Monday, May 9, 2016

Cost-Effective Basic Hair Care Products and Tools

Hey readers!
In this post I will talk about basic hair care tools to take care of your hair. Rest assured these will be inexpensive products as I am always looking to get the most out of my money.
Products:
Prepoo
I have gone into detail about the prepoo in this post. A cost-effective prepoo is to just buy coconut oil and/or grapeseed oil (a ceramide-filled) separately and then mixing them together in another bottle. This way, relaxed heads can get the best of both worlds (a penetrating oil that protects against hygral fatigue and an oil that restores the hair's inner cuticle oil). Grapeseed oil is not needed for naturals but it can be used as an added bonus.
Shampoo/Conditioner
For an inexpensive natural shampoo and conditioner, I always recommend the Trader Joe's line. If you experience dandruff, you should try their Tea Tree Tingle Shampoo and Conditioner. If you do not need dandruff relief, you can try their Nourish Spa Shampoo and Conditioner. Both are moisturizing, low-price and have natural ingredients. You will not spend more than $5.00 on either shampoo or conditioner from either line for a 16oz container.
image found on Google

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Chelating Shampoo
ORS (Organic Root Stimulator) Aloe Shampoo is a great low-priced chelating shampoo for only about $7 for a 12.5 oz bottle. I recommend using a chelating shampoo instead of a regular shampoo 1x a month or 1x every two months.
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Deep Conditioner
For a Protein/Moisture balanced deep conditioner that you can purchase on the ground, I recommend Organic Root Stimulator Olive Oil Replenishing Conditioner. You can get it in a one time use 1.8oz pack to try it out (for almost $2) or you can get the 12oz bottle for $6-$7. It is moisturizing and a light protein—perfect to use as your weekly deep conditioner.
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Protein Treatment
If you need a conditioner to give you a protein punch, I recommend Aphogee Intensive Two Minute Keratin Reconstructor. It is a light to medium protein that can be used 1x a week or 1x a month, depending on your hair's needs. It is light enough to be used weekly but powerful enough that each use fortifies and strengthens your hair. This is why I always come back to it. There is a one time use 0.35-0.75 oz pack ($2-$3) to try it out before you commit to the full size 8oz or 16oz bottle (~$5/~$10). This can be purchased at Sally's and I have recently seen it at Target as well.
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Leave In Conditioner
For a water-based leave-in conditioner, if you are looking to save money, I recommend water. That is the best all-natural and moisturizing option I can provide. However if you are looking for a protein water-based leave-in I recommend Aphogee Keratin & Tea Reconsturizer (~$5 for 8oz) that you can purchase at Sally's or possibly a Target. It strengthens and comes from one of my holy grail hair lines (Aphogee).
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Sealant Oil
Sealant oils are good if you are following the LOC (Liquid/Oil/Cream) method of sealing the moisture in your hair. Coconut oil penetrates the hair cortex and is therefore not a good sealant (a sealant must “sit” on top of the hair to seal in the moisture. It must be too heavy to penetrate). I recommend castor oil (either regular or Jamaican Black Castor Oil—JBCO) which is a heavy oil or you could use your grapeseed oil for double duty and get more bang for your buck by using it as a prepoo oil AND as a sealant oil. I personally do not use castor oil as a sealant oil because it weighs down my hair strands, but many people find success with using it. I usually opt to use a leave-in cream or butter that contains oils such as E'tae  Naturals Buttershine or Qhemet Biologics Moringa Tree Conditioning Ghee but at $16 and $18 respectively, neither is very cost-effective. Therefore, if you are just starting out in your hair care journey I recommend a regular oil. If your hair does not get weighed down easily, castor oil is great. If you prefer a lighter oil, you should check out grapeseed oil.
Hair Butter
You can use a hair butter instead of a cream in the LOC method (so it is now called the LOB method) to seal in moisture into your hair. The best butter option I can give you is Shea Butter. There's other butters but I feel like due to its popularity, this is the most readily available on the ground.
Hair Cream
If you want to use a cream instead of a butter for the LOC method, I recommend Camille Rose Naturals Curl Love Moisture Milk, which is between $13-$14 at Target. While this is pricier than other items on this list, I recommend it for how moisturizing it is for hair. It also smells great and has healthy ingredients such as avocado oil, rice bran oil, castor seed oil, and slippery elm bark.
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Hair Tools:
Puff Cuff
This is first on my list because it is something used to keep our hair up and out of the way—a basic hair tool like a ponytail holder or a banana clip but much better. It is better because it was created to not add stress on our hair strands. A ponytail holder stresses hair because it must be wrapped tight in order to give a hold. A banana clip was not made with curly tresses in mind, and therefore causes stress on curly hair when pulling it in any type of a style. However, the puff cuff was made specifically for curly hair. Its circular design allows it to hold my hair up into a bun or a ponytail without pulling at my hair or causing stress. This is my #1 favorite hair tool. As my hair grows, banana clips, clamps and ponytail holders causes more and more stress on my hair. They tug on my hair so strongly that I get headaches. They causes sore spots on my scalp. A damaged or sore scalp can retard hair growth. However, the puff cuff is gentle on my hair and scalp.
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Water Spray Bottle
You can get this for $1 or $2 at Sally's. They are great because I create my braidouts and twistouts on wet or damp hair. This allows me to keep my hair damp while I braid or twist my hair. Also, some prepoos I use (such as Etae Carmelux Treatment and Burt's Bees Avocado Butter Pre-Shampoo Treatment) requires damp hair. Instead of hopping into the shower just to wet my hair, I can spray my hair with water with the spray bottle.
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Fingers
Best detangling tool, hair styling tool (to make braids/twists), air drying tool (I wring out my hair after I wash it to remove excess water to make airdrying faster), and scalp massager. Just make sure your nails are not split. Jagged nails can tear your hair.
Cotton T-Shirt
After I squeeze out excess moisture in my hair, I use an old cotton t-shirt to squeeze out more excess water. It soaks up water well. Then I wrap it around my head to continue the drying process (or I can just airdry after that) Using a cotton t-shirt minimizes frizz and they are less abrasive (and cheaper) than a regular towel and microfiber towels.
Hair Sectioning Clips
These clips have a basic use—sectioning the hair during styling and/or washing. They are cheap and they are practical.
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Silk Cap/Silk Pillowcase
This is the first thing anyone starting a healthy hair journey should buy. I recommend buying several—they are easy to misplace. You can have one to keep over your boyfriend or girlfriend's house. You can have one at that friend you always sleep over's house. You can have an extra one in your purse. Never let your hair touch your covers or pillows for an extended period of time without a satin cap or satin pillowcase. If you want to lay down with your significant other without wearing a bonnet, just lay down on a satin pillow. But above all, hair health is more important than looking cute for your significant other.
Me in my Silk Cap :)

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Hair Scissors
     This is the last item on my list and I think it is very important. In between your trims, it might be useful to search and destroy (the s&d method) split ends so that they do not climb up your hair shaft before you have the chance to get your hair trimmed. If you trim your hair once every three months, and ignore the split ends during those three months, your hair can get thin at the ends and break. I believe in searching and destroying once a month to clip split ends before they have a chance to wreak havoc on my hair. Then when you get the trim, the trim can even your hair back (s&d can cause unevenness because you are cutting off splits and not paying attention to the evenness of your hair length). Many curly girls only s&d and do not do trims because they do not care if their hair is even. However, trims are good because they can get splits that you did not notice while you were s&ding. I feel like whatever you do is best for you (whether you do both s&d AND trims or just do s&d or just do trims) as long as you do end up cutting off those split ends. Despite the many products out there that claim to “mend” split ends, the only way to “fix” a split end is to cut it. You cannot magically glue it back together. It is best to clip it now when you first notice it when it is just on the very ends of your hair versus when it has reached halfway up your hair strand. You can save money learning how to trim your hair yourself. The following link is a popular guide on how to give yourself trims ( http://feyeselftrim.livejournal.com/ ).


      The hair scissor I recommend is by Tweezerman. Although they are almost $30, you can ship them back to get them resharpened. Therefore they are better than any cheap hair scissor you can find because dull blades actually can cause splits and damage. Therefore I believe that Tweezerman's hair scissors are in the end cost effective. While other professional scissors can cost you $50+, these are cheaper and can get professionally sharpened for free. DO NOT TAKE OUR SPLIT ENDS BY YOUR FINGERNAILS. This is something I struggle with. There's been too many times where I've resorted to clipping splits with my fingernails. DON'T! Refraining from this is going to be part my Mid-Year Hair Resolution (more on this in a later post). Clipping splits with your nails will only do more damage! You can read more at this link http://www.thenaturalhavenbloom.com/2014/02/do-you-need-hair-shears-to-cut-hair.html but a picture is included below so you can see how damaging it is! It is important to use hair scissors! Do not be like me. Although on my s&d days I use hair scissors, I get those urges... Luckily it only happens with my bangs. I have to constantly see those split ends right in front of my face all the time and right when I see them I want to clip them but may not have my hair scissors on me at the time. This causes my bang to not be as long as it could be because after I use my finger nail to cut it, I then use scissors to snip my bang again once I get my hands on my hair scissors.
Image from the Natural Haven







1 comment:

  1. Thanks for sharing this beautiful styles. For good haircut you need to have best quality and professional hair cutting shears. Professional shears help a lot in every way

    ReplyDelete