L.A. Ink

Kat, from Miami Ink, will be opening her own shop and will soon have her own show: L.A. Ink. I noticed her absence on the Miami show, but don't watch it on a regular basis, so I was out of the loop. The site says she wanted to be back home, something she expressed while she was on the other 'Ink.

Curly Hair Care - No Shampoo

I've gone back and forth on taking care of my naturally curly hair. From using products, to not using products, shampoo to no 'poo, using my homemade soap for shampooing (followed by apple cider vinegar rinse) and on and on. My hair has been untouched by relaxers for over five years now and nothing seems to work forever. Hence the back and forth. Right now I'm on a no-poo regime again. Just felt like time. I found a great forum: Nappturality, with tons of curly hair tips and guides.

I do follow some of the guidelines in the Curly Girl book for no-shampoo washing:

Right now I'm using Suave (I hate their website) Naturals Conditioner. This conditioner does not have the "-cones" that people refer to in it and is supposed to be good for Nappy no-poo washing. You can see my shampoo version of how I do my hair here. For that method, I use Cantu if I can get my hands on some.

STEP 1: I wet my hair, use a golf ball sized blob of conditioner, rubbing it into my head, massaging my scalp all over.

STEP 2:Rinse well; apply double golf ball size amount to my entire head and COMB THROUGH with a wide-toothed comb (this part is a must for me and has been the lifesaver of my hair for years -- a comb in the shower).

STEP 3:Leave this on for a bit while I shower. Rinse well. *Towel dry (just wrapping towel around hair, gentle squeeze here and there -- NO rubbing).

STEP 4:Air dry*, once again, not letting anyone play with my hair, though it seems to be hard for people to do this.

STEP 5:The second day I pull my hair back in a ponytail. Sometimes, if I had a miracle hair day, I will spritz it with water and leave it down for the 2nd day. But for the most part it is up in a ponytail.

*Normally when I conditioner-wash I will smooth a gumball sized dollop of conditioner on my hair after rinsing, before drying. As of recent I've been applying the gumball sized dollop after drying to see how that works.

You can see my nappy gallery here. You have to register, to view them, but here's a preview:

MyBlogLog Community

I think I can, I think I can... I think I can make the transfer over from MoveableType to Wordpress. Just need to get up the motivation and brainpower to do it. I'm ready to start over a bit.

I'm looking through the Groovy Mom MyBlogLog Community and throught I'd go through some of the links. Here's some random ones. Visit them:

A Typical Woman
Toddler Tactics
The Parent Blog
Frugal Village
DIY Naturally
Purple Frog Cat
It Matters To Me

Got a blog or journal or site? Show me it here.

Too Many Blogs

Some links from today's surfing:

MomCooks
DiabeticMealPlanning

This is scary, I'm sorry, but it is: TopMomma? Oy-yoy-yoy.

I feel like an old-arsed lady when I say this, but boy-oh-boy the blog game has become saturated, has it not? There are people that have been around longer than me who know what I'm talkin' 'bout. I started back in '99 I think it was -- so almost a decade here. Read journals and such, surfed sites. But could identify a great deal of the journalers out there.

Not anymore.

Holy cannoli, there's a lot of them. And shooooot, when people caught wind that you could make some possible dough blogging? A lot more came along (yeah, yeah I got the Google ads up there on mine -- pays for the site, at least). It is nice to be able to find gazillions of people out there doing there thang, blogging, journaling and what have you. But, I gotta admit, sometimes I long for the good ol' days where google ads (or any ads) on blogs were non-existent and people blogged our journaled just for the sake of doing so.

Fourth of July

Happy 4th of July, Americans. Woo-hoo, yay, firecrackers and all that good noise.

I have spent most of my day lounging around the house, checking email, feeding kids, showering, doing laundry. Thankfully I had the day off from work, always nice (well usually, sometimes when the kids are insane, I'd like the refuge of my quiet office).

Tonight we're going to go see the fireworks. Fun. Might bring a bottle of vino and some munchies. A blanket. Maybe a radio. Sparklers, maybe. We're pretty darn broke right now and it is really hard. I don't know what it is about making more money and not having more. Seems like we should be ahead. I don't want to think about it. There's a carnival at the park where the fireworks are going to be so I KNOW the kids are going to be all whiny about rides. But we're saving up for a different carnival and there will be no rides tonight. Which will bring on whining, surely. Because we've done something wrong in our child-rearing and raised some really whiny kids.

Not that I don't love them, but man. They are a whiny lot. Trying to combat that a bit. Anyone else have whiners?

Spending Less in July 2007

I have some debts to pay off. Have to admit it. I've been doing OK on getting rid of it, slowly. Very, very slowly. I've got an electric bill that I've been carrying a little over each month on and it has gotten me into owing $700. There I said it. But I have paid of my Sam's Card, which is good, my Sears card, etc.

So this month I'm going to try to spend less. Much less. And trying to record my spending. Don't really like the thought of it, honestly, but feel like I need to put it all out there to get a real grip on where my money is going.

If you'd like to join me, or comment, hop over to the forum to respond. I'm getting way too many spam comments and am disabling blog comments.