Saturday Coily Hair Quick Cleanse & Condition Routine

SATURDAY WASH DAY WITH EASE

Air Drying in Four Plaits

After about 2 weeks of not detangling Dimple's hair, this Saturday became her temporary hair day (it's usually Sunday evening). She couldn't go to church in the morning with this dry, brittle, tangled, uncooperative hair. I mean, she could, but we both wouldn't be too happy about it. As I type this, I've already pre-poo'd her hair with a diluted Conditioner (Trader Joe's Nourish Spa). I love that conditioner for it's detangling/slip properties--and the ingredients are the best! Unfortunately, there's not a Trader Joe's store by me--so I have to order it online. After I detangle each section, I'm twisting up her hair (usually ends up being about 10 two strand twists) so that it won't tangle back up.

From Four Plaits to Approx. 12 Smaller Plaits

After I detangle her hair during the pre-poo with diluted conditioner, I put her in the shower and shampoo (if needed). Since it's been around 2 weeks since I last did anything sensible to her hair, I decided to shampoo this time around. I may only rinse off a little of the pre-poo before I apply the dime sized shampoo to each section. I will usually take down each section in order to shampoo it. I just don't feel like I can "get up in there" when her hair is still in twists. Plus, it's really not that much more work for me.

Easy Stretch on Wash Day

After the shampoo, if her hair feels dry, then I will use a deep conditioning product, then place each section into a bantu knot. I will put on a shower cap, and let her finish up her shower. Once she's done showering, I  rinse out the deep conditioner and make 4 plaits from the loosened two strand twists. While she's getting dressed, her hair is air drying in the two strand twists. To help it along, I will use a microfiber towel and blot off the extra water.

I can leave her hair like this until tomorrow morning for a braidout with a LITTLE stretch--or I can make her air dried 4 plaits into about 16-20 plaits for some LONG stretch action (that's what I ended up doing).

This is a pretty simple regimen/routine that eliminates lengthy hair wash days and gets rid of lots of tears from detangling. You can't go wrong with that. As I sit here typing this, I can't help but to compare how much easier Dimple's hair is to about 10 years ago with T's hair drama. The only difference here is that I'm now educated about how to care for coily hair. That makes all the difference in the world.

Just a quick post to share from start to finish our 2 hour Saturday hair day (from pre-poo/detangle, includes shower, and ends with detangling and styling).

PICTURES OF HER FINAL STYLING

 

To view a Step By Step of this Style

The Lazy Way Box Braids: Official Coily Girl Demo

 Start with cleansed, conditioned, stretched hair. This hair was stretched and air-dried first by using 4 plaits. I let them air dry for about 1 hour while I folded some laundry.

Next, each of the 4 plaits were undone and then made into about 4 plaits, totaling approximately 12 to 15 total stretched out plaits. Doing this on air dried hair elongated the coils--resulting in more length to start her box braids with.


While plaiting smaller to stretch, I lightly moisturized her hair with the Eden Body Works Hair Milk. It's a great, creamy leave in product with lots of oils. Taking one of the 15 plaits, I made even smaller box braids, which stretched the hair out even longer. These are the box braids that she will wear this week. I can guess that 

I did approximately 60 box braids throughout the entire head. 


  Why I call this a lazy way box braids is simply because I stop halfway down the hair shaft. Her hair measures over 19'' in length. Doing her box braids as small and as many as I planned to, would take longer than the 1.5 hours that this took. Probably just double the time. I think this process saved me about 1 hour.





After doing a section with 1/2 of the hair shaft left loose, I gathered it into a section and dampened it with water before braiding the whole loose section into 1 plait. I continued his process until I had about 5 or 6 sections with the loose ends placed into a big plait (as shown above).

RESULTS:

Water Only Provides Extreme Definition on Coily Hair

Some things to note about this process:

•  Keep the loose hair moisturized. It is important that the hair from root to ends stay moisturized, but it is especially important to keep the ends moisturized, since they are left loose. Loose hair tends to get dry quicker. I USE WATER TO RE-MOISTURIZE (EVERY NIGHT). The water re-activates the leave in that I used on wash day. The leave in that was used is full of oils (allowing me to skip the sealing with oil step).
• Nightly, moisturize and re-plait the loose ends. It takes me about 10 minutes or less to re-plait her loose hair into about 6 plaits. Satin Scarf or Pillowcase will help keep the frizzies away.
• This style lasts longer than your average braid out. Her hair gets frizzy quickly because it is fine hair. We plan to re-braid the hairline only after co-washing her hair this weekend. We're going to use this styling for another week.

Braidout and Box Braids: Coily Hair