FRIDAY BREW

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If your like me, you know what it’s like to spend more than an hour tackling pesky tangles. This is the unfortunate nature of hair strands that are densely packed together. You may even find it harder to achieve optimal curl definition with strands that are so close together. I’ve learned to work with it but I wanted to share some of my helpful tips that I’ve used throughout the years to tame my dense curls and coils. It’s not easy dealing with all these strands but the time and effort I spend maintaining my mane is worth it in the end and I always experience amazing results when I follow these 5 tips.

1. SECTION OFF
If you have dense hair or curly hair in general, you’ve heard this tip before! Sectioning your hair is the best advice I can give you when detangling dense hair. Dense hair has a tendency to entwine with other strands causing pesky single strand knots and split ends. Section hair off during the detangling and styling process and it may save your strands in the long run from stress and will make the detangling process a whole lot less overwhelming.

2. USE A WIDE TOOTH COMB
They have all kinds of fancy hair styling tools that claim you will get fantastic results if you invest, but honestly, I always end up coming back to my ol faithful orange wide tooth come. Fine tooth comes will tear the hair out and I find that the Denam brush does the same. A wide tooth comb is the best thing for navigating through hair that is so close together. Strands that are packed together can miss out on moisture and nutrients if not detangled properly so using a wide tooth comb will help stretch the products you use to each individual strand.

3. USE THEM DIGITS
When I have a little extra time on my hands, I finger detangle rather than using the wide tooth comb. Finger detangling is a tedious process for me but I know I have a whole lot less hair shed with this method. I’m able to feel my way through difficult areas and resolve the problem head on, literally. This process is much gentler on the hair and gives me full control.

4. BE A CONDITIONER CHEAPSKATE
That sounds really bad but there is good reason for investing in cheap conditioners. Sometimes the only way you can get those pesky tangles out is by using obnoxious amounts of conditioner. Nobody wants to use their expensive conditioners for this so investing in a cheap one won’t make you feel like your just tossing your cash down the drain. Also, some cheap conditioners are actually very effective and are jammed packed with quality ingredients that soften and tame frizz. Tresemme Naturals, Trader Joe’s Tea Tree Tingle, Aussie Moist are a few that I’ve used strictly for detangling and co-washing.

5. USE OIL
Yes, I’m a bit of an oil snob and have tried a lot of different oils for detangling.  Oil softens the hair, makes it pliable and easier to work with. I typically apply oil to my ends because my ends are the problem area and get tangled the most. Dense hair tends to get pretty difficult to detangle at the roots so adding a dime size amount of oil to the roots loosens the hair and helps with the detangling process too. Oil helps separate hair and provides an amazing shine. Dense kinky hair is bound to entwine with other strands because the hair is so close together, so your mission should always be to use products that help separate each individual strand so that all the strands can benefit from the moisture and nutrients from your products. 

MOTHER’S DAY

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Dress
This was by far the best darn Mother’s Day EVER! Me and mom were long overdue for some photos together so I figured Mother’s Day was a great opportunity to steal her away from her busy life and do an impromptu photoshoot in Downtown Raleigh. If there is one thing you should know about me, it’s that I love my momma to death. She is my world! She is goofy, loving, charming, warmhearted and the best thing since shoe strings! She is also a jack of all trades (teacher, professional dog walker, tutor, babysitter, counselor and full-time mom). Yep, I said it, she’s a full-time mom. How is that possible when all of her kids are grown and out the house? Well, because she’s never stopped momming. LOL, forgive me, I make up words on the fly but yup, she moms 24/7-making her weekly calls to me, my brother and sister, counseling us during rough patches and she cooks! I’m telling you guys, I got a winner and can’t imagine life without her! The time together was much needed and I thoroughly enojoyed myself

I hope everyone had an awesome Mother’s Day!

Sincerely,

Deidra Marie

Mom’s sleeveless white dress-Gap, Mom’s brown sunglasses-TJ Maxx, Off the shoulder white lace dress-New York and Company, Circular diamond earrings-Kay’s Jewelers, White Sunglasses-Charlotte Russe

FRIDAY BREW: DIY DEVA CUT

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BEFORE
AFTER
CURLY HAIR BE GONE
Today I’m enjoying a tall iced black hazelnut coffee, and talking about my DIY Deva Cut. If your not familiar with the infamous Deva Cut, allow me to briefly explain. It is a special type of haircut specifically for wavy, curly, coily hair types. The technique is unique in that the cut is done on dry curls with each curl being cut individually one by one. It was designed to help create shape and balance to the hair and is recommended to those who wear their hair in curly hairstyles often.

I’ve been doing my research for awhile and have been trying to find the perfect stylist to whip my curls into shape. Raleigh has lots of hair salons, but my research was very intense as I wanted to make sure I found a stylist that could take on my multiple textures. I finally settled on a stylist in the downtown Raleigh area a few weeks ago and to my disappointment the shop is not accepting new clients. I just couldn’t wait and I was feeling a bit scissor happy so I went to YouTube and found DIY Deva Cuts. Apparently, a lot of naturals have used this technique on themselves and have experienced great results! After watching a few videos, I just went to cutting. My main issue was a lack of shape and balance in the way my hair grows out, so I wanted to focus on balancing things out for a cut with more dimension yet still clean and presentable. That being said, I decided to take off more in the back, keeping my crown long and cutting a long bang. I started on freshly washed, conditioned and detangled hair. I styled my hair in twist, unraveled the twist once they were dry and separated the curls and then proceeded to cut curl by curl. I was very careful about not cutting to much but what a difference in the shape of my hair! My hair didn’t need to much of a cut because I had a pretty defined cut back in December when I straightened my hair, but a shape up was needed and I saved a whole lot of money just doing it myself.

If your thinking about doing your own Deva Cut, I suggest watching a few videos before you begin. Watching others do it really helped me decide what kind of shape I wanted to go for and helped me point out the problem areas on my head so I could tackle them in detail. While I didn’t cut off much, I still see a significant difference in the way my hair lays when styled. It’s also easier to maintain and detangle. Do your research, assess the problem areas of your hair and then you can cut. Start off by cutting a little because once you cut it off, it’s GONE!

Happy cutting!

Sincerely,

Deidra Marie