Being Thankful

I spent a wonderful Thanksgiving with family and friends and tried out new techniques with my hair.
Here is my Thanksgiving look:

I tried Flat African Threading as shown on the YT channel Chocolate Hair/Vanilla Care. I enjoyed trying it out although the next time I do it I'll make sure to use a curved needle. My fingers and brain didn't always want to agree on what we were doing and a straight needle made it more painful than necessary.

Here is a close up of the front:

The back was styled using Curl Formers and although it took me a moment to get the handle of it I have to say that I enjoy wearing them more than Flexi-rods. However, I'm tender headed so I won't sleep in them again. The next time I want a "until I go to bed" curly style I'll just do my hair early in the morning and sit under the dryer.

The style lasted all day even though I didn't remove all the Curl Formers correctly or go back and make them all lie down neatly. I knew I'd have to do something different with the back the next day so I wasn't super worried about it.

The little white sparkles you see are beads that I threaded in as I was doing the flat threading. I've never attempted something like this but I will be doing it again because I like the look.

With the versatility and moisture retention of African Threading, I'm fairly sure that I'll be rocking threaded looks for all of 2014.

If you've ever mixed techniques or styling options I'd love to see what you've done. Feel free to post your creations here.

My Lastest Creation and My Love for Learning

If you follow me on Instagram (if you don't you should *Smile*) there is a post that shows my newest style from various angles. I consider them my glamour shots and for those who are interested I'll take "after" photo's when I take the style down.

The sides were parted into eight sections, four rectangular and four triangular, that I threaded before twisting two together to make the swirls. I knew that I would be twisting and pinning them up so although the thread is attached firmly at the root it isn't too tight.

Learning how to hold my hands and complete the movements to keep the thread taut against my hair was a bit frustrating, but I was really happy when I finally figured it out. I love that this is a traditional African technique that I can incorporate into my life.

I did have some concern about the thread cutting into or tearing my hair, so I made sure to coat each section in beeswax before wrapping to help with slippage. The additional beeswax on my hands made moving the thread around my hand fairly simple as well.

My husband and I went out for a late lunch today, and I was amazed by the number of people who stared and stopped to talk to me about my hair. I'm glad that my styles can encourage conversation and that most of the time I have the time to stop and share.

My plan is to leave this up until Thanksgiving or so and then try out another style that I'm dreaming up.

If you've ever worn a style that incorporated African Threading/Ghana Braids, I'd love to hear about it!

Supporting Black Women because the World still Overlooks Us Outside of Stereotypes

One of the things that really changed for me is how I viewed myself as a black woman when I decided to return to my natural texture. For most of my life, I had been thought not "black enough" because of my "light skin" "talking like I'm white" being "so articulate" etc.

Although my parent's provided inspiring information about our African history it wasn't shown in our day-to-day lives. The rest of that story deserves a blog of its own.

My natural hair doesn't look like, react like, or style anything like my relaxed hair. I had to step back and re-evaluate what being a black woman meant to me. I had to re-define what professional looked like for me. It was a real eye opener.

When people saw me in my business suits and TWA, their reactions were almost comical. In my preferred heel height, I'm 6'1 and I'm a woman of substance, so I tend to draw attention when I'm out and about. The first time I wore a head wrap in public, people seemed genuinely surprised that I spoke English "so well." It took a minute for me to realize that they thought I was an immigrant. Up until that moment I didn't realize that I'd added another layer of being a black woman in America to my experience.

Drawing on all of my own experiences gave me a greater appreciation and love for black people. It sparked an awakening of my consciousness that is continuing to evolve. I've become more active and vocal about our situation and also more active in community service and politics. I hope to express this more thoroughly in my vlogs because I feel that our hair is so much more than just keratin that has grown from our heads.

I came across this blog and it made me glad to see that someone outside of our community sees this truth and spoke up about it. I don't have to hate or denigrate other races in order to say with confidence that #BlackGirlsRock

Has returning to natural changed your views or your lifestyle in anyway? If so please share your story!