Hip Tbl & Beyond Challenge 2018

Love your hair @lulu97 !

I had my hair in chunky twists all last week. I mixed up some conditioner on Friday and let it cure overnight: amla and bhringaraj powders plus shea butter, avocado oil, olive oil, ACV, and honey. I used this on my hair Saturday and left it on for three hours. I washed it out and used Tresemme perfectly undone as a leave in and sealed with a mix of shea butter and castor oil. I have a curry leaf oil on my scalp. Thankfully, the curry leaf oil smell dissipates by morning. I'm wearing jumbo box braids for the next week. I plan on flat ironing and trimming for my next wash day.

Happy to report I am being fairly consistent with the daily massages.
 
I used to water rinse my hair daily and wear it in a high bun, but lately I've been skipping the daily water rinsing and have been shampooing, DCing and blowdrying my hair on the cool setting weekly (using the tension method) and wearing a braidout for the week to keep my hair stretched. My hair seems to be doing well with this routine and it seems like I've gotten a lot of growth over the past couple of weeks, but it could also be due to me spraying my scalp with Xcel21 twice a day. I used to think my hair retained more length with daily rinsing, but so far my new routine seems to be a keeper.
 
Hi, all!

I haven't posted in awhile: I've just been keeping my hair in about 20 twists under a wig, washing and moisturizing my hair in the twists.

Today I'm going to dive into washing and detangling and retwisting my hair, twist by twist. It's going to take a long while. I will be using new-to-me products, and I'm super curious about how my hair will fare with them.

I purchased so many sample shampoo bars that I don't quite now how to design my wash-and-twist day today. I'm leaning this way:
  1. Cleanse all twists with Chagrin Valley Butter Bar Conditioner Shampoo. Leave in, since its supposed to great for detangling.
  2. Take one twist and:
    • Finger detangle, rinse out the previous shampoo, and cleanse with Chagrin Valley Mud & Clay Shampoo bar. Rinse out.
    • Apply Soultanicals Hair Glide to twist and fully detangle it.
    • Apply DevaCurl Arc Angel (gel) and retwist.
  3. Repeat for all twists.
I feel like I should skip a step. I'm already skipping use of the Carrot Milk & Honey Shampoo Bar, which I think I'll love.

I'm going to go and do one twist now and see how the 3 steps above fare.
 
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Ladies, I would like to join the challenge! I am disappointed with where I am with my hair so I'm going to focus on getting my hair back to where it was and better.

My goal is full tail bone length hair. I've fluctuated between scraggily tailbone and waist length since 2011. As of today I'm back at or just above waist length. I went to a salon for an Olaplex treatment and silk press last week. She was super sweet but the detangling process was very unpleasant. The way it looked before the trim was the worse it's looked since I can remember. Was it my lack of focused care over the past year? The harsh detangling and blow dry? The silkiness of the press showing the damage more? All of the above? I don't know.

As of now my hair feels great! Its silky soft with body and healthy ends. She did a great trim. I don't know what part the Olaplex plays in it yet. I will say I'm afraid of heat damage and how well my hair will revert. I big chopped in '07 because of heat damage from a salon visit and this is only my second salon experience since then. The time before was in 2014 by Tamika Bell with no problem. My hair is so straight and silky still after a week and my few shed/broken hairs aren't reverting with soap and water. Y'all I hope my hair is okay.

So onto my plan. When I wash my hair in a week or two I'm going to do a 2 step Aphogee treatment. Then I'm going to wash and deep condition my hair weekly with maybe a mid-week cowash. I will modify the frequency if I put my hair in mini/small twists which I may do. For styling I will do wash and gos, twist outs (maybe), buns, and a single braid. I'm going to finally try regular trims. I trim when its straight and that's only been once, twice a year max. Now I'm going to straighten it and trim 3 to 4 times over the next year to see if that yields better results. I'm also going to try Manetabolism vitamins. For products, I'm going to shop around to find the right combo. The sure things I use are my Abba Gentle Conditioner Leave In and my homemade Naptural85 shea butter mix. I just order ingredients on amazon to make her African soap shampoo and I bought the As I Am cowash and deep conditioner. I will see how I like all of those.

Now to the photos...
BRB. Gotta learn how to do it. Lol.
 
@Natural-K Welcome to the Challenge! Looks like you got a great game plan to get your hair back on track.

****************
Today was wash day. I washed with Elucence Volume Clarifying shampoo & deep conditioned with Joico MRB. My hair was in braids from start to finish (as always). After washing, I applied Qhemet balm and pinned the braids around my head to air dry. I'll wear the braids until Tuesday then wear my hair down. I have a doctors appt Tuesday to get the results of my blood work so fingers crossed I get another clean bill of health until next year! I also get to meet my baby (by ultrasound) for the first time, so I wanna be cute for that! LOL

*********
Paging @MzSwift Just checking to see if you had the baby. Haven't seen you around lately. Hoping mommy and baby are well.
 
Last edited:
Saludable84 said:
My hair has officially left BSL. Now I'm really going to serious on the heavy sealing. I don't want to do anything to compromise my ends.

Today should be wash day and I just plan on sticking to my boring routine. Nect week, I'm going back to buns.
Click to expand...

@Saludable84 Congrats on reaching a new length milestone! What special treatments/heavy sealing products will you be incorporating for your ends now? I see you like Qhemet products and I think they are perfect for treating the ends. I've been experimenting with different combo's and the one I've found most effective is this:
Every 2-3 days, submerging my ends in warm water, moisturizing with the Burdock cream, following that up with the honey balm then stretching my ends with satin rollers. Unfortunately, all the Qhemet products are too heavy for my length and takes around 7-8 days to not have that greasy feel but they are amazing for my ends.
 
lulu97 said:
@Saludable84 Congrats on reaching a new length milestone! What special treatments/heavy sealing products will you be incorporating for your ends now? I see you like Qhemet products and I think they are perfect for treating the ends. I've been experimenting with different combo's and the one I've found most effective is this:
Every 2-3 days, submerging my ends in warm water, moisturizing with the Burdock cream, following that up with the honey balm then stretching my ends with satin rollers. Unfortunately, all the Qhemet products are too heavy for my length and takes around 7-8 days to not have that greasy feel but they are amazing for my ends.
Click to expand...

Before, I was just applying butters equally on the entire length. Now, as I'm twisting, I apply more butter to the last 1.5 inches. It always looks coated, but it absorbs after a day. Well at least it appears that way.

I have to wash weekly, but I also don't need to remoisturize. Even when I refresh with rose water, it may make it a tad puffier, but not by much and it takes days of spritzing to have an effect. So, I definitely don't need to go back in.

I'm guessing when I get to your length, that may change, but right now, I just have to heavy seal.
 
You just made me think about something!

My hair thrives on water and daily rinses or concerns washes. I've been so busy...sometimes my hair doesn't see water for 7 days!

I'm gonna start back doing daily or every 2 days water rinse and leave in and bun.

I still haven't gotten my vitamins either. :(

Noelle01 said:
I used to water rinse my hair daily and wear it in a high bun, but lately I've been skipping the daily water rinsing and have been shampooing, DCing and blowdrying my hair on the cool setting weekly (using the tension method) and wearing a braidout for the week to keep my hair stretched. My hair seems to be doing well with this routine and it seems like I've gotten a lot of growth over the past couple of weeks, but it could also be due to me spraying my scalp with Xcel21 twice a day. I used to think my hair retained more length with daily rinsing, but so far my new routine seems to be a keeper.
Click to expand...
 
SmilingElephant said:
You just made me think about something!

My hair thrives on water and daily rinses or concerns washes. I've been so busy...sometimes my hair doesn't see water for 7 days!

I'm gonna start back doing daily or every 2 days water rinse and leave in and bun.

I still haven't gotten my vitamins either. :(
Click to expand...

I think I'm going to start spritzing my hair with water daily so that way I'm still using water, but I'm not rinsing my hair. I like the results I'm seeing so far from keeping my hair stretched, but I still want to use water somehow in my daily routine.
 
Natural-K said:
Ladies, I would like to join the challenge! I am disappointed with where I am with my hair so I'm going to focus on getting my hair back to where it was and better.

My goal is full tail bone length hair. I've fluctuated between scraggily tailbone and waist length since 2011. As of today I'm back at or just above waist length. I went to a salon for an Olaplex treatment and silk press last week. She was super sweet but the detangling process was very unpleasant. The way it looked before the trim was the worse it's looked since I can remember. Was it my lack of focused care over the past year? The harsh detangling and blow dry? The silkiness of the press showing the damage more? All of the above? I don't know.

As of now my hair feels great! Its silky soft with body and healthy ends. She did a great trim. I don't know what part the Olaplex plays in it yet. I will say I'm afraid of heat damage and how well my hair will revert. I big chopped in '07 because of heat damage from a salon visit and this is only my second salon experience since then. The time before was in 2014 (correction: 2015) by Tamika Bell with no problem. My hair is so straight and silky still after a week and my few shed/broken hairs aren't reverting with soap and water. Y'all I hope my hair is okay.

So onto my plan. When I wash my hair in a week or two I'm going to do a 2 step Aphogee treatment. Then I'm going to wash and deep condition my hair weekly with maybe a mid-week cowash. I will modify the frequency if I put my hair in mini/small twists which I may do. For styling I will do wash and gos, twist outs (maybe), buns, and a single braid. I'm going to finally try regular trims. I trim when its straight and that's only been once, twice a year max. Now I'm going to straighten it and trim 3 to 4 times over the next year to see if that yields better results. I'm also going to try Manetabolism vitamins. For products, I'm going to shop around to find the right combo. The sure things I use are my Abba Gentle Conditioner Leave In and my homemade Naptural85 shea butter mix. I just order ingredients on amazon to make her African soap shampoo and I bought the As I Am cowash and deep conditioner. I will see how I like all of those.

Now to the photos...
BRB. Gotta learn how to do it. Lol.
Click to expand...

Examples of my hair before:

6/2015 Tamika Bell salon visit
2d2d9c2.jpg


12/2015 My work :)
2h6sex3.jpg


To this :cry3:
2/19/2017 Before trim
4zuwxx.jpg


2/19/2017 After trim
f27ojp.jpg


So this now is my before picture. I'm ready for the challenge!
 
MileHighDiva said:
@Natural-K
Why did you stop going to DSD/Salon Tamika Bell?

You have a :gorgeous: head of hair!
Click to expand...

Thanks!

I only went that one time on a visit to Atlanta. I'm in So Cal. She was careful to avoid heat damage which I appreciated but in June in ATL for my hair not used to heat and humidity it didn't last a couple days. However, it was still worth it to me. It was a nice experience and nice trim for my first salon visit in ~10 years at the time.

Now this time was also in Atlanta. It was semi on a whim. After going more than a year without a trim, the longest ever for me, and feeling lazy/not finding the right time to straighten it myself I decided to give it a try. Plus I was curious about the Olaplex treatment. I read the threads on here and I followed this stylist on IG so I gave it a shot.

At this point I think I'm going to go back to going it alone. Flat iron at home and trim at Super Cuts. If I make it out of this without heat damage I will be forever grateful. The only other stylists that I still hold out going to are Reniece and Eclectic_vibez. These two for sure.

How about you? Do you go to the shop or DIY? Also, how often do you straighten? Trim?
(this is for everyone)
 
@Natural-K

Oh, okay! You're in different location than @ dontspeakdefeat/Salon Tamika Bell.

I dust/trim seasonally/quarterly. I follow DSD's philosphy of trimming for retention. That piece of advice from her helped increase my retention. :yep:

I did a no trim challenge once and it cost me several inches :nono:

I DIY, unless my H.S. classmate is home visting for the Holidays etc. So, my last professional visit was Thanksgiving holiday 2015. I might have her do my hair when she's home this summer for our class reunion.

She knows my issues with stylists and she's very gentle.

By the way, her shop is in So Cal. I'll post a link to her IG, so you can check out her work. She's used to us long hair ladies.

I had a visit to myself on 3/18/14 that resulted in heat damage.

I can get chemically/thermally relaxed results via roller setting. So, I don't use direct heat anymore via my own hand. It's not worth it.

So Cal Stylist used to LHCF Ladies:
 
Last edited:
@Natural-K
I don't use direct heat in my hair anymore. If I want a straight-ish look, I roller set and wrap my hair. Each night that I wrap it, it gets straighter and straighter. Or I'll put it in a semi Bantu knot (with the ends excluded from the knot) after roller setting. My avatar is the result of the latter. I can honestly say without a doubt, that I don't like pin straight hair on myself. So roller setting gives me the look I like without the need for direct heat.

As far as trims, I really no longer have a set schedule...however I try not to let a new year come in without trimming my ends. So at least once a year. I can go that long without trimming cause I don't play about my ends. I do a special treatment on them every 2-3 days (explained in a post above), keep them stretched to minimize ssk's and if I do get them (which I rarely do nowaday's) I snip them right away.
 
Natural-K said:
Thanks!

I only went that one time on a visit to Atlanta. I'm in So Cal. She was careful to avoid heat damage which I appreciated but in June in ATL for my hair not used to heat and humidity it didn't last a couple days. However, it was still worth it to me. It was a nice experience and nice trim for my first salon visit in ~10 years at the time.

Now this time was also in Atlanta. It was semi on a whim. After going more than a year without a trim, the longest ever for me, and feeling lazy/not finding the right time to straighten it myself I decided to give it a try. Plus I was curious about the Olaplex treatment. I read the threads on here and I followed this stylist on IG so I gave it a shot.

At this point I think I'm going to go back to going it alone. Flat iron at home and trim at Super Cuts. If I make it out of this without heat damage I will be forever grateful. The only other stylists that I still hold out going to are Reniece and Eclectic_vibez. These two for sure.

How about you? Do you go to the shop or DIY? Also, how often do you straighten? Trim?
(this is for everyone)
Click to expand...

What stylist was this? How did you get an appointment with Tamika Bell's salon?

And your hair is absolutely beautiful!
 
Everyone's hair is looking LOVELY!

Update:

I finally repurchased some collagen. I found one with vitamin C and hyaluronic acid. So far it seems geat.

I tried several of the Chagrin Valley poo bars. Overall, they are too harsh/stripping. I did like how slippery the conditioning shampoo bar made my hair. I was able to detangle my hair with it. And the poo bar with carrot and honey in it was NOT stripping. I haven't tried the beer-containing poo bars yet, nor the ayurvedic ones I purchased.

I finally tried the Mielle Organics DC. :yep: Verrrrrrrrry nice. Amazing slip! I was able to EASILY detangle with it. If the smell weren't so strong, it would rank as my #2 DC of all time, behind only the SM hipo masque.

Thanks for turning me on to the Mielle Organics DC, ladies!
 
I'm holding out for Reniece & Co. too. Would you go back to Tamika again? She's on my backup list. Who is Eclectic_vibez?

Manetabolism gave me a lot of energy when I took them three years ago. I had so much going on that I didn't track growth. They're on sale (buy 3 get 1 free) at Sally's through today (2/28). Considered giving them a try but I think I'm going to stay with my Spring Valley HSN plus MSM (3,000 mcg), Bamboo Silica, etc. Don't want to jump all over the place.

Oh, you're hair looks great and hoping it reverts back properly.



Natural-K said:
Examples of my hair before:

6/2015 Tamika Bell salon visit
2d2d9c2.jpg


12/2015 My work :)
2h6sex3.jpg


To this :cry3:
2/19/2017 Before trim
4zuwxx.jpg


2/19/2017 After trim
f27ojp.jpg


So this now is my before picture. I'm ready for the challenge!
Click to expand...
Natural-K said:
Thanks!

I only went that one time on a visit to Atlanta. I'm in So Cal. She was careful to avoid heat damage which I appreciated but in June in ATL for my hair not used to heat and humidity it didn't last a couple days. However, it was still worth it to me. It was a nice experience and nice trim for my first salon visit in ~10 years at the time.

Now this time was also in Atlanta. It was semi on a whim. After going more than a year without a trim, the longest ever for me, and feeling lazy/not finding the right time to straighten it myself I decided to give it a try. Plus I was curious about the Olaplex treatment. I read the threads on here and I followed this stylist on IG so I gave it a shot.

At this point I think I'm going to go back to going it alone. Flat iron at home and trim at Super Cuts. If I make it out of this without heat damage I will be forever grateful. The only other stylists that I still hold out going to are Reniece and Eclectic_vibez. These two for sure.

How about you? Do you go to the shop or DIY? Also, how often do you straighten? Trim?
(this is for everyone)
Click to expand...
 
So this Friday I am going to a new salon to get my hair done...I actually have to travel to another state (no ladies it's not Reniece but boy do I wish it was!). The closer I get the more nervous I get, I've decided to add a professional trim as well :eek:. I really hope the initial vibe I get and the process as it goes will calm my nerves and I trust them to do the trim - if not I will forgo it and come home and do the @dontspeakdefeat method myself. Looking forward to having my hair pampered and some quality me time on Friday, will post before and after trim pics!
 
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