Store Shelf Products vs. Al Natural: My Take

A while ago there was a deep debate on my twitter timeline (which is mostly women of the natural hair twitter community) and the debate was whether you can still achieve healthy natural and long hair using store shelf products that typically contain "not so great" ingredients. I remember my point was that I know the relaxer was a very big no no because it, for a fact causes breakage (which i noticed along my hairline) but what about the same products that we all grew up on and momma swore by? I personally always had long hair. I didn't have a problem with breakage until I was 15 years old and decided it would be fun to experiment with color. That's when the real breakage came. But what about that good ol' Blue Magic hair grease? In my opinion it really does the same thing that shea and the oils do. Gives the hair moisture. Yes of course it contains mineral oil/petroleum which can stunt hair growth but what if you just apply it to the hair shaft and not your scalp? The hair is dead but not the follicle. I never liked greasing my scalp anyways. But What if you aren't as financially able/inclined to spend the amount of money that these natural hair companies are asking for? What are you going to do? Go to the nearest beauty supply store and buy what you can. Of course my analogy would be like comparing the use of store shelf products to alcohol consumption. Don't over do it and you'll be fine! lol Going out to drink every now and then is okay. Have a few drinks party with friends but don't over do it. If you do you start to see some serious side effects like a beer belly (bleh!). Same with hair products. Try to keep at least one or two natural products around. Like shea butter! Shea butter can be found anywhere and if not locally the internet is the best place. Also try your hands at homemade conditioners and even oils that you would normally use in the kitchen (i.e. EVOO). Mix it up, use what you can and go to the store for the other stuff.

Gel and Shea Butter: My New Favorite Combo

Ever find that perfect combo of products for a style that you just want to use again, and again......and again some more? (lol) Well that has been me recently with my twists. I always just used my shea butter mix, which is fire by itself, but my twists never seemed to last more than 2 days with out getting frizzy! And then if I just stuck to my guns and left them in anyways my twist outs were never super defined. Well, I absolutely love using ic fantasia polisher gel for my puffs and wash and go's and it never makes my hair super crunchy. So I decided to try adding it with the shea butter mix on my twists. I just moisturize each section with my whipped shea butter and then add a light coating of the gel. Now this isn't some new found technique. I'm pretty sure there are people who have actually tried this combo before. Matter of fact, I've talked to some of them on twitter (follow me! twitter.com/naturally_flyy). However, I LOVE this combo. As you can see in the pics my twists are tight and my twist outs are defined like no other. Try it! you'll like it!

NYX Mega Shine Lipgloss: New Formula or "Second Chance Luck"?

When I first decided to purchase an NYX makeup haul I knew i wanted to get some lip gloss but was sort of skeptical because of my past experiences with other NYX lip glosses. Of course buying makeup of the internet is a very big win or lose situation especially when purchasing from a retailer instead of the manufacturer. Also my last time purchasing their lip gloss I would have considered myself an inexperienced makeup user. So I bought sheer not thinking that there would be no color and I also purchased from a "tween" lip gloss line which just gave me that greasy lip look. I did purchase from the Mega Shine line (a pinkish-peach) but the color I got gave me a tint of color and that again plays into the fact that I was inexperienced and didn't know what colors would play best with my skin tone. Well this time I was prepared and more educated. I purchased five colors:
nutmeg
African queen(bottom pic)
taupe
sunrise
sugar pie (top pic)
FTW!!! I so lucked out! These colors were so pigmented and creamy! Even the light colors showed up on my brown lips. Taupe of course is true to it's name, sugar pie is a lighter nude color w/ a hint of pink, nutmeg is a nice brownish red color, sunrise is like the red of a chili pepper, and African queen (my fave) is a nice fuchsia.
So it had me thinking, did the formula change or am I just getting good at the makeup guessing game? Well I know they did change their formula for the eye shadows but I didn't see anything about the formula being changed for the lip gloss lines. Well I guess I'm getting good! lol