Tuesday, October 29, 2013

Beauty Review: Not Your Mother's Kinky Moves

So I'm gonna be really vain for a minute.

Maybe more than a minute.

But basically I want to talk about my hair.

People ask me a lot what I do to my hair.

When it's curly, people say "wow you have a lot of hair - how do you get it to not be so poofy!" (Note: It is often very poofy.)

When it's straight, people say "how did you get those crazy ass curls of yours to be so straight?" (No one has said it quite like this but that's the take-away.)

*Truth.

The deal is, my hair is in a constant evolutionary state, and has been for the past 28 1/2 years.

It's finally to a place where I feel like I like it and know what to expect from it and it's "me," but it's taken awhile, and I still get the urge to change it quite a bit and have problem days. I think my hair is a part of my identity now.

One really great product, combined with my own rapid aging, has helped me have an easy, painless, and very "me" hair routine.

First, let's take a little trip.

*Me, with my mom (wowza, btw, mom!) when I was less than a year old. FIRE ENGINE RED hair. 

*By the time I was 4 or 5, it was a little darker blonde, but still super straight and super thick. 
**Also, can we talk for a minute about how, even 28 years later, I still cheese and ham and pose for the camera? 

*In high school, it was super long (I must have just cut some of it off - this was probably sophomore year), dishwater blonde, and straight. A little wavy, but not much. 

But then things got a little crazy. 

See, Courtney and I tried to re-highlight my hair. 

And it turned lilac. 

So I dyed it red.

*At Phi Mu Formal. And yes, I am that ridiculous. 

*Scottish Fest

I kept it in the blonde/red/strawberry blonde family for a long time, although I did cut it pretty short a couple of times: 

*With my new car in Fayetteville, in 2007.

I kept it reddish for awhile, eventually going a dark brown: 

*In 2011. My Mom is still wowza. 

This whole time, it was mostly straight unless I curled it (which took forever), and would take any color I tried to dye it. 

And then it started coming in gray. 

I had had gray coming in for a long time, but it would be like one or two pieces. I still didn't have to really straighten it to get it straight (maybe a piece or two, and when it was short I did to get it less frizzy), since it would stay kind of wavy-ish all on it's own. I did straighten it most days, though, since I couldn't get it to curl in any way that I liked. 

But, sometime in mid-2012, it really started coming in gray. 

Like, gray in my eyebrows gray. 

Unfortunately, it was only in patches (I would just let it go if it was all over, or if it was in some semblance of order). 

But it did two important things. 

1. My hair wouldn't hold color anymore. I got my hair dyed at the salon in January 2013, and then went to London in February. Here I am in London, and, despite how awesome my hair stylist is, it was already fading: 

*In January.

*In February.

So I let it fade out until August, when it was kind of a dark blonde, and had this done:

*A couple of days later - now the grays can grow in with abandon!

Which leads to the second issue:

2. My hair coming in gray has completely, totally, absolutely changed the texture. 

My freshman year of high school, I had to sit in hot rollers for hours and have my mom and aunt help me curl my hair, and the curls still fell out just a few hours later.

I really like the new texture though. It's so much easier to manage, and, this is going to sound weird, but I've always felt like someone who had curly hair. 

Now all that personality is just bursting out on top of my head. 

I can still straighten it: 

*using my patented combination of Not Your Mother's Smooth Moves (which I also love!) and BB Prep spray. 

And I do every once in awhile. 

But I can't even describe, how, after decades of having to get up and "do something" with my hair, it feels to wake up, shower, go to work, and not even think about it. 

Not even have to touch it. 

To *gasp* throw it in a ponytail the night before and pull it down in the morning and the curls be even better. 

To not have to blow dry it. 

I do put some curl cream in it, just to make it less frizzy and help it hold up to the rain/heat/sun/wind/cold/drizzle that is Memphis weather any given day. 

This, by far, is the best curl product for my type of hair that I have ever used: 


Seriously, this is the stuff of the gods. 

And the best part? 

It's between $4 and $6 dollars and widely available.

No I'm not joking. 

Feel free to give me an internet hug.

*With a quarter sized amount of the Not Your Mother's, Organix Awapuhi Ginger Shampoo and Coconut Milk Conditioner. No drying, no straightening, no curling. Just shampoo, conditioner (not much), cold water rinse, little Not Your Mother's, and out the door. 

I think that Kinky Moves is the perfect consistency. It's not so heavy that it weighs my curls down, but it's not so airy that it doesn't do anything. I especially like it for my type of hair - not corkscrew curly, not super tight curls, but not really wavy either. Sort of that in-between curl that gets overlooked a lot.

Although it doesn't do anything for the fading, I think it does help me keep my color longer since I'm not using any heat.

The Not Your Mother's also smells AMAZING and is so affordable. And anything that smells good, is cheap, really makes me feel like I've finally found my real hair personality, AND lets me sleep an extra 30 minutes is a winner in my book




















2 comments:

  1. I love it! That is exactly the texture my hair is right now. So I will be trying these products. And may I say that yes, your mom is still quite the wowza! I find it hysterical that you are getting gray. I have about decided to let mine go completely gray. We will see if i actually do it or not. I also find it amazing that you and Miranda are standing on the edge of the big birthday a year from February. Where is that cute little girl up there in the pic you posted and the other little blond haired blue eyed tooter who used to hang out with her? Makes me sad in a way. But happy that you are independent women and are making your way in the world. OK I am rambling. Love ya!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I really love this stuff - and it's cheap enough that if you don't like it, it's not a ton of money wasted!

      Aw, we were pretty cute, but we turned out okay! :) Love ya too!

      Delete