This is my Natural Curly Girl Hair Routine all the way from shampoo to Styling incl. Plopping. I’ll show you how to I go from this matted fuzzy mess to shiny defined beautiful natural curls! To get bouncy defined curls you have to treat your curly hair nicely, it's all in the moisturising & the scalp.
I purchased all these products myself and have been using them for a long time, and they pass the Michty curly hair test!
Enjoy!
Video Tutorial
Aveda Colour Conserve Shampoo
Lee Stafford Treatment for hair that never grows past a certain length
Macadamia Natural Oil Deep Repair Masque
Macadamia natural oil Oil Insfused Comb
Hairhouse Warehouse Sharp Long toothed comb
2 x Cotton T-shirt
Macadamia Natural Oil Healing Oil
Macadamia natural oil Nourishing Leave-in Cream
Hair dryer with a diffuser
Step by Step what I do to get bouncy, soft natural curls.
And we start with Step 1. The first thing I do is wet my hair and go for a shampoo.
I use a gentle shampoo for colour treated hair and I just apply the product to my scalp and foam it up to give it a good clean, avoiding the length of my hair. At the moment I'm using Aveda Colour Conserve shampoo. It’s ok and not too harsh and I don’t go near shampoos that strip the hair and make my hair feel rough and all straw-like. I’m thinking of trying a cleansing shampoo after I finish this bottle.
Then I rinse out all the shampoo & squeeze as much of the excess water out of hair as I can so the conditioner doesn’t get diluted by the liquid.
So Step 2 is Fertilise those Folicles (and it seems this hair want some camera time)
I use Lee Stafford Treatment for hair that never grows past a certain length. A giant name and worth every letter! I really love this thick creamy silky stuff. I scoop out a decent sized lump and apply it to my roots all over my scalp making sure my cranium is coated in this magic potion and I also smooth it along, rubbing it through the beginning of the length of my hair.
This and my conditioner has really helped my hair grow as much as it has in the last couple of years. I highly recommend this product and got the tip from Shiv on her channel Letzmakeup and I’m so happy I did.
I use this treatment pretty much every time I wash my hair, but you can use it once a week to maintain the condition of your growing hair.
Step 3. is Condition... & deeply!
I grab the most magnificent Macadamia Natural Oil Deep Repair Masque which is my saving grace of healthy lengthy growing hair. It’s full of oils like Macadamia, Argan Oil for a really slick and moisturising feel.
And I smear a full palmful and I mean a palm-ful of the conditioner thoroughly through each side of my hair. I rub my hands together to distribute the product and then I smother my hair in it, smoothing it along the shaft and making sure my strands are super lubricated and ready for the long journey of combing ahead. I twist my hair around itself to let the product soak in while I do the other side. I take the conditioner through the whole length of my hair practically up to my roots and if your hair is as thirsty as mine you would understand but if you have an oily scalp then I’d stick to the ends for this deep conditioner.
Then to begin the detangling experience I use the tools that Lord Buddha gave me and detangle the shit out of your hair. First I separate my hair into sections and then claw my way to unknotty hair using my digits like a really wide toothed comb.
My hair is about 6 days since my last wash and it is really, really knotty, so it’s a bitch of a job but I’m the only one who can do it.
Using your fingers to detangle is seriously the cheapest and the absolute best tool and I’ve been using mine for as long as I can remember. With your hands you can feel the knots better and reduce the breakage suffered so you keep as much of your hard earned length as possible.
So I scramble my way through my locks using my fingers, slowly getting closer to smooth hair, swapping between each side of my hair and being delicately to separate the knots with my feelers then for my troubles I get a handful of hair which is ever so delicious.
Step 4. Then I go for this fabulous comb also from Macadamia natural oil which is apparently coated with a resin made of oil infused with macadamia oily goodness but to me it’s just a great wide toothed comb that fits well in my hand and combs through well. So I set that comb to work and go to town on each side of my hair alternating to make sure my arm/neck doesn’t get super tired.
This is quite the arm workout and I’m surprised I don’t have bigger guns from this massive upper body routine.
I really like this comb and despite all the weird claims it has it is a freaking awesome apparatus if you aren’t a fan of brushes or combs that rip your hair out. I’ve tried the tangle teaser and it was a big joke. Not only did it make that awful ripping noise which I know is the teeth going gently past your hair and not ripping out your strands but it wasn’t strong enough to get through any of my knots and was totally useless for detangling any part of my head. It actually made the process longer, not quicker as some people will have you believe and was as good as a feather duster in a sword fight. I tried it multiple times but it’s fine for some but not for me. Enough ranting back to it.
Step 5.
When I feel like that comb has smoothed my hair as much as it can, I swap to a comb with thinner longer teeth. It’s a comb I bought at Hairhouse Warehouse and I don’t know the brand and I got many years ago. It’s a really sharp long toothed comb that looks scary but does a great job. So, I comb through each side of the hair again to remove the last of the knots doing the old swapping sides thang.
The arduous journey though the jungle of my ringlets takes a really long time, I can tell you, the whole process from finger detangling to final combing takes me about 15mins solid of arm flailing to totally get my mass of curls into shape. And I’m pretty exhausted at the end of it too.
When I am close to knot free in this orientation then I get to the first steps of styling my hair which we see in this back shot here.
I start at the lower part of my skull and comb the hair back from there. As I’ve moved the hair in a different direction the hair need to be smoothed out by the comb and laid down to get the curls to go with the flow so I comb through each section slowly combing from higher up on the back of my head and grabbing more hair to brush backwards and style the way I like it.
I use my other hand to assist the detangling and can get a good rhythm going which makes the process easier.
The top section is the knottiest and takes some extra care, so I also do some combing to the side when I get to the longer sections cause my arm suddenly gets too short and I get rid of those knots and coax my hair into some semblance of neatness.
I also add some water to the top of my head to relubricate the conditioner cause by this time it has started drying and this makes the process easier. Here I also comb the side through again to make sure the curls lay with the grain and all are friends.
Then to finally style my hair I adhere to the two finger rule. Many have their own two finger rule but mine is this. I remove most of the part on the top of my head and comb backwards leaving two fingers of space so I kinda have a 1 inch part but the rest of my hair flows out from that point. I comb my hair in all directions away from the part and also comb through the length some more including from the underneath side to keep those more brittle hairs under control and get that length all straightened out.
And that’s all from Mr scary comb.
Step 6. is Rinse out all that gooey fun and make my noggin all squeaky clean and fresh.
Then I squeeze out as much water from my hair really wringing it out well and I mean strangle it so it has a chance to dry quicker than sopping wet hair. Then I twist my hair together and I put my hair in an Ibis clip to keep it out of the way while I finish off my shower duties etc. and give myself a timeless stylish hairstyle while I do it.
So after those off screen not appropriate for youtube shenanigans I steal one of my boyfriend’s cotton t-shirts in an ever fashionable red and use it as a towel. I slide it up under my hair and do that flip and roll thing that all chicks apparently know how to do, you know what I’m talking about, but if you don’t here’s a barely in frame sequence of me putting my hair up in the shirt turban style, twisting the end around my hair covering the length of my hair in the cotton and then I attach the sausage looking end bit to the rest of the towel/my hair with the ibis clip from before.
(So once I secured that I contemplated how) The cotton t-shrit is much better than using a towel cause it’s smoother and if you’re fancy you can use a micro fibre towel because the looped fibres of a regular towel can get caught on your hair and cause breakage which is definitely not what a curly girl wants considering there’s so much shrinkage involved in curls.
So I let my hair sit in that surrogate towel t-shirt thang for a while and use this time to dry off and other tid bits like clean out my ears with the best tool ever, the cotton bud, (cause there’s no better time than when your ears have been soaked in conditioner and rinsed well.)
I also like to moisturise with tasty Pink Grapefruit body butter from The Body Shop that smells gorgeous and is such a juicy thick moisturiser and great for thirsty post exfoliation skin especially down there. Hey, not what you’re thinking, I mean on mah legs. Bitch, please?! Hee hee hee!
So taking a chunk of the body butter I smother it all over and also apply my deodorant and enjoy the freshness of the scents.
And now I unravel my hair and take off the shirt and as you can see it soaked up quite a bit of moisture and after all that hard work I end up with damp but soft and detangled hair.
And for my styling and after care products I use a version of the LOC method and grab a handful my Macadamia Natural Oil Healing Oil and when I say handful, I mean, a mother of a handful and I rub my hands together to spread the product and then distribute through my hair by running my hands along my curls and combing again with my fingers. I thoroughly coat my strands especially the front section and I also add a bit extra to the ends to keep them juicy.
The reason I apply the oil first and then a heavier buttery product on top, is layering the products like this maximizes your moisture retention for your hair shaft by sealing in the freshness and keep as much moisture as possible on the hair shaft which is beneficial for curlies girlies who struggle to maintain moisturized hair.
Although if you have highly porous thirsty hair then this way will be great but if your hair isn’t very porous you could end up with oily limp curls so play the sequenced of these products and see what method works best for you.
For a true LOC method you can also add a leave-in conditioner before your oil but I don’t find that necessary with my hair and if you so choose you can also add a styling gel or the like on the top of all that.
So for my creamy buttery top layer, I have become a convert to Macadamia natural oil Nourishing Leave-in Cream. I just bought the full size after trying the mini size because I fell in love with it so damn hard. I pump out about 4 pumps to fill my palm and once again smooth it between my hands and enjoy it.
It seriously smells like candy and rainbows all rolled into a delicious creamy goo that is nirvana for my curls. I smother my coils in the nourishing cream that really lives up to it’s name and comb though with my fingers again to make sure every strand is covered and separated into defined curls. I make sure the front section is well coated so the front of my do is at it’s best and those drier sections are moisturised well.
This leave-in cream is my latest find and after trying many many many different balms, and creams I can confidently say that this is the best for my hair to get defined and soft curls without any stiffness and plenty of spring.
So after applying all my after products I end up with this moisturised but very wet mop of hair.
And now to help get my hair into a dry usable state I use my secret weapon. Another t-shirt! Here’s a cotton shirt of my guy’s, yep another one I swiped.. And now We Plop! And for those that aren’t familiar with the term plopping when it doesn’t involve a doodie joke, I’ll show you out here.
So you take the shirt and lay it down with the waist towards you and flip your hair over, and then pile up the length of your hair up, like this, I’ll show you again. Try and keep the hair all on top of itself and piled up positioned on the top of your head. Then grab the sides of the shirt and tie it behind your head at the base of your skull. then grab the other end and flip it towards the base and twirl the sleeve section taking it towards the front of the head and tie it up to give yourself a snazzy turban. Since I have to keep this on for a while I like dress it up a bit with this head scarf from Cheesecake Dolls on Etsy and I tie it around my turban thingy and make a neat little bow to make it all purdy. These scarves are made by Elizabeth Weekes and are lovely even when you’re not washing your hair.
I have a whole bunch of different colours of them too and you can find a link to her store in the description box.
And now I leave this delightful sassy do-rag on for a minimum of 15 minutes or for as long as I can be bothered which is usually about an hour.
So after that time I extract my hair from it’s cage with a flourish hey big spender "boom bada boom chiki boom boom boom.” and the tshirt has soaked up a lot of the excess dampness and also allowed my curls to partially dry in a coiled up state so they will end up bouncier and have a better curl structure.
This is what my hair looks like still damp but getting there.
Any curly girl knows that when you wash and comb your hair you end up with a fabulous ball of icky fluff that is the hair you’ve lost but as you see my combing method doesn’t rip out any excess hair and lets you keep as much of your thickness and growth as possible.
For a bit of styling and drying help I use a touch of a hairdryer. It is a must to use a hairdryer with a diffuser on the end cause you don’t want to blast your hair with heat and damage all the goodness you just put in with the oils and creams. Of course these products I use give some heat protection, but I don’t use much heat to dry my hair with prejudice and paranoia like the weapon it is. But it can be useful and let ya have some fun with it.
So what I do is headbang and flip my head upside down to get into this position and it’s very important to use the hairdryer on a low heat setting and low fan strength and I dry the base of my skull and roots in this upside-down position to get more volume at the base. I also slightly dry the length of my hair by cupping the ends towards my scalp and hold the diffuser against my head for a few seconds and do this all over my head to get the curls to dry in a curlier fashion and get more volume as well. I don’t do much hair drying and certainly not until dry, it’s more just for styling as I said.
And that’s the end of my massive honed Natural Curly Girl Hair Routine.
It takes me about half an hour to get to rinsed hair then to get my hair dry enough to apply product to it gets me up to 40mins and then an hour later I take my final turban off and then getting to hair that is mostly dry I’m at an hour and 40 mins and then for total time it takes about 3 hours from shampoo to mostly dried hair like you see here. And for totally bone dry hair I need 5hours unless I use the hair dryer more and that’s no way to treat your tresses.
If you have a mixed hair type of 3C to 3B coily and spirally hair like me, I hope this helps you get the best out of your tresses with this heavily tried and researched method.
Thanks for reading. I hope you enjoyed my curly hair regime.
