Addiction: For the love of Palmer's cocoa butter!

I am an addict - there I said it. And this is my poison... cocoa!

More than chocolate, I absolutely love cocoa butter, I won't even lie. I should tell you actually, I was waaaay ahead of Vaseline and could often found in the P.E. changing rooms at school, mixing lumps of cocoa butter into my little vaseline pot. Purleese! Y I've been slapping that stuff onto my lips for yonks - and Mr O can testify that the results speak for themselves. 

Now, I did try mixing up a cocoa butter moisturiser once. That was an interesting experience. I bought a couple of blocks of pure, raw cocoa butter straight from Kaneshie market in Accra, Ghana....but it just took so  long to melt that I gave up and just used it in its natural state. When I applied it straight to my skin, I found that it was greasy, a bit impractical to carry round and I wasn't really feeling that 'shiny' look. If you've had a better experience with cocoa butter, let me know how you used it please!

I had never set eyes on cocoa before, despite 10 years of using it on my skin and about 20 years of eating it!  

I was eager to bring one back home to the UK to show Little Miss O where her special ezcema cream came from. (That's right, only cocoa butter gave her relief from the itch!)...one of the many ironies of 'medicine'!

Since the big chop in 2009, I've generally tried to keep my use of store bought products to a minimum. I've just become more aware of my hair and skin and what I put on it. I still use some store bought products (it can be hard not to sometimes) but I try to choose paraben-free products or just to mix up my own. 

When I don't mix my own, I'm very very choosy. In fact, I'm the girl that takes an hour in the shop reading all the labels before deciding that none of the products is good enough to touch my skin...or Little Miss O's skin for that matter and you know what, there is only one brand of cocoa butter that I let touch my skin...it's paraben free and I just have to tell you all about it, just in case you've been living under a rock for a while and are still using what I affectionately term an 'imposter' (or 'bootleg') version?!!!?

But despite this experience, I still love and use cocoa butter - at least 4 times a day I should add! Like I said, I'm addicted. I always have been. Now I've discovered that my fave brand has lots of new products in their range... 

I feel a 'Cocoa butter bust cream' review post brewing... or perhaps Mr O can write a guest post reviewing their 'man friendly' products...

Oh the possibilities...

M

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Hair Inspiration: For Mothers and Daughters

I'm not sure where I stumbled across this photo but I loved it enough to save it... It makes me think of Little Miss O and I in 2 years perhaps... Now that would be some impressive hair growth on my part... better get working on it!

How to get rid of hair dye from your hands!

Ok, so on Tuesday I mentioned that I needed to sort out my 'silvers' and so as usual I bought a pack of hair dye from a well-known brand and whilst a friend was over, I started to dye my hair. I do not know what possessed me, but I didn't use gloves!!! : ( By the time I realised, it was too late. Why the friend didn't advise me is a mystery to both of us - it was only when Mr O walked in and asked what I was doing did I take note of the fact that my hands were changing colour!

Over 12 hours later, my hands are still a different shade of black compared with 24 hours ago! A classic school girl error you might say. Last night, I googled 'how to get rid of hair dye from your hands' and was met with a really unhelpful answer on Yahoo which was 'use gloves'... um DOH! If I had used gloves then I wouldn't be googling this... sigh...

Anyway, I tried a series of home 'remedies' and there is definitely a noticeable improvement, but since the initial staining was so bad, this doesnt really say a lot! Just in case anyone ever googles the same thing again, here is a little list of things that in combination/alone helped to alleviate my hair-dye stained hands....

* Note that adding more hair dye to try to 'dissolve' the stain did not work for me!


- Lemon juice (the freshly squeezed kind)
- Bicarb of soda
- Hand wash
- Washing up liquid
- Whitening toothpaste
- Shampoo
- Nail polish remover
- Alcohol hand cleansing gel
- Vanish stain removing spray!
- Window cleaner!!!!

** Also note that I did NOT soak my hands in undiluted bleach as suggested by source! (can you imagine explaining that one to your Dr!)

I tried to use natural household items as far as possible but you can just imagine the random array of chemicals that my hands are likely still covered in - not just from the hair-dye itself, but also from my 'treatments!'...

*** Finally note that I tried all these 'treatments' in the order listed above, you can see the desperation!

This experience makes my argument for finding (or darn it even making) a natural hair dye even more convincing. Seriously, my hands are still covered in ammonia. Yuck! They don't stink or anything but this cannot be good! Sigh, I just want to stop putting rubbish on my body - completely. I imagine that henna could still stain my hands, but in some way I would find this somewhat more acceptable.... 

Why can't I be one of those hippified people who wears bright colours and jewellery that jingles as I skip barefoot (yes, skip!) across white sands and who rides a bicycle with a hand-woven basket - all whilst casually carrying an acoustic guitar across my shoulder and sipping on carrot and ginger juice.

Sure, I realise its a massive generalisation, but really - I'd love that... to be/become that soul....

Maybe I just want to be India Arie herself?!?!
 
I bet she wouldn't forget to wear gloves when dying her hair... in fact, I bet she just goes to the salon...or better, I bet she doesn't even have any silvers : )p

Anyway, lesson learnt: Wear gloves when dying hair at home or just stop being a sissy and go the salon! Until the next time though, I'm going to start finding out a bit more about natural hair dyes... I have 6 weeks to come up with a natural, more hair, and apparently, hand- friendly, solution!

Mrs O
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Natural hair and professionalism

I've just taken out 6 weeks worth of twists and have spent the last day or two looking at hair styles etc to do with my current 2 inches of afro hair. In my youtube-fest, I came across this video of a US news anchor, Rochelle Ritchie - she big chopped her hair - and ratings have gone up!

In a professional job, it's important to look 'professional' and often this mean long/slick/smooth/straight hair, possibly with a bit of wave/curl. To most of us though, when we picture a professional woman, we probably don't see a a woman in a suit with 'kinky' or 'coily' hair.

Well, Rochelle Ritchie has shown that if your own hair is suffering from constant weaves/braids/relaxers and you wish to, then yes, you can wear your hair naturally and still look professional. 

I love her story. 

I'm inspired. 

I had to share.

Mrs O
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My new favourite song! 'I love my hair....'

...I just stumbled across this video and I HAD to share!



I can't wait to share it with Little Miss O tomorrow - what a way to kick off her day!
'I love my hair...I really really love my haaaaiiiir!'

Hooray for Sesame Street - it's almost worth getting SKY for! : )p

The Perfect Bride

Somebody- a friend who is at the start of wedding planning (let's call her Cleopatra (why? well, why not!?!) said to me that she really wants to be the 'perfect bride' and because she fears she wont be' the perfect bride', she doesn't want to be the centre of attention for the day. I was deeply saddened by this.

I'm not suggesting for a minute that I have never used the term 'the perfect bride' and I don't for a second think that if at all this 'perfect bride' does exist, that Cleopatra could not be it - but the truth is, deep-down, just as I don't think there is such a thing as a 'the perfect wedding', I don't think that there is such a thing as  'the perfect bride'.

There I said it - I have never seen a 'perfect bride'!

Surely there is no definition of the term 'perfect bride'. If there is, then 1) Its not in my dictionary and 2) I obviously failed miserably in being 'the perfect bride'! I woke up on the morning of our wedding with a spot on my face!

My skin had been clear for MONTHS before the wedding and it certainly wasn't there the night before, when I stood in the hotel mirror grinning at myself and saying "you're getting married tomorrow - eeek! yey! wow!" But when I woke up on the 2nd January, with the spot smiling back at me, I just thought "how ironic" and laughed. After all, there was absolutely nothing I could do about it anyway! Why let it ruin my day!

So on the day, it was easy to deal with such 'impefections'. But what about the months leading up to the wedding? How do girls deal with the 'I must be the perfect bride' syndrome. I guess you either develop a formula for obtaining 'perfection' and try to stick to it or you just scrap the whole ideolgy of 'perfection' and JUST DO YOU!

So, what did I do? Well, initially, I opted for the 'develop my own formula' to ensure that I was 'the perfect bride', this looked something like:

"perfect dress + perfect hair + perfect make up + perfect skin + perfect nails = perfect bride"

How exhausting this stupid formula turned out to be. My hair wasn't growing quickly enough, I changed my mind about my dress and got a new one, I couldn't decide on 'diva' or 'natural' make-up and suddenly 'perfection' just seemed distressingly unobtainable. It made me think, what the heck is 'perfection' anyway?!

I have seriously struggled with this concept over the past year and have made a conscious choice to reject it. Seriously, whenever I feel the urge to stress about my shortcomings, imperfections or general flaws, I just say -

"I reject perfection, I embrace my imperfections and I'm just going to be the best version of 'myself' that I can be at this precise moment in time - period"

I truly believe that every woman can be the very best version of herself within her own money/time constraints. Perhaps, you don't have time for a skincare regime that involves pre-cleansing, steaming, exfoliating, washing, toning and moisurising but you probably could buy an all-in-one face wash and achieve great results. The point is that you can only do the best you can do and what others are able to do at any point in time is irrelevant. There will always be someone in a 'better' or 'worse' position than you - why use them as your barometer when you set your own!

I suppose my post really is to say, girls (and I'm talking specifically to you Cleopatra) - you are not 'perfect', neither am I, none of us are in fact and that's OK. There really is no reason to be perfect and perfection is boring anyway. Trust me! Our flaws make us who we are and our bodies will unlikely change shape just because 'our big day' is coming up. God meant to give us big hips, a jelly belly, broad shoulders, a big nose and/or one boob slightly bigger than the other! There is NOTHING we can do about these things (assuming surgery is not an option!) and there is no reason why you should obsess over these things. Actually, it's our 'flaws' that make us perfectly imperfect. You can read that as 'perfect' if you want to! : )P Of course, there is always something that you could do, no matter how big or small, to make yourself look and more importantly, feel better, but know when to stop girls! It's important that your groom recognises you on the day, right?! He fell in love and asked YOU to marry him, so its only fair that YOU are the one walking towards him on your big day.

Cleopatra thinks that no matter what I say, people will always criticise a bride. OUCH! I'd hate think that anyone criticised me, but hey apparently it's 'natural' for women to critical of other women. I just think by doing that, we become more critical of ourselves. Maybe if us girls acted a bit more like men 'taking things as we see them', then we'd be less harsh others and less critical of ourselves too.

After all, aren't be all trying to be the very best versions of ourselves that we know how to?

Surely that should be enough....

'Cleopatra', you just try to be the very best version of yourself that you can be. 'Yourself' is beautiful, intelligent, happy and smiley - lots of girls would LOVE to be you! I know you will make a stunning bride. I just pray for you to enjoy the journey as much as the destination... xx

With love,

Mrs O
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Confessions of an Ingredient Junkie!

Interestingly, it was only after 'going natural' that I even considered what was in the products that I used on my hair. The ironic thing is that I am so concerned about what goes in our mouths yet, when it came to our hair,  I regularly fed it crisps instead of potatoes! On a daily basis, I would load my hair with grease, spritz, leave-in conditioner, gel, hold spray and sometimes more.  What's worse is that I was (through complete ignorance and miseducation) doing the same to Little Miss O's hair...

Determined to bring more 'green' to our hair regimes, I sought more natural products from our local black hair shop of choice - ummm this was interesting. When I actually read the ingredients list they were full of chemicals that I couldn't even pronounce! They were laden with parabens, liquid paraffin (vaseline essentially) and water! These products hid behind the lines 'contains olive oil' - umm yeah, 20%! Or 'nourishing coconut oil' - umm does 10% count! I was a bit annoyed as it made it so difficult to choose good, nutritious products..but I eventually (after spending about 45 minutes reading ingredients lists) settled on a brand - Kid's Organics by Africa Best. The advertised ingredient was always much higher on the ingredients list and I could see fragments of ingredients in most of the products - a quality I look for. I used the whole range on my own hair and Little Miss Os. It was all going well. I still think there are some very good hair products on the market - but most are not so great.

One day I thought,


"this natural stuff is so good, what would happen if I used ONLY the nutritious ingredients and cut out the fillers"

.... and so I became an ingredients junkie! I headed straight for the internet - there's a such a wealth of information and I'd noticed that there was a great online community of 'mixtresses' discussing homemade products and hair! It was fantastic.


After the internet came holland and barrett and then the greengrocer (for things like avocado, eggs and lemons)! I really enjoy making my own products now and am slowly phasing out store-bought products that are either unethically produced, bad for the environment or have the potential to be bad for my family's health.  


So far, it's going well - I make my own exfoliators, scrubs, cleansers, toners, scalp oils, hair moisturisers, body souffles, hair spray and face masks! Our whole family uses them - including Mr O! Sometimes I use recipes found in books or online but mostly I love to experiment! Sometimes the result is as desired, other times its not (lol) - but that's part of the learning process and adds to the fun!

If you're interested in natural hair and skincare but aren't sure where to start - check these sites out. These are just some of my personal favourites:


For Blogs and Community
black girl long hair - this is like the GodMother of hair blogs! God Mother of hair blogs!
nappturality - this blog has a forum! It's great for swapping tips on haircare and products!
afroniquely you -  also has a forum. I really like this blog too!


For Products:
akoma skincare - I absolutely love this site, especially how it shows its engagement with the people that make our products!
carol's daughter - i suppose the God Mother of natural products for black hair!
anita grant - this a bit like a UK version of carol's daughter!


For Ingredients:
from nature with love - this is pretty much a one-stop-shop for mixtresses or people who want to learn about the properties of different ingredients.

No matter what your hair/skin type, I've learnt that there's definitely a mix out there for you...


Happy Mixing!


Mrs O
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I miss my hair...

Yesterday I posted about letter writing and today I'm posting about something completely different! Hair! 

Whilst I love the versatility of my twists, on some level when I look in the mirror, I'm still not so sure who is looking back at me! I am such a hair schizophrenic - I just can't make up my mind...natural - extensions - braids - weaves etc . I see no real problem with me changing my hair style frequently, but today I felt the need to re-engage with my initial reasons for shaving my head and see how they compare to how I feel now.

This was me a year ago, straight after the BIG CHOP:

So why did I start this journey in the first place?

- The main reason was for our daughter. I decided that I would not relax her hair ever! She has beautiful, long, thick and curly hair - she gets this from her Father! I feel that relaxed hair is a commitment and I want her to decide to make it for herself - if she chooses to later in life. She was only tiny, but I feel really strongly about it - I also feel strongly about leading by example and couldn't bear to tell her that she can't relax her hair even though I do. So the only solution was to - stop relaxing my hair. I guess I could've waited until the conversation came up (I predict circa 2016), but I also had my own reasons for not relaxing my hair. Transitioning (braiding my hair until it grew out) was never an option - I don't have that kind of patience!


The personal (i.e not about setting an example) reasons were:

- I hated the burn of relaxer! My scalp is sensitive and it was always a horrible process for me. The sad thing is that I'd always leave it on, gritting my teeth through the pain - because I wanted the hair to gain the full benefits of the relaxer. It's ironic really because whilst getting the benefits of relaxer, my hair was losing all its natural properties and becoming weaker and weaker.

- I was freaked out one day when I relaxed my own hair without gloves, as when I had finished, my nail polish had come off - ummm - scary!

-  I hated the feel of my hair immediately after relaxing - it was lank and thin looking and lacking in volume. Of course that was all fixed by blow drying and my old friend 'Luster's pink lotion - but we've since fallen out'.

- I used to look at girls with their natural hair texture and feel dare I say 'envious'. I used to wish that I could be brave enough to sing- I am not my hair..and mean it! Hair is such a big deal in the black community - it's frightening! Strangely now I feel that I kind of am my hair - its an expression of who I am...it's just a question of what I want to say with it and lately that changes on a daily basis lol

...it was time for a change and I took the plunge - less than a year before our wedding - I did the BC! I was fascinated and inspired by the various natural hair communities online and decided enough was enough. I had done the talking 'I want to', 'I wish I could' yadadada and then one evening I just took out my weave, washed my hair and asked Mr O to cut it  - and he did! The next day I went to his barber shop and they fixed it up for me - and there I was, at the start of my hair journey...

..and here I am now with twists. I think for me the solution is to get more creative with my natural hair and when I do get bored - I should simply get a weave - fine I still have to waste time seeking out the perfect hair, but my hairdresser does it in 3 hours, which is far more suited to my aversion to a numb bum! 


For now, I will make the most of these overpriced twists before taking them out - no doubt as soon as I do, I'll be wishing I had them back in again!!! 

The irony eh?!

Mrs O

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