Get awesome autumn hair!

A few updates to summer hairdos will transform tired hair into glamorous autumn style. Motions® Hair Care stylist, Nthato Mashishi, has the low down on the hottest hair looks from the international fall/winter fashion runways. Solange Knowles (Beyoncé’s baby sister) and Alicia Keys are just two of the dozens of celebrities embracing the natural texture of their hair.

Nthato has a few tips to get the soft, natural curl look this autumn. “Start with a spritz of oil spray for a healthy shine. I use Motions® 3-in-1 Oil. Separate the hair into small sections. Spray each section with the oil spray and twirl the piece around your finger to create a natural curl shape.” Finish the hairstyle by spraying with Motions® Oil Sheen & Conditioning Spray to enhance your natural shine.

For short hair, Janet Jackson’s wet look style is easy to achieve and it’s fabulously sexy. Fingers are perfect for styling the hair. “This natural look for shorter hair will look sexy on all hair textures. Don’t mess with it too much. Once it’s dry, just a few sprays of Motions® Oil Sheen and Conditioning Spray and you’re good to go.” The next time you visit the salon, have the hair cut shorter on the sides and back to neaten up this look.

For more style tips from Nthato Mashishi and more hairstyle how-to’s, visit www.facebook.com/MotionsSouthAfrica .

 

*Article by MotionsSouth Africa.

Natural Oils That Are Good For Our Hair

If you have kinky, coily hair or what we call “skuurpot”, then you definitely know our hair is prone to dryness and breakage! Now this is were natural oils come to our rescue!

One thing about the structure of our hair, is that it’s very coily and the natural oil from our scalp doesn’t get to travel easily down the hair shaft; hence the dry and straw-leeking feeling we get. Another important point to note is that  oils don’t really work very well on their own, unless water or a water-based product is used as a base. In essence, the oil is useful for ”locking” in the moisture in your hair…

Below we’ve listed a few good oils with a brief description of each one and why they are good for our hair.

Olive oil

This oil is quite popular and it’s used for many things; for example, your skin, face and of course for cooking :-)

Olive oil is one of those oils that penetrate the hair shaft and at the same time it helps to retain/seal in the moisture that is already there.  It’s also a popular oil for hot oil treatments and once you wash it out, it leaves your hair super soft and shiny!

Benefits: Olive oil is useful for ”…repairing split ends, making your hair shinier, silkier and more lustrous and it even helps heal dandruff…”.(http://www.buzzle.com/articles/little-known-olive-oil-benefits.html)

You can use your regular olive oil that is used for cooking (the best one is: extra virgin olive oil) or you can buy a bottle from Clicks (this is where I buy mine). However, I should warn you that extra virgin olive oil can be a bit pricey but a little  does goes a long way.

Coconut oil

Another good oil for our hair, is coconut oil (my personal favourite ). It doesn’t only smell divine (if you like the smell of coconuts) but it’s also a good sealant. You normally find it in solid form but in warmer temperatures it becomes a liquid. Even though it’s in solid form, once you rub it on your hands it melts, making it easier to apply into your hair. I normally apply it on slightly damp hair so that it can retain the moisture in my hair.

This oil really helps to keep my hair soft all day long. Be careful not to use too much as it will make your hear feel scrunchy & greasy.

Benefits: Coconut oil is good in nourishing your hair strands, thus preventing dryness and breakage. It also helps to stimulate hair growth by moisturising your scalp so that you don’t have any dry, dead skin that can clogg up the hair follicles (http://www.buzzle.com/articles/coconut-oil-for-hair.html)

Castor oil

I know you’re probably thinking “Eeeewww”, but this oil is good shem. Plus these days I hear you find them in different flavours (e.g. strawberry, peach etc)… I’ve personally never seen them so I just use the normal Clicks Castor oil. My hair breaks less now. I usually mix it with a bit of Olive oil for extra sheen & sealing after moisturizing. My twists & twist-outs also last longer if i apply it when twisting and to my twists daily; so it acts like a holding gel.

Tip: Just a teaspoon will do. Don’t apply a lot to avoid build up.

Benefits: This oil is highly recommended if you want to achieve hair thickness and promote hair growth because it has a substantial amount of Vitamin E. It also helps to keep the hair shiny and soft. Read more on its benefits here.

Have you used any of these oils and how do they work for you? What other good oils do you use and can recommend?

 

 

Ladine Hair Softener: Leave-In Conditioner

I think I may have found…”The One”

I mean, my hair has never been this soft…and the smell is just divine. I also use it on my one year old’s hair & love how her curls just come alive. It’s also good for detangling her hair.

I bought it at Le’ Looks hair salon in Eastgate Shopping Centre but I’m pretty sure one can get it at any black hair salon; paid R75.00 but I’m not complaining at all..and definitely going back for more when this one finishes, which won’t be anytime soon as a little goes a long way.

I only use it:-

• right after rinsing off my conditioner(with cold water) and towel-drying

• when my hair feels extremely hard & dry (every second morning) and follow up with a mixture of Castor oil & olive oil.
• On my daughters hair after a wash & when it feels & looks dry. I only use it on her hair as I don’t wanna overload her hair with lots of products. It alone is enough for her curls.

Ingredients:

Water (Aqua), Glycerin, Isopropyl Mystate, Dimethicone, Cetyl Alcohol, Dimethicone Copolyol, Strearalkonium Chloride, Propylene Glycol, Rosemary oil, Wheat Bran Extract, PEG-40 Hydrogenated Castor oil, Trideceth-9, Tocopherol, Ethoxydiglycol, Diazolidinyl Urea, Methylparaben, Propylparaben, Fragrance(parfum), Amyl Cinnamal, Coumarin, Hexyl Cinnamal, Coumarin, Hexyl Cinnamal, Linalool, FD & C Blue No1(C142090)

Coconut milk for your…hair

Yes, you read right…Coconuts contain a lot of essential fats and nutrients that are good for one’s hair. Usually we hear a lot about coconut oil (you can also get a bottle from Clicks and RAF in Hillbrow) and how it’s a good oil for your hair; but I’ve also recently discovered that a good dose of coconut milk can also do wonders to it.

According to Style Hair Magazine “unlike coconut oil, coconut milk contains proteins, which strengthen hair and can help to minimize breakage. It also has properties which protect hair and scalp from UV rays.”

I’ve been hearing about other naturals using coconut milk or cream in their hair and I thought since I already love coconut oil so much, why not try it out…Well, that’s what I did over the weekend as part of my weekly deep conditioning. And I also dragged asked my sister (who recently cut her hair short) to try it out with me so we could see if this really works…

I bought a can of Mayfair coconut cream (you can buy cream or milk but I hear cream is better because it drips less and its also higher in oil). I bought mine at Pick n Pay by the long life milk section; the can was situated next to the condensed milk cans. It wasn’t that expensive — about R15 for a can. There were also a few other different types of brands, but I just chose the Mayfair one because it was cheaper

Steps I followed for the coconut milk treatment – be warned it can get a bit messy:

• Make sure you have a towel, bowl, shower cap or a plastic shopping bag and an elastic band.
• Pour the milk into a bowl. One can was enough for my hair and my sister’s but if you have longer or thicker hair, you will probably use the whole can.
• Wrap the towel around your neck to catch any drips.
• Lean over the bathroom sink and coat your hair with the coconut milk until all your hair is covered in it.
• Put on the shower cap or plastic bag. The milk still managed to drip a lot even though I used the cream version, so by tying an elastic band or head wrap around your head can help.
• Leave it in for an hour and then rinse, shampoo and condition as normal.

Believe it or not, after washing our hair it really felt so soft and smelled like coconuts (and I like that smell ). My sister is always complaining that her hair is very dry, so doing this treatment at least once or twice a month can really help to bring moisture to your hair.

There are also many other natural hair recipes available online that one can try out…

So in conclusion, you don’t always have to buy hair products from the store; just search in your kitchen cupboard and I’m sure you will find some honey, olive oil or even mayonnaise to use in your hair (more on that in later posts)

Taking care of your natural hair

Hey you beautiful sistahs! Probably many of you have experienced that dry ‘scrunchy’ feeling in your natural hair, every now and then. Your hair feels dry to the touch and just looks so lifeless – no shine, no sheen or even moisture.

Well, you are not alone. This is one of the main issues for someone trying to maintain their natural hair. That brings us to the part of how to take care of your hair so that it’s manageable, feels soft and most importantly its healthy!

One main thing our hair craves for is moisture, and lots of it. With the right amount of moisture our hair comes to life and all those tight curls suddenly loosen up. There are many different types of moisturizers that are good for our hair, but the main one is nothing more than just plain H2O – water!

Yip, it’s that easy. We suggest having a spritz bottle filled with water and to ‘spray’ your hair once or twice a week (just spray little so that you hair is not drenching wet). You can find all different types of spritz bottles from Dischem. Some people even add a little bit of glycerine and/or coconut oil to the water to make a mixture. Remember how we all grew up with ‘glycerine’ being applied to our hair? Well, it seems our mothers were on the right track

Glycerine is a known humectant, which means it serves to draw moisture from the air into your hair. Oils are also good for moisture, but only those oils that our scalp and hair can absorb. The oils to best avoid are PETROLATUM and MINERAL OIL. If you see those two on the list of ingredients…ruuun! These are found in a lot of hair moisturisers meant for black hair. In fact, what these two oils end up doing is clogging up the pores in our scalp and coating our hair so that it’s not easy for moisture to penetrate to the hair shaft. Instead all that will happen is that our hair will look oily and shiny, but it will still feel very dry. However, the ‘good oils’ to look out for are the following: Olive oil, Coconut oil, Jojoba oil and Carrot oil. These oils can be found at your local stores, like Clicks or even at your local supermarket & hair product shops like RAF and Charlie Parker. Many of the Organic Root Stimulator (ORS) products contain a lot of these ‘good oils’. But a word of caution, everyone has different hair textures and what works for someone might not work for the next person. We want to encourage that you try out the different products, but stick to what works for YOUR hair.

Hair treatments like ORS’ Hair Mayonnaise are also good for conditioning your hair. But hair conditioning treatments are best done only once a week or once every two weeks depending on your hair type. Washing your hair too often can also dry it out!

NB: Don’t be lazy/ discouraged to read that list of ingredients at the shop before purchasing your products. Your hair will thank you for that….And last and most important, remember to drink lots of water!