GHC's Friday Frotastic Feature:Geraldine the Great (Waist Length in 4 years)

Hello beautiful ladies!Its been a little while since I posted but I hope everyone is doing well. Today is Friday so you know what that means! A feature on an amazing hair icon!!
Today's article features Geralidine the Great,a Nigerian Natural Haired woman with amazing hair. She reached wast length hair in 4 years of being natural. A few of the members of the Ghana Hair Chick Facebook page requested for a feature on her and she kindly agreed to answer a few of my questions, so here goes!

Q.How long have you had natural hair?. 
A.I've been natural for 5 years.  My last relaxer was on October 2008, and I big chopped in June of 2009.

Q.How did you go natural?Did you transition and for how long?

A. I went natural after suffering from breakage post weave installation.  My hair thinned out and I swore off all manner of manipulation on my head.  I ended up transitioning for 10 months.

Q.What helped you during your transition?Any tips for transitioners?

A.I transitioned by wearing kinky twists.  I would periodically redo the twists so that they remained fresh in appearance.  I also moisturized obsessively, once I learned that my two textures of hair were fragile.  If you're transitioning to becoming natural, experiment with styles that require a low amount of manipulation.

Q.How did your family respond to your decision to go natural and how did you handle it?. 

A. My family was accepting of my transition, but I received the most amount of support from my boyfriend who actually assisted me during my big chop. I was resolute in my decision to becoming chemical free, so outside opinions and comments did little to deter me from my mission. 

Q.What has been you greatest challenge with your hair and how did you handle it?

A.My hair is extremely dense and tightly coiled.  I'm also a heavy shedder.  These qualities used to make my detangling sessions dreadful. I adapted to the task by cutting down my detangling and shampooing sessions to once a month, with co-washes in between.

Q.What do you love most about your hair and what was your proudest moment?

A.My proudest moment?  Being able to wear a bun!  Lol, it may seem silly, but if you have dense 4abc hair like mine, then you know that a lot of work goes into gathering this hair-type into a bun that doesn't pull uncomfortably at your edges.

I love that my hair is thick and dense.  I'm happy that I don't have to  work too hard to coerce my hair into appearing full.

Q.Please share your regimen/hair care routine with us.

A. I'm very big on protective styling.  When I first went natural, the tightly coiled hair mantra of the time was that our hair types liked to be left alone.  To an extent, I do agree with this sentiment, and so I employ a lot of protective styles in my regimen (wigs, twists, braids, buns).

Generally speaking, I'm quite simple in my routine- a monthly deep conditioning, detangling and shampooing session, and co-washing whenever it suits me. 

Q.What would you say is the most important thing that has helped you retain length and health of your hair?

 A.Protective styling and finger detangling have gotten me to waist length in 4 years.  These are the two biggest factors that contributed to my length retention.

Q.Any final tips/advice?

A. If you're thinking about doing it, do it.  Furthermore, if you are thinking about becoming natural, be prepared to shed a lot of misinformation that you might have had about hair care.  Keep an open mind, and lose all your hair expectations.  You are embarking on a journey that sets you outside of societal boxes, so don't regress by stringently abiding to hair rules, categories, and expectations.  An open and determined mind will push you through the moments of self-doubt and frustration.

Geraldine can be found on Facebook as Geraldine the Great and on her blog at http://geraldinethegreat.blogspot.com/

Many thanks to +Geri GeraldinetheGreat for allowing me write this feature on her..:).

Hope you enjoyed reading this and got inspired. If you'd like to see someone specific featured here on the blog, simply drop a comment below and I will try to get her here..lol. Thanks for reading and have a fabulous day!

Curlformers:A Ghanaian Natural's experience

Well hello!It has been forever in the blogosphere since I posted anything so here I am,back again!All I can say is please bear with me.School has been very busy so posting hasn't been as frequent as I would have liked.Hopefully today's post will excite you so much I will be forgiven :D.
I was browsing Youtube a while back and saw a 4c textured natural(basically someone whose hair is very kinky) with these really cool curls.I watched the video and she used Curlformers. Apparently those have been around for a very long time but I didn't know they existed till then.
Now for those of you who were as confused as I was,Curlformers are these rod-like things made with a more flexible plastic than rollers or setting rods.They come in various sizes and lengths,and their main purpose if to make your hair curly without having to use heat or  rollers.The reason why these fascinated me was because you didn't need pins or anything(I HATE sleeping in pins) so they looked to be very simple to use,plus they REALLY stretched the hair.
If your hair is anything like mine,that part should have you very interested.My hair shrinks like crazy,and I really enjoy styling it even when its all shrunken because I like the short hair look,but sometimes I also want to have stretched hair so I can maybe have a ponytail or a bun or just something  dressy.
So I decided to give curl-formers a try.The original ones were much too expensive for my budget,so I got knock-offs from China that were MUCH cheaper.Let me be honest and say it wasn't as easy as it looked in the videos!It took me a very long time to pull my hair through but I finally figured out a way to do it without tugging out all my hair.I put them in on freshly washed hair, which was damp, and slept in them.It was uncomfortable,but it wasn't as bad as having pins in my hair.I didn't use any setting products apart from my regular Cantu Shea butter leave-in Repair cream and a shea butter mix that I made at home.I think if I were to use setting lotion for example or gel,it would look much smoother than this.My ends still looked pretty rough,but my hair really stretched out and the curls weren't bad.Unfortunately the style didn't last as it was rainy,but the stretch was so good I could tie my hair up in ponytails the whole week.
Here are some pictures.Enjoy!

Break the Silence about your hair

HelLO!It has been quite a while since I posted and I feel very guilty(guilty face).I've just been very busy with my school work and very tired.However today I just made up my mind to post something and here we are!I hope everyone has been doing great!My one year anniversary since big chopping came and went in August,and I did a length check video which I can now not find on my computer.I know,weird!But I will try and post some pictures of what I've been doing with my hair since June(wow..that's a lot..lol).I have had several different protective styles including braids,kinky twists and wigs.

Currently,my hair is not in any style.I have an old bantu knot out from Sunday that I have been keeping under a cap to protect my ends from the cold.I also hennaed two weeks ago,and I should have taken pictures,but I didn't..(sad face).I will be doing it again and I will definitely take pictures then!
My hair isn't doing as great as I'd like.I have retained a lot of length,but the thickness is not improving so I'm looking for ways to fix that.I also think I may be shedding too much,but how much is too much?The shedding has always been a lot for my hair so I don't know if that's normal or not.Anybody ever have a similar hair issue?How did you fix it?

In other news,I had a friend make a comment about my hair and I was tempted to respond badly but stopped.Have you had such an experience?How did you deal with it?I'm still trying to find a way to respond,so let me know what I should say..lol.
Finally,I will soon create a page on Facebook so that even if I don't post here I can share some pictures and other things on there, and you can also share your own pictures.Without much ado then,here are some pictures for the last 3 months!Enjoy.

Styling braids or twists:The simple tie and tuck

This hairstyle is a very simple,quick and convemient one for when you need to do something different with your briads or twists and don't have time,need a nicer  look or just want your hair out of your face.You don't need anything and I particularly like it because I don't have to put bobby pins in my hair,which I really don't like.Whenever I put any pins in my hair,I end up taking them out because I feel uncomfortable.Not so for this style.

1.Push all your braids straight back from your face.If you want a part in there somewhere,part the braids where you want it.Otherwise all of your hair will need to be back.

2.Take about half a handful of braids/twists in each hand from each front side of your hair and tie it loosely at the back of your hair.This is the tie part of the name.Loosely so you don't pull out your edges,and not too many braids so the knot doesn't remove or look too big.

3.You will have space between your tied back hair and your braids.Gather the remainder of your braids and push them into that space gently.Think tucking.You're basically tucking those braids into that space.Keep going till all of the braids are in there and the ends are secure and not showing.

And that's pretty much it!You can accesorise with whatever you want,but this style pretty much works by itself and still looks great especially when your braids have been in for a while and look frizzy.I did this a lot after my twists had been in for 4 weeks.Here are some pictures of how mine turned out.

Blowing out your hair:African Threading from Ghana

Heat may be used to blow out and style hair,but in order to prevent damage to hair the heat has to be used at a low temperature and it has to be used sparingly.Also a heat protectant will help to reduce the risk of damage,but its not a sure fix.So how do you stretch out your hair for a style that requires it?Maybe you want a nice big fluffy fro but your 4C hair isn't cooperating or you just want your hair to look like its actual length.Maybe you're going to braid your hair and want your hair to be smoother so you need to blow it out.If your hair is relaxed or transitioning you may want to stretch your new growth so you can style your hair.This technique is very useful for any of these purposes.It is
-heat free
-chemical free
-hair damage free
-reduces shrinkage.
My mom uses this threading technique all the time(and her natural hair is awesome if I do say so myself) and when I was transitioning she used to do it for me a lot so my hair would be more manageable.Here's the method.

1.Section your hair into small manageable sections and hold each section with a clip.The size and number depends on you,but the general rule of thumb is smaller sections will result in better stretching than bigger sections,but they also take longer.I usually use medium pretty sections,about 6 all over my head.

2.You will need to make sure each section is detangled and moisturized. If its dry spritz on a little water/aloe vera juice and seal with a little oil/shea butter.You will also need hair thread from Africa if you can get it,or regular yarn.You will want to make sure the yarn can be used for braiding hair so it doesn't tangle your hair up.

3.Take one end of the thread or yarn and pull till its about 4 times the length of your hair.Fold that back onto itself so you have a double piece,kind of like looping thread through a needle and getting two pieces of thread joined together.Cut that off.It might help to do one section of hair for starters,use the thread to make sure it will be the length of thread you need,then use that as a template for more thread.

4.Beginning with whichever section you prefer,put your thread/yarn at the bottom of the section.Begin twisting the thread around your hair,making sure that each part of your hair is covered.This motion is hard to describe,but you are kind of rolling or tying the thread around your hair,not like regular twists in your hair.Keep up with this to the tip of your hair and tie the end of the thread well to prevent unravelling.

5.To help you sleep or look sane(lol) because when you're done you will look crazy,tie each section to an adjoining one flat on your head so it looks like a flat twist or corn row.Leave this overnight and that's it!Overnight is recommended because this technique needs a few hours to work.It is also a nice protective style,working well with wigs.If you plan to wear it with wigs,try to make sure you part your hair where your wig is parted and make sure to tie the sections as close to your scalp as possible.

So that's it!I have posted a video below from +AfroDiva Nally to help explain this better.


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 Till next time,stay blessed and fabulous!