What IS short hair exactly?

A helpful, yet dangerous weapon

Errr...so I haven't posted in a month O_o. FINALS DID IT! I would have posted this today, however I was doing all the errands I wanted to do for the past month. I hope you understand!

So, my birthday passed earlier this month and I did the one thing that I really wanted to do on my birthday-straighten my natural hair. All Saturday afternoon, I did everything in my power to safely heat style all this hair I have

After it was all said and done,  I was happy about the length, but I absolutely HATED how my ends looked. To me, they looked so ratty and chewed up and it wasn't healthy. After much analysis and celebrating a new year, I decided that i can cut it off. I sort of talked myself through the process that I had reached my ultimate hair goal of armpit length hair and that hair is indeed hair, it will grow back and as long as I kept to my regimen, it will look better than it did before. So Sunday night, I did the brave girl thing and cut about 2 or so inches off.

Now fast forward to Tuesday afternoon. I washed it so that my curls could come back. No heat damage was apparent, but what did hit me was that my hair felt so...short! I went into a rant on twitter and had the following conversation with a friend of mine. It went a little something like this:

Black Friday gives me HIVES!

Recently, I've been trying to do my best with trying to get my grades up as much as possible, therefore I have 1) not found the time to write and 2) didn't have inspiration on things to write about (although i do have plenty of pieces for what may turn out to be the last addition to Closet Overhaul '11). However, I do want to get into this "Black Friday" madness because all the videos coming out on YouTube give me hives with how crazy people can get.

I hope the savings over at Urban outfitters were STEEP because that is too much pushing and shoving to get a few dollars off of a dress...or a bag...or a top. No shade to Urban Outfitters, I quite like that store!

(._.)

Yes, I understand that these irons were selling for $2. Is it worth getting into a panic for something I could find for a few dollars more on Amazon from the comfort of my own couch however? No, I don't think so either.

If these videos are what Black Friday is all about, then i'm perfectly fine with just staying home and eating more turkey and things of that nature.

If anyone reading this has ever experienced the Black Friday madness, I have one question for you: Was it worth it?

Another bored Saturday=Make up of the weekend!

Here we go again, another Saturday afternoon goes by where I don't feel like doing homework. As the day goes by, the only bit of activity I do all day is to stay in bed all day watching youtube clips, checking email and logging onto Twitter. By the time 3 PM came along, I decided to finally get out of bed and play with colors. Today, I felt like I wanted some smoke on my eyes and this was the result-for better or for worse. I think my application has really improved (I hope! Constructive criticism is always welcome.)

More pictures and a product list once you get into the cut

YOUUUU SNEAKY MOM!

A Saturday random for you all-Jimmy Kimmel issued a challenge to parents to tell their kids that they ate their kid's halloween candy. Of course, all kinds of tantrums and tears ensued, but these two are my favorite.

This video made me like kids again. Their reaction is PRICELESS!

Have a good weekend!

Well, this just changed the #naturalhair game for ME

GAME CHANGER!

Eight years ago as the Great Hair Disaster of 2003 (I will detail this great battle in which many hair strands were lost in another post) was at it's peak, I did a lot of research. Questions that I remember googling:

• How long will it take for my hair to grow back?
• How can I make my hair grow back fast?
• Why did my hair break off?
• What relaxer should I use for my hair not to break off?

I bet you're looking at these questions and laughing-I am too, I was 13 at the time! When I finally got the facts straight, I learned that hair grease was bad for the hair, and in my mind, this changed EVERYTHING! No more itchy scalp, no more random snowstorms on my shoulders, no more dry, crispy hair. All of this is how "grease" felt after my last relaxer and now that I was going natural and learned that grease is bad, this absolutely changed the game for me!

Through those eight years, I've been tweaking and trying different things to get growth. I started to feel that my products worked for me...maybe a few months ago and I felt relieved that after all these years, I finally found a hair routine/regimen that worked for me.

Now, lets fast forward to about....2 weeks ago. I know many of you saw Nikki's post from NYC about how she uses Dax pomade to get her signature braidouts. I looked at these pictures and I thought for a bit-what if hair grease could help with my ends. I went into my pantry cave of products and found a jar of grease alllll the way in the back and looked at how much was left and felt relieved that there was some product in the jar. After I wash, conditioner and put leave in conditioner into my hair and then put the infamous grease on my strands (not my scalp! That would have been bad!). I did that all on Saturday night, I write this post on a Wednesday afternoon and I only had to moisturize (ick moist sounds like such a dirty, creepy word D: ) this morning.

So I write this to show that 1) regimes are forever changing, 2) Don't discount ANY product, you never know how it's going to work until you try it and 3) the natural hair is forever changing, make up the rules for the game!

So is there any discovery that you made that you felt changed the natural hair journey? 

Costco does make-up brushes!?

Before, I start this story, let me describe my mom's relationship with Costco. My mother's go-to store, like a lot of people in this country is Costco. I would say that 95% of the time, if it's not available at Costco, unless she really wants something, she won't get it. Although it's just me and her in the house, This house is practically furnished by anything you could find at Costco.

So on Wednesday, she brought home this big purple box. At first, I thought she had a bit of a splurge (I understood of course, who doesn't deserve a splurge once in a while as long as you can afford it. We don't want to be buying MAC Lightscapade when you haven't paid the light bill!) and from what I saw, I thought it was a brand new cutlery set. Then I look a little closer and I see this

What I saw from far away

At first, my face went like this---> O_o. Don't get me wrong, I am very appreciative that my mom saw these brushes and thought that I would like them-hell, I have been talking about getting new brushes for months! I was starting to go on like I was Bubba talking about shrimp! You know, "there's all kinds of brushes-foundation brushes, crease brushes, kabuki brushes, powder brushes, liner brushes"...you get the idea lol! On the other hand, I had my mind set that my long-term brushes were going to be from MAC because all my eye brushes are MAC and they are still in pristine condition six some even seven years later. I am willing to give everything a chance because you never know what your new favorite product will look like.

EDIT: 11/13-The brushes are still there, I just wanted to make a few notes before you read on:
1) These are NOT the Borghese brushes that were released a while back.
2)The brushes retail for $24.99. I just remembered that I forgot to put the price in as a part of my review.

So, here's what's in the box. There's lots of pictures to show what I'm going on about, so jump on in!

A letter to my skin condition

Dear eczema,

I don't use the word hate, but I know this for sure, I don't like you. I don't want anything to do with you as a matter of fact. You make things very awkward, and the worst part is-I didn't even do anything to you!

Do you remember that time in the 8th grade when we first met? I remember it so well-a friend of mine complimented my eye make up. As I tried to process this for five seconds, I realized that you're so visible that you made one of my eyelids a different color. The only way I could save myself from embarrassment was to thank her for the compliment as I slumped into my seat in the lunchroom. After that, I did everything possible to get rid of you and it worked...for a while because you were gone and I thought I never had to worry about you again.

Well, I got out of the shower today and I see that after a seven year hiatus, you have reappeared on the eyelid where we first met. My eyelid isn't enough for you for some reason because now, I see that you have found the area behind my ears and perhaps my scalp because I see more snow on my shoulders than a blizzard in the Colorado Rockies (my homemade still-being-tested peppermint oil hair spray is after you. AFTER YOU I SAY!). This will not do. THIS WILL NOT DO AT ALL! I can't wear make-up for a while [I'm expecting my little black box from MAC by Wednesday, can't try it out until it goes away >:( ] and it's making me more self-conscious than I already am. THANKS FOR THAT!

I guess what I'm trying to say is-you suck. Once I get rid of you, I hope you we never cross paths again.

Yours (with a Q-Tip of anti-fungal cream in hand),
Jess x

--Do you have a skin condition that sucks? Go ahead, write a letter to it, tell it about itself!