Hey everyone, this is my second monthly hair update. February was a pretty uneventful month hair wise, I did pretty much the same thing at each wash day. My styling was non-existant, I wore my hair in its shrunken state most of the time. Read on to get a more in depth look of the month that was. 

At the end of January, I decided to start doing monthly goals for my hair depending on the current hair struggles I was having like dryness. I also wanted to minimise manipulation.

January Hair Goals Review

• I want to do more flat twist styles that I can keep for a week in order to curb daily manipulation. I did this only once, my style lasted for 4 days
• Up my moisturising and sealing to every night. Managed to keep up with this goal 90% of the time during the week. Weekends were another story
• Do scalp massages 3 times a week using my oil mix concentrating on my edges. This is part of the Two Months Front Hair Growth Challenge by Joie Not even close, my scalp massages have been lacking
• Use steam for all my deep conditioning sessions in order to up my hair’s moisture levels. Yes, yes and yes!

Wash Days
I had only 3 wash days this month – I was totally uninspired. I had to semi force myself to have a wash day. I am currently using the same products at every wash day bar the deep conditioner. It has become very routine really. My normal wash day looks like this:

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• Prepoo coconut oil with heat for 20 minutes or without heat for 1-2 hours
• Shampoo The BodyShop Rainforest Moisture
• Instant Conditioner Herbal Essences Hello Hydration. Video review of this product
• Deep Conditioner This is where I use different products depending on my hair needs. I almost always add a dash of JBCO to my conditioners
• Leave-In ElastaQP Olive Oil and Mango Butter Leave-In conditioner
• Sealing Whipped shea butter (recipe)

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Moisture Retention
I have noticed that my hair retains moisture during the week, but the minute I step out of town over the weekend – all that moisture disappears. It is also due to the fact that I am lazy to moisturise over weekends and by the time I get back on Sunday evening, my hair feel like the Kalahari. To combat this, I moisturise twice on Fridays just to make sure that my hair goes into the weekend with maximum moisture levels. I do plan though to be more diligent in my moisturising over weekends.

Single Strand Knots
Because I have been wearing my hair in its shrunken state a lot thins month, it has been single strand knot central up in here. The worst part of it all is that I love searching for my SSKs and tearing off my hair just before the SSK starts. I know, I know, it’s such a bad habit – uuurrrgghhh. I have to quit it otherwise, I am going to damage my hair. My current goal is to only use my hair shears when getting rid of SSKs – this way I can get rid of them with minimum damage to my hair. Please pray for me.

New hair stretching technique
I threaded my hair last week, I did it on 2 day post wash day moisturised hair, I kept it threaded overnight. I loved how it stretched my hair, but of course true to Durban style – the humidity had my hair looking as flat as ever after a few hours. I plan to thread more in the future and do it more properly this time.

Best thing about my hair this month
I am seeing and feeling my hair growth. It feels so much fuller and there is just more hair than before. Whoop whoop!

Not so great thing about my hair  this month
The increased single strand knots and my ever persistent hand in hair syndrome

Goals for March

• Buy a co-wash conditioner. My hair crush, my boo Nomonde has awesomely soft natural hair, she only shampoos her hair once a month and co-washes all the other times. I want to try this out on my hair.
• Steam my hair at every wash. This worked well in February, I am keeping it up for March
• Braid my hair. My first long term PS as a natural is coming up – I’m excited about hiding my hair for a bit