Blog #48 - Wise Words from A Cuban Man

"You don't need new stuff. You just need to treat the stuff you have like it's new."

This is what I took away from a conversation about cars. I was getting out of my car and one of my dad's friends was driving by. He was in a nice little car and we were talking about my car and how I wanted to get a new one because it's old. I told him what happened to me this weekend (which is another blog in and of itself) and that I wanted to get the window fixed, but my mom shut me down. He said "if you take care of it like it's new, it will be like new" and then started telling me all of the extra things I need to do to it and that I have to take care of it and make it mine. And then when he said "this type of car is a really good car. If you take care of it, it will take care of you. It will welcome you in" is when I realized that I needed to change my way of thinking. This car has been passed down in my family since we bought it in 1995. My mother drove it, both of my brothers drove it, my brother's girlfriend drove it and now it's mine. My mom has drilled into my head "drive it for a few more years, beat it up and then we'll get another one". In reality, I need to treat this one like it's new. I started thinking of all of the things I want to do to it - like get a new hubcap, maybe add some tints, get all of the dents and scratches out, things like that.

I then started to think about it in terms of life and things/people in my life in particular. I need to start taking better care of my family and friends. I don't need new family/friends - I just need to treat the ones I have now like they're new. Think about it. When you get a new car, you take extra special care to not get it banged up or get any dents or anything like that. You should do the same with your friends and family. Each day is a gift...unwrap it and take special care to not damage it, break it or put dents in it. That's my basic spiel of the day.

Love your friends and family like they're new, precious gifts. Tis all.

Blog #47 - Natural Hair Journey, pt 1

So, it's been a minute since I've blogged about anything remotely happy or interesting in my life, but I decided to take this natural hair care journey really fast. I was looking at a lot of things that I use in my hair and just analyzing my hair care routine overall when its curly or straight and decided that 1) I was putting WAAAAAAY too many things in my hair and 2) all of the things I put in my hair aren't the greatest things. I decided to purge my hair care routine and go natural - the henna blog and the kinky curly blogs are the actual start of my journey. What really kicked this off was I was in Walgreen's one day to pick up this conditioner that someone on youtube recommended as an alternative to the "Knot Today" from Kinky Curly and this Russian guy was looking for natural products for his wife. We were looking on the back of labels and I picked up some things that I use(d) and had a "wtf is this" look when looking at the back for the ingredients. I think that was my moment that I said "eff the traditional products" and I gravitated towards this brand called Shea Moisture.

The Shea Moisture Shea Butter shampoo is like THEE best shampoo that I've used on my hair in forever. I can wash my hair on a Sunday, wear it curly and then go to wash it again that next Sunday, and my hair will STILL feel like butter as I'm just standing under the water letting my hair get wet...and it will smell like shea butter, even after a week. I love it. At first, it doesn't really look like much, but when I get it in my hair, I can definitely run my fingers through it after rinsing the shampoo out. I bought the conditioner a few days ago and it's a pump and thick...I'm not too big a fan of it, but I'm willing to try it again. I really like the Tresemme Naturals Moisture Rich Conditioner for my hair as a followup to the Shea Moisture shampoo.

The next product I use is Kinky Curly Curling Custard. Yeah, I know I tried it before and it was an epic fail, but I decided that it was a fail because of the henna so I waited for it to grow out a little bit and then try it again. I think I did the henna in December, so I waited until about March to try the KCCC again. I love it! I just wish I had a different haircut to provide more bounce and body and shape to it because my hair is pretty one dimensional and flat right now. I need more body and bounce and shape!!!

I was talking to a friend of mine who is a natural yesterday about how I felt really good when talking to this girl at Walgreen's about natural hair care (she rang up my purchase for the Shea Moisture Conditioner) and how the girl was telling me what she uses in her hair. She showed me the product and I told her to junk it ASAP because like the 2nd or 3rd ingredient is Sodium Laurel Sulfate, and that's why her hair is so dry. I continued to tell my friend how I haven't had a relaxer since around November and I wanted to try and see how long I can go, so...I guess this is my official start to this. It's already been around 3.5, 4 months so I think I'm doing pretty okay. I've flat ironed my hair before and it came out really nice and bone straight at the roots, which is good...considering all I used was my shampoo, conditioner and some argan oil before I blew it dry. I'll have to try it again to see how it comes out again. I think it was a little greasy, so I'll try to put in less of the oil...that should do the trick. I have to put pics up, though to document this journey.

I also need to find a natural hair dye for the summer time. I want to lighten it up a bit. Oh well...onward and upward on this journey!