How To Do Mini Twists On Natural Hair Tutorial

After two years away from Youtube I am finally back. I have a better camera, lighting and most importantly I have got a great place to film. For me to know that people are still interested in my videos and want more- I would be so grateful if you could view my video and share some love by giving a thumbs up and leaving a comment. Any video suggestions would also be greatly appreciated. So please watch the video below for a tutorial and/or continue reading this blog post for all of the detailed info on my mini-twists.

For the past 2-3 years mini-twists on my natural hair has been my favourite (and pretty much only) protective style. The reasons I love it is because my hair styling skills are limited, I can't canerow, I have never done twists or braids with extensions and simplicity is really key for me. I can do these twists with little preparation and although they take a while, they can stay in for weeks and during that time they require almost no upkeep. All of you ladies with tightly coiled afro hair can probably relate to my struggle of putting natural hair into a bun, with the mini-twists this is not a problem. I am still experiencing breakage in my hair so this time around I am going to try to switch up how I style my mini-twists to prevent always wearing them in a top bun. Stay tuned for my video on how to create different styles while wearing your mini-twists.

Installing the twists

As you can hopefully see in my video tutorial, I divide my hair into four sections and start with the back section. Each section takes about an hour so in total it usually takes me four hours to instal these twists. I do my twists on dry, stretched hair for length retention. There are two ways you can do this, either twist on blow dried hair or put your hair in braids (as if you were doing a braid out) after washing and leave to dry. Once dry, brush the hair out in a heat less blow dry fashion (tutorial here) and then start twisting. I almost always use the ORS HAIRepair Coconut Oil & Baobab Anti-Breakage Conditioning Crème or Cantu Coconut Curling Cream if I've run out. The reason I tend to use the ORS product is because it is a hair leave in, but it doesn't feel like it contains too much water which helps prevent the stretched/blow dried hair from reverting. When you start twisting, applying a small amount of product onto the twist, mainly focusing on the ends, to "lock" the twist, apply product to end and twirl it.

Maintenance

The twists are very low maintenance but the main things in terms of maintenance for these would be refreshing the twists (look wise), moisturising and how to keep them at night. Once a week, I would re-twist the perimeter of the hair if needed, using a small amount of water or leave- in. At night, I divide my hair in two sections and put those in a low bun. I twist each section before making it into a bun (I will show this in future videos) and then put on a scarf to sleep in. You could leave the twists for two weeks or one months if you can go that long without washing your hair. Depending on your hair type or how easily it gets tangled, you might be able to even wash your hair in twist. I saw this in a video recently by Laila from Fusionofcultures so if you're interested in washing your twists, have a look at that.



Styling

As mentioned earlier in this posts, I tend to wear my mini-twist in a top bun like the one you see in the first two pictures. However, I am looking to switch up the styling and I am planning to do a styling video if I can come up with some more easy to do styles! In these pictures you can see how it looks wearing it out. Although less noticeable in the pictures, my hair is a little to thin to wear out. I'd love to wear it this way hopefully in a year or so if my hair recovers from the damage and gets fuller.

If you've made it this far in the blog post, thank you so much for reading! If you enjoyed it, please share my posts on your social media or even better, Pin one of my pictures to your Pinterest board.


Let me know what you though of this post and video and what you would like to see next!

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WAHL Afro Styling Range By 5ive

"The power of professional styling in your hands"

Today I have a really exciting review guys, I will be reviewing WAHL's afro styling range by hair celebrity stylist and former afro stylist of the year- 5ive! I am sure I am not the only one who grew up using the WAHL hair dryer on the left in the picture below, in fact, I don't think I ever had a hair dryer from another brand. Therefor I was very excited an honoured to have WAHL send me these products to review. This styling range was created in order to give you the confidence to create salon worthy styles at home and is described as follows:

"Suitable for every hair type and texture, this range provides full styling control with a variable heat straightener, a powerful hairdryer for unlimited styling capabilities and a root styler to effortlessly smooth out frizz"

WAHL Afrostyling PowerPik 3000, £24.99

So the hair dryer I am reviewing, PowerPik 3000 is the one one the right in the picture below.

Description from WAHL's website (link above in title):

"The Powerpik 3000 delivers 1800 Watts of powerful performance for ulta-fast drying results. With 3 heat and 2 speed settings to provide maximum styling control and a cold shot to set your style. Includes a pik attachment designed for reaching hard to dry areas and 2 concentrator nozzles for precise styling. Fitted with a hanging loop, 3m salon length cable and removable air filter for easy cleaning"

In the box you will get the 1800W PowerPik 3000 hairdryer, pik attachment, two concentrator nozzles and an instruction booklet.

As I had an older version of the WAHL PowerPik hair dryer I thought it would be interesting to do a comparison between this and the older version. So the first thing you'll notice is the design which I personally think is an improvement with the PowerPik 3000 but I don't mind the previous designer either. The first noticeable thing when it comes to actually using the hair dryer is that the buttons are different and placed differently to before, as you can see in the image below. The PowerPik 3000 has two different speed settings and three heat setting for improved control- this is a feature that is missing in the previous model. The cold shot is present with both models and is definitely useful as I usually will use it once the section I am working on is completely dry or in between to prevent over heating. When using the old dryer, I've found myself pressing some buttons by accidents due to where they are placed- and I had less of this problem with the new PowerPik 3000 version.

WAHL Afrostyling Hair Straightener, £32.99

Description: "The Wahl Afro Hair Straightener which, endorsed by top Afro Stylist – 5ive, has variable heat temperature and ceramic coated plates which helps create a sleek and smooth finish"

Now I am not an expert when it comes to hair straighteners, I've always had one and I straighten my hair once in a while. My old one looked pretty rough so I was super excited to try this. Since I received this product I haven't straightened my whole hair but I tried a section for the sake of the review. The website described the ceramic plates as a technology which makes the straightener reach your ideal temperature quicker, maintains a constant heat which in turn allows even heat distribution throughout the length of your hair for a perfect finish! Also, as you can see it has rounded edges which in my experience is great if you want to use your straighteners to create curls/waves.

The design is super sleek with this digital display showing the temperature the straightener is set to. The minimum temperature you can use is 150°C and the maximum is 230°C. This is going to be really useful for the next time I straighten my hair, I've never had a straightener with different heat settings before.

WAHL Afro styling Root Styler, £29.99

This is a product type I've never tried nor really heard of before. I did a Google search and I can't find another product like these- so I think it's safe to say this is quite unique and innovative.

Description: "Designed to work close to the root, the styler will smooth out coarse and frizzy hair whilst adding volume and lift. The heat protectant double guide comb system provides a safe way to style by enabling you to get the ceramic coated barrel extremely close to the root. The variable temperature settings ensure this styler is suitable for afro and mixed textured hair"

So I think this was pretty forward to use (that is if I am actually using it correctly), but at least I was able to get it to work. When I first tried them I actually used them during a youtube video I was filming so I've included some stills which hopefully give you an idea of how the product is used and the results. I had blow dried my hair using the hair dryer and then tried the root styler on blow dried hair. The pieces I tried turned out really straight, very close to the root. I can see this being useful if you're doing a sleek bun or any style where you want sleek and straight edges.

I tried it two different ways but I think the way I did it below, putting the hair "on top" makes more sense and was more effective.

What styling tools do you use and how often do you use them?

Have you tried this range?

x

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(*) These products were sent to me to review

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Nylah Hair Care Products Review- Super Botanical's Conditioner, Strength and Shine Shampoo Cream, Magic Star Comb and Herbal Hair Tea Growth

Hi everyone!

Today I will be reviewing some hair care products from the UK brand Nylah: the Nylah Super Botanical's Conditioner, Nylah Strength and Shine Shampoo Cream, Nylah Magic Star Comb

and the Nylah Herbal Hair Tea Growth. 

Let's start with the obvious, the packaging! The packaging is amazing and that was actually the first thing that caught my attention when I first came across this brand, the name is nice, the logo and design looks luxurious and clean but with some nice patterns included which I think represents the heritage part beautifully(their tagline is Heritage, hair and science). 

Here is a little bit of information about the brand from their website: 

"Named for my beautiful daughter, for her wonderfully kinky, afro hair that delights and inspires me. For the people who need haircare products that are safe, gentle and effective. For people who believe that their hair says something about them and their backgrounds, their heritage their roots. For women who love to simply be ourselves: creative, inspirational, strong and beautiful."

So the brand is a UK brand which caters to afro hair and it is also a black owned business.

Nylah Super Botanical's Conditioner, £14

"Super Botanical's Conditioner Restore and protect your hair’s natural moisture with our rich and creamy double strength conditioner. Loaded with essential amino acids, and super botanicals, this fast-acting formulation softens and moisturises hair to help prevent breakage. Carefully formulated to a P.h 4.5 to help re-balance your hairs cuticles and lock in moisture."

So as you can see above, the key claims for this conditioner is that it is moisturising and strengthening. It contains humectants, some detangling agents and a lot of natural emollients such as Shea Butter, Jojoba Oil and Crambe Seed Oil. The latter is one which I had not heard of before (INCI Crambe Abyssinica Seed Oil) but the packaging says it is Ethiopean Crambe and after some quick research I found that it is known for its high Erucic Acid (omega 9 fatty acid) content and for being a very stable oil. It is definintely very creamy and softening and it smells of sweet orange oil, which is one of my favourites. I always detangle with my conditioner and my hair seems to be extra tangly compared to others, therefor it is very rare that I found a conditioner to have amazing slip. The first time I used this conditioner my hair was especially tangled and I after trying it a few times I found it to have medium slip, in other words I would prefer it to have a bit more slip for my particular hair type. In terms of the price point, I know smaller and start up brands have to have higher price points- it is understandable. However, I am personally a bargain queen when it comes to cosmetics so I would have liked it to be a bit lower. However, a lot of high quality ingredients are in the formulation- so you would definitely get your money's worth.

If you have been reading my blog for a while, you'd know that I always try to include the ingredient list as I myself find it quite annoying when it's not included. For some reason I took the picture of the product information and not the ingredient list (although you can see the ingredient list a little bit. I would refer to the website but the ingredients are not listed there. If you want to see the full ingredient list feel free to send me a dm on Instagram (@Yolandaas) or comment on this blog post and I will send it to you.

Nylah Strength and Shine Shampoo Cream, £12

The second product is the shampoo cream. I personally have never tried a product marketed as a Co-Wash, but I'd like to think such a product would be similar to this one- which is marketed as a Shampoo cream- in case anyone was wondering what the difference is. This is a really nice formulation which definitely is very creamy- and will still clean your hair properly. The cleansing agent, or surfactant is a mild syndet (synthetic detergent) called Sodium Cocoyl Isethionate. It has been shown to be more gentle to the skin barrier, than soap and other surfactants. I did get some lather the first time I tried it, and a little less the second time, which probably was due to how much product that was or wasn't in my hair at the time of washing it. The shampoo cream also contains humectants and emollients like Glycerin and Shea Butter which is great for natural hair. I believe the scent is the same as for the conditioner, sweet orange- but I could be wrong. Either way it is really pleasant and not overpowering.

Now to the Nylah Magic Star Comb and the Nylah Herbal Hair Tea Growth (both linked). Despite planning to quite a few times- I kept forgetting to use the herbal tea, which is a hair rinse. I was very excited to try it but I've been keeping it in my food cupboard with my regular teas, so when it's time for wash day I always forget. However, the herbs it contains (Nettle, Rosemary, Peppermint and Horsetail) are all known to have great benefits for hair. Nettle is said to naturally inhibit DHT (hair loss causing hormone), Peppermint and Rosemary are said to stimulate hair growth and Horsetail contains Silica which is supposed to strengthen hair strands. There is not that much to say about the wide tooth comb as I am sure you are all familiar with this hair tool. It is good for detangling tightly coiled afro hair. I see a lot of naturals with tightly coiled hair types mention different detangle tools as their favourites so make sure you try different ones to establish which one is the best for you. I have recently found a paddle brush to work well for me. I use this wide tooth comb if I have to detangle my hair slightly between washed, but for my wash-detangle session I need the paddle brush to make sure all tangles are removed.


Overall I really loved using these products. They all contain a lot of strengthening and nourishing natural ingredients and none of the products contain Parabens, Mineral Oil, Synthetic Fragrance, Artificial Colours, Formaldehydes, SLS or SLES which is good if you are sensitive to any of these. I have to add as well the the founder is very nice and she has done a great job creating this brand!

Have you tried these products, and if not, will you be trying them out?

xx



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(*) These products where sent to me to review

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