable. I used them and got the stick in my hair finally! It's not very "tight" but it feels like it'll stay. I may damp-bun for a while until my hair gets longer. Anyway, I'm going to put the instructions here; I hope that's okay.... :

1) tip pointing away from bun
2) piercing the upper rim of the bun
3) push it up towards the sky a little bit (parallel to your scalp) - quarter to half an inch
4) turn it down towards your scalp catching some scalp hair with it
5) push it straight through the base of the bun (where your twisted ponytail starts at the scalp)
6) catch some scalp hair on the other side of the base (before ending up at the outer rim of the bun)
7) when you see the tip getting out beneath the outer/lower rim of the bun - back it up a little and pierce the lower rim of the bun.

Basically you're catching upper bun rim/scalp hair/bun base/scalp hair/lower bun rim - weaving them together over the rigid stick.


LATER: Walked on my lunch hour & a million strands came out b/c it's getting really blustery (getting ready to rain), so when I came back I tried to put the stick back in but had trouble all over again. Soooooo...I used the two cheap hairsticks I got at Sally on my lunchour. They're holding great. They felt a little rough on the tips (cheap things) so I will file them down tonight.

I also got Biotin at the health food store.

When I let my hair down & ran a pick through it at lunchtime, I could not believe how it looked. My hair has never looked and felt so shiny and real before.

LATER STILL: Yes, believe it or not, I still have more to say.

So many people commented on my hair sticks today. And I got whistled at! :twisted: I couldn't believe it! These sticks are real show-stoppers. I guess they're not so common...actually, come to think of it, I don't know if I've ever seen anyone wearing them, at least not for day-to-day. Are they too dressy for daytime? Anyway, the people at work who commented on them were all very interested in how they work, and apparently they make it look like I must have very long hair, b/c two women told me (separately), "Wow, your hair must have really grown if you can do THAT with it."

I have gotten so many comments on my hairsticks! Most of the time it's, "How on earth do you get those things to stay in your hair?" but twice now it's been, "Wow, your hair must really be long to be able to do THAT." It must be an optical illusion or something as I have just 22" of length! But who cares! It feels good. :smile:

I love my hairsticks. :inlove:

Went to town with the Col-meister...we walked, he was in his stroller...shipped a package internationally, got iced coffe (a cookie for Babes), peeked in all the store windows & then walked home again, all in a nice breeze, no less, and my hairsticks are still in & looking very neat.

Felt like a change later and to give my hair & head a little break, so I'm wearing a black bandeau headband that I got the other day at Sally. I LOVE IT. It looks SO CUTE. I had thought with fine hair, it would look weird. It doesn't...it looks awesome. So, another new look that works well for me.

My hair feels greasy and gross today. BLEH. Maybe I need to go to every other day CO's instead of every 3rd day. But I have a feeling it's related to my and Colin's long walk to town yesterday. I was walking around sweating (yuck) for two hours. Maybe it'll be different in the winter. In the meantime, I can't wait for Dave to get home tonight so I can hop in the shower! OR, wait. Maybe I'll just deal with it while Colin is up...I could just walk around w/the conditioner on my hair & then sneak into the shower just to rinse it off. I think I'll do that. Should I try the honey this time? Hmmmmm.

Okay...so, I didn't CO because I just don't trust Colin with my head under the sink long enough to put on the conditioner, then go rinse it out after 10 minutes, then do the conditioner-plus-honey, then wait another 15 minutes...etc...etc...so I did two bad things: Washed my head upside-down (but gently, gently, gently) and used real shampoo. BUT, it's Nature's Gate, so...no sulfates or sulfides or whatever that dealio is.

So anyway, this is what I did (results to follow after it's rinsed & then dry):

I washed with Nature's Gate Red Tea/Pear. Smelled really good. Rinsed well in cool water and wrung the length out gently of excess water. Heated honey, about 1 tbsp. or so, in the microwave 15 seconds. Note to self: May only need 10 seconds next time...when I pulled it out it was bubbling! Added about 2 or 3 tbsp. Nature's Gate Red Tea/Pear conditioner, mixed well, it blended right in with no problems. It was a little on the thin side. I used all of it, primarily on my length but just a tiny bit up closer to my scalp. I have my showercap on over it now and am waiting 15 minutes. Will check back in with the results.

Colin is laughing hysterically at the sight of the shower cap on my head!

LATER: Well, so far I'm not floored. It isn't completely dry yet, but it looks LESS shiny than usual (??!!??). It feels pretty nice, though. Maybe I shouldn't have shampooed beforehand...? I don't know. On the up side...looking at the honey jar, I realized it was almost exactly the color of my hair. So that's what color my hair is: honey. How cool is that? I always say "it isn't blonde but it isn't brown and it's sort of red but not really red..." if anyone asks what color it is. So now I know: it's honey!

4:00 PM: Sigh. I am NOT loving these results. It looks okay, though slightly less shiny (??) than usual. It even feels okay...not softer than usual but good & strong...and it looks probably a tad thicker.

BUT, it is tangly. Tangly, tangly, tangly! Finger-combing wouldn't do the trick for me. I had to use a pick. And even then, following several finger-combings and then the pick, I was still encountering snares. I don't think I'll be doing this again.

On the plus side, I finally got just one stick to work in my hair; however, I had to do it on a slant. I think that style looks kind of cool, though. It's really holding; it even feels a little tight. So I have it bunned & up to protect it b/c I was never going to be able to stay away from fiddling with it and de-de-detangling it repeatedly (and possibly causing damage) if I kept it in my bandeau hairband.

OK, just measured b/c I couldn't resist even though it's only been a little over two weeks, and it took a couple times because I didn't feel I was doing it correctly, but what I wound up with was 22.5" !!!!!!!!!!!

IT GREW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It grew 1/2 inch.

I measured from my cowlick ("widow's peak") so I'll have to remember to measure from there each time.

Ugh! I just can't wait to wash my hair tomorrow (CO, probably, but you know what I mean). I just have to get this awful honey out of my hair. My hair is a MESS. It's oily/dry if that's even possible. I wore it in sticks all day and now it's in a wide elastic headband. I do like these headbands, except for the bump they leave in the back.

ETA: All right...I couldn't stand it. I CO'd with Suave Naturals Aloe Vera conditioner because my Nature's Gate is already nearly half gone, and I only started using it last week. :shock: So I used the Suave for CO, rinsed after 10 minutes (I was in a hurry as it's getting late) and used the Nature's Gate Pear & Red Tea to condition as my last step. Wore it up in a towel for just a few minutes; now it's air-drying. I'm hoping it will dry quickly as my hair always looks like junk when I sleep on it damp.

I was SORELY tempted to try the dumb treatment the lady at the Sally's counter managed to talk me into...it was only $.99...but I decided at the last minute that if it's a humectant, it will probably slow my hair-drying process, and it's already after 11:00 at night. I'm going to list the ingredients here. If anybody happens to read this and sees anything bad about the formula, could you please PM me? I would appreciate it. These are the ingredients:

Beyond the Zone Pro Formula Last Call Hair Masque
water (aqua), kaolin, cetyl alcohol, panthenol, panax ginseng root extract, rosmarinus extract, urtica diuoica (nettle) extract, eucalyptus globulus, melaleuca alternifolia (tea tree) leaf oil, mineral oil (paraffinum liquidum), tocopherol, gelatin, xanthan gum, stearalkonium chloride, dicetyldimonium chloride, magnesium nitrate, magnesium chloride, methyldibromo glutaronitrile, mica, titanium dioxide, methylchloroisothiazolinone, methylisothiazolinone, tetrasodium ETDA, phenoxyethanol, methylparaben, propylparaben, propylene glycol, butylene glycol, dipropylene glycol, fragrance, Yellow 6 ICI, Violet 2 ICI.

Just to kill time, here's my current vitamin/supplement regimen:
*Spectravite multivitamin/multimineral, which includes lycopene

*Nature's Bounty B-Complex + C: vitamin C, 200mg; thiamin (B-1), 10mg; riboflavin (B-2), 10mg; niacin, 50mg; vitamin B6, 5mg; vitamin B-12, 10mcg; pantothenic acid, 10mg

* Twinlab Hair Factors, 3 tablets daily for a total of: vitamin C, 4500mg; biotin, 9000mcg; calcium, ~150mg; PABA, ~1500mg; inositol, ~3000mg; L-cysteine, ~1500mg

NutriMin C Resist Essential Fatty Acids: flax seed oil, 1040mg; alpha lipoic acid. 7.5mg; Coenzyme Q-10, 7.5mg

I hope I'm not hurting myself with all this stuff. Actually, so far I feel great.

My hair is very, very smooth and STRAIGHT today. I did no combing at all following my CO and extra conditioning last night. I finger-combed it, then sort of moved it around on the top once in a while just to keep the strands separated so they would dry faster. Didn't draw my fingers through the length again or anything. Then I went to bed when it was still damp. This morning it is almost pin-straight. I hope this happens again!

ETA: Well, I got two sticks in it but couldn't settle on how they would look nice and I thought I'd give "one stick" just one more try based on the instructions above, and it went in and....ahhhhhhhhhhh. One stick. Feels SO good in my hair. Don't ask me why. It just feels supported yet weightless at the same time. Hair still feeling nice so far.

Good hair day.

For the life of me, I can't figure out why some days I can do one stick, and other days it just won't hold. Maybe it just takes practice. I have 2 sticks in again today. They look neat. I like the look of one horizontal stick better, but any sticks at all (one, two or ten) are a little "different" from the norm and, IMO, very classy and casual/cool.

ETA: I think I'm finally getting the hang of getting one stick to stay in. I took it down to nap, ran around with it down for a while (how weird after having it up all the time :) ) and then put it back up with just one stick. I think the secret is in making the twists tight enough.

UGH, my hair is back to that horrible state again: greasy yet dry (now how the h*ll does that work...???) and thin and stringy and AWFUL.

But this time...I know what it is. :) It's over-conditioning.

I've been CO'ing with the Suave Aloe and following it with Nature's Gate conditioner b/c I found out that many women condition just the length again when the CO'ing part is all done. BUT apparently this does not work for my hair. It's too much. So I'm going to start over again tonight by using the Tresemme shampoo, the Nature's Gate conditioner and then the following 2 weeks or so, two experiments:

1. CO'ing with Suave Aloe, and then no conditioner following.
Then: 2. CO'ing with Nature's Gate, then two days later, washing with Nature's Gate & then conditioning with Nature's Gate, then two days later, CO'ing with Nature's Gate...and so on...etc.

After all that (or maybe during, if I run out of my NG conditioner, which I very well might!!!) I'll try the samples of the other NG "flavors," which the girl at work just handed me:
Persimmon & Rose Geranium
Mandarin Orange & Patchouli
Grapefruit & Wild Ginger

Oh, p.s., I broke three hairsticks this weekend. Cheap plastic ones.

HAIR EXPERIMENT:

2 oz. jojoba oil
4 drops each of:
rosemary
cedarwood
lavender
thyme

This is for a leave-in scalp massage treatment. Let's see how this goes.

Had to wash last night because I worked out to a new tape and I was REALLY sweating. As in horrible little rivulets running down my neck. (Yuck.) So I washed (for-real washed--with Tresemme) and conditioned with NG and my hair came out really really nice. Full, soft. I only finger-combed. I put it in a pony instead of a braid last night b/c I just hate the way my hair looks when it's braided. When I took it out this morning, though, it looked kind of "separated" on the ends. Hmmm. But I have it up in a nice bun now.

I wish I could get into a rhythm and figure out what my hair actually needs, all the time.

I do think I'll work out every other day b/c I really have to wash my hair after I work out, so I'll make the two correspond. Make sense?

Oh, and the smell of that oil was so atrocious that I couldn't stand myself. I think I'll try just the lavender in the jojoba the next time I oil.

It sure has been a long time since I posted. I measured last night and came up just shy of 23.5"...so that's what I put. :wink: Not bad...started at 22 two months ago, now I'm 23.5 and that was with a half-inch trim in there. I'm really happy about that.

I'm getting back to CO'ing again. I washed for about a month and my hair started feeling the strain. I had to use jojoba every time so what is that telling me? So on Saturday night I CO'd with Tangerine Tickle and my hair came out really nice. I kept it up in a towel for almost half an hour, while I bathed (I had put in the Tangerine Tickle under the sink, then rinsed in the shower & then drew a bath) and it then took it down and let it air-dry. I didn't finger-comb the top this time, just the bottom. It came out really nice and STRAIGHT. :inlove: