Body and Beauty and Living-Naturally

macys,
originally uploaded by NiÉriu.

I am not much of a gardner. Heck, I am so dark fingered I manage to kill weeds, the only things I grow successfully are Aloe-vera and nettle. It doesn’t help that patience is not exactly my forte.

Anyway, I like the spring…it’s a welcome relief from the winter and get me in the mood for summer.

I had heard of the macys flower show but seeing it in the flesh was quite spectacular and believe me I am not easily impressed.

These pictures taken with my daughter’s camera don’t quite do the arrangments justice but I had to share nonetheless. Enjoy…

The crowd was so much there that I couldn’t really get a decent shot when I went, but hope this gives you a small idea of what it was like?!

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Just got back from NYC where I spent the easter break. I was worried that I would be disappointed but I have to say I LOVE New York and I will definitely be going back.

Meanwhile let me just say again,if you are expecting your order, fret not, it is on the way. The last batch of outstanding orders will be posted in tomorrow morning.

I took off my Spanish hair before I travelled mainly ‘cos I just got tired of the long luscious locks, and I wanted really low maintenance hair for the trip. Before taking it off though, I did one more treatment for deep conditioning so that it wouldn’t shed too badly.

Garlic is very good for combating hair loss so I mashed up about half a bulb of garlic. I put it through the garlic press several times to make it as smooth as it could get.

And then I mixed up the garlic puree with about 4 table spoons of olive oil and then left it on the window sill ( in a little glass jar for the day) When I was ready to use it I mixed the olive garlic combo with an egg and 2 Tablespoons of natural yogurt and whisked them all up really nicely.

Summarily ingredients were :

*2TBS Natural Yogurt

*4 TBS Olive Oil

*½ bulb of Garlic

*1 egg

*5 drops of rosemary essential oil (you may use any of your choice) and 3 drops of lavender.

Apart from the beneficial effects of the essential oils, I used them to try to cover up the garlic scent by complementing rather than masking it.

After washing my hair with one of my soaps rather than my usual no-poo, I did a clarifying  rinse using diluted apple cider vinegar. And then, put my conditioning mix on and combed it through making sure to get enough on the ends.

After combing through I covered it with my shower cap and tied my towel around my head and went about my business. This was left on for nearly about 45mins- 15mins to half an hour would be plenty, I just got busy doing other stuff ( like watching TV!)

I rinsed this off thoroughly in the shower. When it is thoroughly rinsed off, you can barely smell the garlic, especially with the essential oils I used. You do have to rinse thoroughly to get rid of all the bits of the garlic.

I let the hair dry naturally and once dry, much to my pleasure, it was really bouncy and almost good as new. Alas it was time to take it out.

When I loosened the braids, I was even more pleased t observe I had much less shedding than usual. I have since repeated this treatment on my own hair with similar results of reduced breakage.

It does take some preparation so I don’t see myself doing this more than twice a month because as I said earlier, I am a low-maintenance kinda girl.

If you try this, let us know how you get on.

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I ‘d usually used regular honey from the stores but I decided to try out the manuka honey. I got one with 20 UMF rating.

I decided to try this out on my psoriasis patches which of late have been quite itchy. I mixed about half a spoon with my cleansing oil and rubbed it onto my face and then left it on for about half an hour before going for my shower.

I then mixed a little bit…just a smidgen with my facial butter and and also with my body butter.

Results: It doesn;t seem to be as sticky as regular honey. I didn’t itch at all on the patches either. It hasn;t noticeably improved anything else dramatically that I can see yet, it’s been about a week since using it.

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After a few days of being bound in a bun I noticed that when the hair was let down, it didn’t quite have the bounce it had when it was new. The curls were no more defined, it was more wavy and quite frizzy.

What I tried :

• 1Tbs honey
• 4Tbs oil ( I used equal amounts of olive and coconut but any oil should be fine)

Mixed the efck out of these and then massaged the mixture into the hair. I worked upwards from the tips to the scalp and I was more concerned about the frizzy ends.

I left it on and went for my walk which was about and hour and half and then  washed it off using just conditioner.( I continue to do condish-washes even when my hair is off duty)

I let the hair dry naturally(took a good while as it’s soo thick) but it was sooo soft, best of all the curls were back and so of course I had to carry the hair in a pony tail!

Note: It didn’t leave the hair greasy.

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treehair,
originally uploaded by NiÉriu.

Not usually my forte but thought seeing as it’s an issue for me right now, it’s a good way to break the silence.
Hair…..what to do with it!!
Well it’s supposedly spring but it’s still too cold to have my hair out. I tried to a couple of weeks ago and it was freezing. I quickly banged a weave on it, but that was too itchy so I took that out after a few days and put in tree-braids which I’ve kept in since. I used human hair this time-the first time I’ve ever used the stuff. It does feel softer but I ‘m not sure I’m mad about it. I think also that long hair is just not my thing, I am definitely happier with what I’ve got naturally.
For now, I’ve started to wonder when this coldsnap will end and I can stop with the protective styles. It ain’t cheap getting the hair done either I tell ya!
The pic here shows the back of the hair. Seeing as I’ce been rocking this hair -spanish hair, it gave me a chance to try some stuff on it that usually works for my afro hair.
So, I’ll be putting up a few posts with my experiments with this hair so far.

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