My No'Poo Journey! How I Wash My Hair Without Shampoo, Use My Hair Mask, And Deep Conditioner.

Say hello to your new hair products! I know, I'm crazy right? Are you seeing all the weirdness that is food, not hair products! Looks like I'm going to be making some weird science experiment for my little sisters 2nd grade class. But really, these are the "products" that I put in my hair. NOT what you would normally see walking through the hair product isle in a store.

Now lets just take a moment to embrace our inner hippie, shall we? I started doing this crazy new thing called No'Poo (no shampoo, nothing to do with what we do when going to the bathroom). Let me just say that after I made the switch about 7.5 weeks ago, I am never going back to commercial shampoo and conditioner! I am also currently not using heat, I used to be addicted to my straightener and used it everyday. Now I've straightened my hair twice in almost 8 weeks!

Let me introduce you to my shampoo and conditioner. The norm for No'Poo is simply baking soda and apple cider vinegar. The mixture that I normally see people using is 1 tablespoon of baking soda in 8 oz. of water and then 1/2-1 tablespoons of apple cider vinegar to 8 oz. of water. The baking soda and water is your shampoo, you simply spray the roots of your hair with this, just the roots, and then massage your hair and rinse, and rinse well! The apple cider vinegar is your conditioner, spray the length of your hair, steering clear of your roots/scalp or it can make them greasy looking.

But as you can see, I also have an egg in the above picture. I have dry hair, and dry scalp and didn't really like the way baking soda made my hair feel. So instead of using the baking soda mixture to wash my hair, I simply take an egg, beat it and then mask it into my hair in the shower. Sometimes I do use the apple cider vinegar mixture in my hair for added moisture.

 I can tell you that my fiance thought that I was crazy for doing this, but he does support my decisions no matter how crazy they are!

 As a warning though! If you decide to go the egg route, do NOT use warm/hot water on your hair to rinse it out or the egg will cook in your hair!! I do sometimes when I get out of the shower have to pick bits of egg out of my hair, but its worth it!

Another warning with No'Poo, in the beginning you might absolutely hate it! You will go through what is called a transition phase. The transition phase is what your hair goes through after you make the switch. It could be that you hair gets extremely greasy, this is because shampoo strips that natural oils from your hair and it needs to get used to them being present. Your hair can also get very dry, if this is the case try not using as much baking soda or switch to the egg like I did. The transition phase can last anywhere from a week to a few weeks to a few months. But I promise you it is well worth it!

Now you're wondering "What are all the other random food items sitting there used for?" Let me tell you!

This is my before shower hair mask. The ingredients include 1 cup of milk, and 1 tablespoon of honey. After you put it in a bowl microwave it for 20 seconds so the honey will mix in with the milk and then flip your hair upside down over a sink and normally what I do is take the spoon I used to stir this and scoop it up and pour it all over my hair and scalp. Let it sit for 20-40 minutes, however long you like, and then "shampoo" your hair.

Now lastly, my deep conditioner. My most favorite thing in the entire world, coconut oil! Seriously, I use this stuff for everything! Cooking, lotion, in my body scrub recipe (more on that later), my hair, my son, my fiance, oh, you name it! But as far as No'Poo and oils go, be careful! Because coconut oil is a lighter oil and the closest to the oils your hair naturally produces this is the safest oil to use while No'Pooing. That being said, I wouldn't recommend caking this into your hair because I personally have never tried that and am not sure if it will come out without using shampoo.

What I do is dip one of my fingertips into it and then rub it into the rest of my fingertips, then massage is onto my scalp with my hair upside down. I'll also do the same thing, but rub a fingertips worth all over my hands until its got a little shine and then run my fingers and hands through the rest of my hair.

I do this the night before I know I'm going to wash my hair and then I wake up in the morning and either do my hair mask, or not, and then wash my hair as normal (and by normal, I mean with an egg or baking soda as I discussed above).

I know this was a long post, but I hope that at least someone found this useful and considers going  No'Poo! It has so many benefits to your hair, and it is so cheap in comparison to commercial shampoo, conditioner, and products.

Leave me comments about whether you found this useful, how the mask or deep conditioner worked on your hair, or any other No'Poo ideas for I am always interested in what other people are doing!!

Homemade Salt Spray for Beachy Wavy Hair

Today I am going to be teaching you all how to make your own salt spray! If you've ever swam in salt water and had your hair dry with the most perfect beachy waves, then you are going to want to try this out!

First off, let me just say I've been using this ever since I decided to go No'Poo (I will be making a post about this later, but for those of you who do not know, this is not about going to the bathroom! It is throwing away commercial shampoo and conditioner and if you're like me also products. But more on that later.) This stuff works wonders! I currently have this in my hair and it looks so good! If I were to compare salt spray to a product it would be a natural spray gel or mousse without all the foreign harsh chemicals. 

Anyways, to make this Homemade Salt Spray what you are going to need is:

1. A 16 oz. spray bottle
2. One tablespoon of coconut oil
3. One tablespoon of salt
4. Sixteen ounces of warm water

That's it! It's that simple!

Step one, get a tablespoon of melted coconut oil and put it into your 16 oz. spray bottle. It is easier if you have a little funnel to pour it in, but if you're like me and don't have one, just do the best you can! Also, most coconut oil comes as a solid, if your house isn't above 75 degrees that is. DO NOT microwave your coconut oil! I mean you can, but if you do it does kill a lot of the good enzymes and other good things in it. Take the container and put it under hot/warm water until it is melted.



Second, put a tablespoon of salt in the spray bottle. Again it is easier with a funnel. I don't have one so I just did it over my sink and got basically most of it in.

Next add 16 ounces of warm water. I stress that you need warm water so that the salt dissolves and the coconut oil stays liquid. After you add the water shake it up for a little while until you think that the salt is dissolved enough.

And you are done! I hope you all learn to love this stuff as much as I do! I do not recommend using this everyday because the salt can dry out your hair. Also I used the coconut oil because it is the closest to the natural oil your hair produces, and it isn't as heavy as say olive oil.

Leave me comments if you have any questions or to tell me your experience when using the Homemade Salt Spray on your hair!(:

 Here is me with Salt Spray in my hair after I mastered the art of the Snake braid.  If you follow me on Instagram, you will recognize it.

I'll be posting the how to video on this braid soon, be sure to check back or check my Instagram or Twitter feed.

My Baby Got Glasses!

At Cylas's four month appointment I went thinking that every baby goes cross-eyed as much as he does. I remember my littlest sister Sophia, now 7, going cross-eyed a lot as a baby. But my mom told me I should ask his pediatrician about it, so of course I did to be on the same side, and it is a good thing I did! His pediatrician told me that he should have grown out of it by now and that she is going to refer us to an eye doctor.

So along came his eye doctor appointment. The building was beautiful. It looked like it had been an older Mexican restaurant. Anyways, we got called back to the office and the doctor examined his eyes. He first had to put drops in his eyes that made his pupils dialate and let me tell you, Cylas did not like that! The doctor warned us that they could make him very sleepy, but to wait in the waiting room for a half hour for them to work. They did indeed make Cylas tired and he took a little nap while we waited.

After waiting the half hour, we got called back again. The doctor brought out lenses and a flashlight to check his eyes. He would hold the lens up to one of Cylas's little eyes and shine the light through, he explained that the amount of light that shined through was what his prescription would be.
After about a hour and a half of being there, we learned that Cylas has Strabismus, a condition that causes his eyes to turn inward toward the nose and his vision is +3.50. He will have to have reading glasses for the rest of his life, but he needs to wear them for the next two months at least to see if that fixes his strabismus, if not then we will discuss surgery.

Almost a month passed and his glasses finally came! I got a call on the morning of January 9th that his glasses had finally came in, I was so excited! We also had a WIC appointment (which if you don't know what WIC is, it's a program that helps Women Infants and Children with nutrition, checks for food and baby food for the first year. I will go into further explanation in another post.) so we had to wait until after that to go pick them up. But after the appointment, I met up with my mom to go pick up the glasses.

When we first put them on him, I almost cried! He turned his little head and looked at me and gave me the biggest smile! It was like a whole new world for him! He was finally able to see everything around him! He smiled at everyone he saw that day and it was the cutest thing. I even eventually put him in front of the bathroom mirror, like I have multiple times since he was born, but this time he looked in the mirror and got so excited! He slapped the mirror, tried to press his mouth against it and was just in general a happy baby. Mind you, he never had such a reaction to the mirror before. I'd have to say it was one of the most heart warming days of my life.

It's been a couple of days since he's gotten his glasses and he is doing a bit better with them, he does pull them off every now and then and I haven't noticed him going cross-eyed as much (which I am VERY happy about!)

It is strange to see such a little baby wear glasses, he's 6 months old, weighs 12.6 pounds and is 24 and a quarter inches long (so yes, he's tiny.) But I think he looks adorable!

Well, here he is: Mister Cylas Anthony Flatt wearing his first pair glasses!(:

Spit-Up Happens... A LOT!!

The above picture is my son Cylas when he was a day old. I hold this photo so dear to my heart. He was so tiny when he was born; 6lbs, 14oz and 19.5 inches long. He has grown a lot since then!

When he was first born he sat on my chest the first two hours; the happiest two hours of my life! I was incredibly sore! After two and a half hours of pushing they decided to use forceps, to my despair.

But never mind that, I could go on for days about that day! This post is about spit-up and if your little one happens to be like Cylas, we had to deal with a lot of it!

Every time that I fed he would spit-up, and I don't mean just a little a bit, I mean a lot! Like he'd spit up everything I just fed him! I'd burp him, but only after I'd feed him. I'd cry all the time over it, at least a couple times a day, if not every time that it happened. 

Well one day I was sitting in my mom's living room feeding Cylas and he once again spit up all over me. I then broke down and cried uncontrollably to my mom. She told me to that next time Cylas got hungry let her know. 

Cylas has always been a very regular little boy and eats once every two hours. So two hours after I had fed him, he was hungry again. I told my mom and she came with me. Cylas is notorious for popping off and then latching back on, still is at 5 and a half months old, but she told me that every time he does that to burp him, so I did. 

Voila! He unlatched and I burped him, this made him really, REALLY mad until he burped and then he latched back on and ate and then we started over. Him unlatching was pretty much his way of saying he had a bellyache. At the end of that feeding he didn't spit up at all. 

I didn't know it until a bit later that I had over-active "let-down" AND over-production so I was basically drowning him. 

I'm not saying this will be the case for everyone, but it worked for us! And it could work for you! Thanks for reading! I hope this helps!(: