Recent Pictures

As promised, here are some recent pics of my hair. I've been experimenting with color by testing a few locs which you can see in the third picture. I haven't been 100% pleased with the results, so I'm thinking of going to a professional colorist to have it done. One of my biggest issues is finding locs with several holes in them. There's a nice sized section of locs towards the middle that have holes. I'm not sure why I didn't notice before, but it's really disappointing because they look awful. I counted eight holes in one of them. I remember this being discussed during the Sisterlocks class and believe it has to do with the "Y" being split incorrectly during retightening. My appointment is next Wednesday so I'll definitely have to bring it up. Has anyone else encountered this?

Oh what a year...

I can't believe it has been a year since I've posted an update. But oh what a year it has been! I've been blessed abundantly and things have been wonderful. I have lots of new hair pictures to post, just as soon as I download them! Coming soon!

Hair progress

I couldn't make a comeback without posting pics of my hair. My mom braided it for me and I wore it for three days before taking the braids out. I'm mad that I didn't start wearing it like this sooner!

What I've been up to...

I've been enjoying my maternity leave! Sad to say, I return to work tomorrow and I'm oh so sad about it. The last 12 weeks have been wonderful. I have so much to report, I don't know where to start. Lets see....

Nugget (my husband's nickname for our little girl) was 5 lbs 4.3 oz at birth and now at shy of 3 months, she is 9 lbs 9 oz and developing quickly! She smiles at me in the morning when she wakes up and laughs while her diaper is being changed. She's not a fussy baby at all, thank goodness! I forgot that I was tagged early last year and I didn't get a chance create a post, but I'm going to change things up a bit and share a bit about my maternity experience:

1) I thought that after giving birth I would be able to pick up some of the projects I had put off while on bed rest. However, I learned the importance of taking it easy and making the most out of my time off with my daughter. After all, this was the only time that I would be with her everyday 12 weeks straight for the rest of her life. Projects could take a back seat!

2) I never knew that childcare could be such an issue. Growing up, my brother and I never went to a sitter because my mom worked nights to be home with us during the day, and my dad worked days to be home with us during the night. I had never really thought about the importance of their alternate schedule before but now I see how fortunate they were to be able to do that. Finding reliable childcare for Nugget has been a headache. My job has an on-site daycare but the waiting list is long. We have a temporary solution worked out but childcare is definitely something to consider for solutions before expanding our family :-)

3) I learned very quickly to accept help whenever I could. I was so grateful to have co-workers offer to spend their lunch break with the baby so I could take a nap or a shower and feel like a human being again. My parents brought dinner to us daily for three weeks and one of my girlfriends brought us an abundance of food. It was such a blessing!

4) I have no idea what to do with Nuggets hair. It's starting to take on a life of its own but I'm hesitant to put any product in it. It may not even be necessary but her scalp tends to be dry. One friend and a few articles suggested olive oil for infant dry scalp. Any suggestions?

5) I always drink liquids from a straw. I even carry two straws in my purse in case I'm offered a drink without a straw available.

6) I can recite every word from the movie The Last Dragon by memory, including the songs. It's not something I'm necesarily proud of, I just think it's interesting. It was my favorite movie growing up because I had a crush on Taimak aka Bruce Leroy. I wonder what ever happened to him...

Look who is here!

Welcome God's newest angel to the earth! Just in time for Christmas too! What an experience this has been. I'm still a bit sleep deprived but wanted to post some pictures and let everyone know that we're doing great. More coming soon!

The day my life changed...

We had the opportunity to have the 3D/4D ultrasound. I'm telling you, my life changed the moment I saw that little face. I was amazing to see her on the screen sleeping, opening and closing her eyes, sticking out her tongue, and making facial expressions. I was so emotional the following week, just thinking about how I am responsible for this little life. I pray that God would give us the wisdom and knowledge to be great parents to her.

Here she is yawning and sleeping. She was sleeping with her right arm around her neck, which is funny since I do the same at times. My husband thinks she looks like me. I think she has my lips and his nose. My husband calls her nugget. Now I really can't wait to see her in person! At the appointed time though of course. This little ladybug has tried to come early twice. I've been talking to her and telling her she has to hang in there for a few more weeks so she can come home with us from the hospital!

First Baby Shower & Birthday Celebration

I wanted to share some pictures from our first baby shower. It was such a nice event. Check out the cake with the baby carriage on top. The cake was half carrot, half red velvet, and very delicious! For the menu, we had a fruit platter, mini crab balls, croissants, rice and peas, stew chicken, and two salad. The drinks were my three favorite Caribbean drinks: Sorrel, Mauby, and Ginger pine. My husband absolutely loves Mauby. It took awhile to get him use to West Indian foods, but he took to the drinks right away. Every Thanksgiving and Christmas, he asks my mom to make him a special batch, just for him. Notice the balloon colors, purple and mint green? Yep, I'm serious with mine. No pink! :-)

My mom and my aunts from New York are cooking for the next shower so it's guaranteed to be a throw down. I always think back to a funny comment that my Bishop made after I got married. We had the wedding rehearsal dinner at our church and my aunts cooked. They got wind that Bishop liked oxtail so they cooked some. Bishop later said if only my dad had eleven more daughters, then he could have eleven more chances to eat such a wonderful meal. It was hilarious!

So much hair, so little time...

Hi there! I know I've been away for quite some time. Thanks to n'drea for letting me know I was missed :-) So much has happened in the past couple of months. I've missed blogging so I'm happy to get have this quiet evening to do some catching up. Lets see, where do I begin? I am now 34 weeks pregnant. Oh what an experience that has been. I went into preterm labor twice but fortunately, my little blessing is still right where she should be. Yep, I said she, I'm having a girl! My husband and I are so excited! We decided to do her nursery on purple and mint green, and it is so pretty! I know I won't be able to avoid pink forever, but I'm starting out with a non-pink nursery. The furniture is black, wall paint color is called lavender lace, and we put up crown molding and painted it a soft shade of blue. You can sort of see the wall color in the second picture on the left, but I'll take a better picture this weekend.

I celebrated my 30th birthday in October, which was neat because we had our first baby shower the day before so it was a double celebration. My next shower is next Saturday and we're expecting a huge crowd since my family will be here for Thanksgiving. I can't wait!

My hair has grown like wildfire! These pictures don't show the current length, since these was taken in September so I'll have to add taking updated hair pics on my to do list for this weekend :-)

I got my first client call for a Sisterlocks consultation. Unfortunately, I had to refer her to someone else since I've been on modified bed rest. I was extremely disappointed, but I know there will be other opportunities. Since I haven't been able to retighten my own hair, I've been sticking with my duo team. Once I give birth, I plan to get back on track with things. Sometimes I tighten my hairline, but its been difficult since I can't stand for long periods, and I haven't mastered being able to retighten while lying down. So, I'll have much to look forward to at the start of the new year!

Introducing some of the newest Sisterlocks Consultant Trainees!

I had the absolute best time at the Consultant Training class. I met some amazing women and learned a great wealth of knowledge. We got to speak with Dr. Cornwell over the phone which was a nice treat. This picture is from our third day of class. That's me with the blue scarf in the back with my head peeking up!

At the end of day four, we had the pleasure of being shown some styles for locked hair. Check out these beautiful Sisterlocks in a pretty style. My classmates nicknamed me "mega locks" because of "my massive amount of hair". It was funny. I wore my hair down one day and everyone asked if they could play in it. Our live models didn't show up so we had to volunteer as models. Everyone was eyeing my hair for practice, but I had a retightening recently so I had to decline. They were disappointed :-)

The picture below shows the completion of my first 4 rows, yeah for me! I need a lot more practice on my mannequin head, but I'm getting the hang of the technique more and more.

I took this class to learn everything I could to better maintain my hair. I wasn't sure whether I wanted to be certified, but I think I will pursue it now. By the way, for those on the East Coast (and other areas too of course), one of the Master Trainers will be sending out information on having a gathering in our area (possibly Philly) and having Dr. Cornwell join us for a meet and greet. In addition, they are are going to see if they can get approval to possibly have the Sisterlocks Homecoming planned for the East Coast in an upcoming year. No promises yet, but I'm hopeful that they will pull it off. I think this would be great, although I admit I am biased living in MD :-)

I'll be sure to pass along all info I receive!

Sisterlocks Certification, here I come!!!

I did it! I registered for the Sisterlocks Consultant Training program being offered this month. This last experience (see my last two posts below) was the final push i needed to go forward with this. I really need to learn to do this for myself, and be in a position where I can help others in similar situations. I pray that it will be a great experience for me, and should I develop a clientele, that I will be kept humble in remembering what I have been through. Thank you Lord for giving me and courage to press on. Thanks to all of you who encouraged so graciously, and thanks to my husband who never let me quit and helped to find a way to make this financially possible. I can't wait to share about my experience!

Update Part 4

Disclaimer: I am a very positive person who really tries to avoid drama in my life. Lately, it seems that my hair has been involved in one drama story after another. I was hesitant to post this before getting all of the facts straight. I really don't like to speak negatively about people, however, I felt this was important to post so here goes :

My mother/daughter duo charges $85 for the first 3 hours, then $25 an hour afterwards. It takes them a little under 3 hours to finish my hair. When I went for my retightening Monday, i was told that "to be fair, and given the amount of hair that you have, we think the price really should be adjusted". They reasoned that if I was going to one person, it would take at least 6 hours to finish my hair and I would pay much more than $85. While this is true, the reason why I sought them out is because they advertise the fact that there are two of them which will shorten your retightening time. So whether you have 300 locks, 450 locks, or 600 locks, you pay the set price. But, just because I have 680 locks, I should pay more off the top? Wow.....

Well, needless to say, I was blown away. I felt that there was more to this then they were letting on. It turns out that they had a conversation with my previous consultant and found out how much I use to pay when going to her. Based on another conversation I was made privy to, I believe that they used this as a basis to up my price. For the sake of background info, my last consultant charged $85 for the first 3 hours and $15 an hour afterwards. But, she wanted to split my appointments into two days at $85 the first day and $25 an hour the second day which would have been $185 out of my pocket. Besides conflicts to my schedule, I am a new home owner on a extremely tight budget (due to my nice mortgage bill) and could not fit $185 in my budget for hair every 5 weeks.

Now, I do understand that people have to make their bread and butter. Sisterlocks can be very time consuming for the client and the consultant. As you know from my previous experience, my first consultant took 12-13 hours to retighten my hair. I stuck with her for awhile because I didn't know any better at the time. But now, I don't want to be played for a fool. The biggest problem i have with paying by the hour is that the consultants don't work consistently yet don't stop the clock. On Monday, both consultants stopped for at least 20 minutes to do other things and that added time to my count. Was that fair? I don't think so. For a 3 hour interval, they get paid the same amount of money despite the number of locks. Is $85 fair for two people? Probably not, but they set that price and after my 3 1/2 hour session (which should have been 3 hours flat), they moved right on to the next person. So why should I be charged more if they are doing my hair in the same amount of time as someone with 300 locks?

So I asked what the new price would be and I was told $125 flat was fair. They also said that they wont be upset if i decide not to come back. To be honest, I don't think $125 is unfair, I just don't like the reasoning behind the change especially since they never complained about my hair before now. Man, discouragement comes in many forms.....