It has been way too long!! Life simply took over. I am now a medical student and have been so busy, I’ve neglected my hair a bit. Well, I’m back on the saddle. Yes, I’ve reached waist length (a while ago, in fact) and most likely went past it. However, the ends were so thin, they were almost invisible. So around July of this year, I decided to cut it to BSL. My goal for the year of 2022 is to get back to WL and I’m doing that with braids as a protective style. Here is the plan:
Protective style
self-installed large knotless braids (X-Pression Kanekalon hair)
Length to Keep in Each Install
3-5 months (re-braiding individual sections to refresh)
after each install, give hair small break then reinstall fresh set of knotless braids
Products
scalp: castor oil, Wild Growth Oil, Sulfur 8
hair: any leave-in, castor oil, whipped shea butter (home made)
deep conditioner: Alter Ego Garlic Mask Hot Oil Treatment
Regimen
everyday or every other day, apply castor oil/WGO/sulfur 8 mix to scalp
daily moisturizing of hair length with whatever moisturizer and oil on hand
shampoo hair in braids with diluted shampoo on weeks 1, 3, 5, etc
co-wash hair in braids with conditioner on weeks 2, 4, 6, etc
during hair break, apply henna
during hair break, shampoo and deep condition with hair mask
It’s a simple plan. By December 2022, barring set backs and an unfavorable growth cycle, I should have waist length hair. My ultimate goal is tailbone length hair and I hope to get there by December 2023! 😀
I’ve also been working on my skin care, which has been going well – thank goodness!
So last week, on March 26th (Wednesday), I randomly decided to put mini twists in my hair. I’d washed and conditioned my hair two days prior and placed them in medium/big-sized twists (my second time doing twists of any kind since the big chop; the first time was right after I big chopped. See this post.) I don’t know if I was trying to do a twist-out (unlikely) or keep them in big twists. Anyway, I was watching the lovely Alicia James video on mini twists after spending literally hours on Youtube looking at videos of Senegalese and Havana twists – basically, twists that required added fake hair. However, after seeing the Alicia James video, I was inspired to just do twists on my own hair with no added hair. So I did.
It took forever.
On the first day, Wednesday, I spent like 15-16 hours and only got through 60% of my hair. Granted, I was taking my time and took breaks here and there. But still, that’s a lot of time. Thankfully, I had the On Demand function on my TV to keep me company.
On Thursday, I didn’t get much done, I think I spent 3 to 4 hours max, and on Friday, I sped through the rest by making the twists in the back bigger and forgoing neat parts.
I would say that the overwhelming majority of the time spent doing this style was on detangling thoroughly and making neat parts in the front of my hair. The actual twisting took like 10-20% of the work and time. Yeah, I gotta do better haha.
How I Did My Mini Twists
– I did it on fully dry semi-stretched hair (I stretched my hair with medium-sized twists. Had I known I was going to do mini twists that week, I would have stretched my hair with braids, instead, and left them a little longer than two days for best stretched-out results).
– I used just water and my whipped Shea butter mix for moisture. (I’ll write about how I made my whipped Shea butter in a later post. It was my second time making it, and it was actually successful, considering I hated the Shea butter the first time around, and I think it had more to do with the fact that I still had relaxed hair than the composition of the mix).
– If you’re doing two-strand mini twists, do not borrow hair from the other strand if you find that one strand is longer than the other, because it will make unraveling a lot harder! Knots and breakage galore!
– Patience.
I honestly think I just have a big head, and then there’s the fact that my hair is grazing BSL, if not already there. So doing mini twists may not take as long for you as it did me if your hair is shorter/less dense. My sister, during the beginning of her natural hair journey, did mini-twists a lot and they usually took anywhere from 4 to 6 hours to complete and they were tinier than what I have on now, but I would say she was between neck length and shoulder length during that period. She said it would take too long to do now since her hair is much longer. Lucky for her, I volunteered to do her mini twists for her in preparation for her Portugal trip in three weeks. Practice makes perfect!
I am not gifted with “styling hands” so there’s definitely room for improving my mini twist technique. I accept the challenge. 🙂
Excuse my homely appearance. This is my hair down and parted to the side just for the picture. I’ve been keeping it in a medium-high bun 99% of the time. These pictures were taken one day after completing the twists, yet the twists looked kind of “old” to me. I intend to keep them in for at least two more weeks.
Hair We Grow! 