Frotastic Curls

Hey hey!!!

As y'all have probably noticed, my kids have hair, A LOT OF IT! Not only do they have a ton of hair, because they're biracial their hair is quite different from mine. But if that wasn't enough of a challenge, Nia's hair is different than Isaiah's AND their hair changes texture over time!!!!

Here's Nia at 3 months:

 Her hair is straight!!!!! It only curled when wet, so momma put that lotion in! Oh, and how mad I would get when  we took her hats off and it was all nappy again....

Then at 6 months:
More curls but again, only with some hair product. I used Soft&Precious back then.

When she was 1 she started to have soft curls that got a bit tighter with time:

She's about 20 months here.

And now that she's 3 - ba-baam! Yeah, she doesn't wake up with cute little curls, sorry I have to break it to ya!

This is what I deal with every morning (Mind you, this is AFTER I detangled her hair)!!! Cotton candy craziness!! Someone doesn't want to keep braids in or a night cap on! Well, I don't blame her, her curls are gorgeous when tamed, haha, and at that age I wouldn't want to keep a cap on at night either! So I got her a satin pillowcase (cotton draws out the moisture in her hair and it doesn't produce oil like my hair does) which should keep those tangles to a minimum.

Now to Isaiah. See those curls? I didn't have to do anything, they just happened!  Back then he had a cute little fro-hawk, by nature by the way, though people kept asking me if I cut his hair like that. Uhm, yeah, I totally cut my 6 month's old hair into a fro-hawk.....NOT! Moving on.

Now we have encountered this:

Slight hair explosion! His curls are much tighter then Nia's were at that age so I have a feeling we're looking at a future afro!!! I say this with excitement and fear all at the same time! It'll look amazing BUT it'll be work, since he's a boy, it'll be much work. For some reason boys don't seem to care so much about their hair at that age. Anyway. Yes, their hair is more work than mine will ever be and it's not super easy to manage but it's not super hard either. You just need to know what you're doing. In my case that involves some trial and error, have I mentioned error yet? And with their texture changing it also involves a journey through the hair product world til you find what works for their hair at a specific stage.

So over the past 3 years I've used a variety of products, I washed their hair with Johnson's baby shampoo for curly hair and used olive oil when they were babies and the occasional Soft&Precious spray to define those curls. At some point I used Just Me Detangler for Nia and I'm sorry to say it went in the trash rather quickly. Her hair smelled yummy and it worked okay but left her hair very dry after a short time. After that, we moved on to Mixed Silk and Silken Child from Silk Elements. At first I was in love with Silken Child but it soon showed that it too wasn't for Nia's hair, as was Mixed Silk. It's a great product, just not for Nia.

I shall add, we've always had our routine: Wash her hair twice a week, condition it, detangle it and moisturize (with a mixture of oils). Every day we detangle. I try to braid it every so often if she lets me. Nia is VERY proud of her hair, as she should be. She'll flip it and tell the world that her hair is SO AMAZING! Oh yeah, quite the dramatic actress here! Getting side tracked! Sooo, I went back to Sally's as it is the only store with a decent selection for ethnic hair here in Minot. I wanted to try a different detangler, a spray, so I bought Lavish Curls from Curls. LOVE the smell! It's not exactly for children though and I think that might have been the problem. It is more of a moisturizer, not a detangler per se. I read awesome reviews about their kids line Curly Q's for Kids over at Treasures for Tots and Baby Big Hair, however, the stores here don't sell the kids line - insert sad face. So back I went to Sally's AGAIN and checked out a line I considered buying the previous time when I went with the Curls product: Taliah Waajid. She's a mom who's been in the natural hair business since 1996. You can find her products here. I chose her line because it's free of all those chemicals and alcohol that dry out my babies' hair. I could tell the difference after the first use! Her hair was big and had these beautiful but not weighed down curls, even the next morning, way less tangles too! I love the shampoo, The Great Detangler leave-in conditioner and the herbal comb out lotion, the latter is specifically for kids. Again, Sally's carries more of the adult products here, the comb out lotion and the herbal style and shine are the only kids products they carry from her line. I will go more into depth about the different products as well as some new combs and brushes at a later point. This post already is a bit lengthy!  :)

In the meantime, check out Treasures for Tots' tips on biracial hair care and make sure you also hop over to Baby Big Hair for some more tips, they have awesome shirts too!!! I'm going to get some for Nia and Isaiah!!

Til then, love,