5 Days, 5 Natural Hair Styles

A week ago I participated in a style challenge in one of the natural hair Facebook groups I belong to. The challenge was to come up with 5 different hair styles over 5 consecutive days. Admittedly, this was a bit of a challenge for me as my daily styles during the week mostly consist out of twists, braids or buns. Nevertheless, I put my creative hat on and came up with the following 5 fairly simple to achieve styles.

Let me know which style was your favourite as well as which one you’d like to see a tutorial of as I’ll be featuring the style with the most requests/likes in one of my upcoming You Tube style videos. On that note, please stop by my YouTube channel and hit the subscribe button. I’m very new at making videos, and so would definitely appreciate your support. You can also follow me on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook for daily inspiration, styles and tips.

Day 1 – The Side Swept Fro

Day 2 – The Angled Fringe

Day 3 – Pompadour Up-do

Day 4 – The Classic Top Knot Bun

Day 5 – The Chic Turban

Love your curls!

 

Camille Rose Naturals Product Review

Hi Lovelies

It seems like we haven’t connected for ages! Well to make up for it, I’ve finally completed one of those reviews that I’ve been promising you since last year. My review is on the oh-so-heavenly Camille Rose Naturals brand.  You’ll also be happy to know that it’s quite a detailed review in the form of a video.

Do watch it over on my YouTube channel and leave your feedback by liking, commenting and subscribing. Please be kind as I’m very much a newbie to camera work and editing. It’s especially strange listening to and watching myself on camera, but I did have loads of fun making the video, so I hope you enjoy watching it too.

Love your curls,

Where to buy some of my favourite natural hair products in SA

I’ve been receiving quite  a few questions regarding where I purchase my hair products in South Africa (SA). Some of them I’ve purchased online while others have come directly from cosmetic and health stores. To take some of the guess work out for you I’ve compiled an online list where you can get your hands on some of my favourite products as well as some sites that I’ve found through a simple google search that stock natural hair products in SA.

Have a look at my updated regime post if you’re interested to see a run-down of the products I currently have in high rotation.

Stores I’ve purchased from

Birkeye

Birkeye stocks a variety of products from Organix to Miss Jessie’s to Jamaican Black Castor Oil. Personally I’ve purchased ApHogee Keratin 2 Minute Reconstructor, Shea Moisture’s Raw Shea Butter Deep Treatment Masque and Kinky Curly’s Knot-Today Leave-in Conditioner.

The Kinks Hair

They stock the following brands: Curls, Hairveda, Shea Moisture, Eco Styler, As I Am and Kanuri. My purchase was limited to Shea Moisture’s Coconut and Hibiscus Curl Enhancing Smoothie. A quick squiz over their website just revealed that they’ll soon be stocking Giovanni products as well.

The Perfect Hair

This online store stocks the As I Am, Mixed Chicks, KeraCare, Carol’s Daughter, and Shea Moisture brands. Personal purchases include the As I Am Curling Jelly and the As I Am Coconut Cowash.

Stores I’ve not purchased from

Tender Loving Hair

I’ve never shopped here but I do love the fact that they stock a wide range of Shea Moisture and Sunny Isle products.

Niche Hair Care

Products include Design Essentials, T444Z Hairfood, shea butter and silk scarves.

Obulunji

They stock a variety of products, but every time I’ve been on the site the prices don’t show up properly. I’m not sure if it’s just my browser so have a look for yourself. If you see a product you’d like to purchase but can’t see the price I suggest you contact the store directly by picking up the phone or sending an email.

Afro Botanics

This is a proudly South African natural hair care range that launched last year. It includes a sulphate free repairing shampoo, a deep penetrating moisturising conditioner, a repairing and strengthening protein treatment, a conditioning moisturiser and a super hair growth crème.  After only hearing amazing things about it, this range is definitely on my future must-try list.

Ruutos

Ruutos seems to be a South African hair care brand in its own right.  Unfortunately I don’t know much more about them but I thought I’d include it here in case any of you would be interested to check them out.

Nubian Nature

They stock a variety of natural oils, crèmes and butters.

A few other places to purchase from

• The Wellness Warehouse for Giovanni Hair Care products, carrier and essential oils;
• Rockin Naturals for shea butter, flaxseed gel, oils and hair accessories. Contact them on +27 78 208 3344 if you’re in the Cape Town area and,
• Dis-Chem and Clicks for Très Emme Naturals, other selected products, carrier and essential oils.

Some stores are pricier than others so do your research properly and take it from there, but don’t you just love the fact that we have more options available now?

Love your curls!

 

Image via Pinterest

Choosing to love yourself

Recently I’ve been seeing  a lot of posts where people have been ‘feeling’ their hair, i.e. they’ve simply been loving their hair. Well, the day I took these photos it wasn’t quite as much about feeling my hair as it was about feeling myself, in the sense that I was feeling confident and pretty much happy to be in the skin that I’m in.

From time to time, we all have moments of self doubt: Am I pretty enough? Do I fit in? Am I cool/hip/trendy enough? Am I meeting society’s expectations? Am I making my friends and family happy? Am I making enough money? Am I in the right job, city or country? I could go on forever. Well you know what I say to that?

Let it go and keep it moving…

Let me give you an example: I’ve picked up a bit of weight since I got married 6 weeks ago. Not too much,  about 3kg, so not enough for others to notice but enough for me to notice the change in my body. But you know what, for probably the first time in my life I’m not beating myself up over it. I’m just seeing it for what it is: it’s Winter and it’s bloody cold. So yes, I am snacking and eating lots more comfort food and I think in a way my body might be better off for it for another month or so. But I also know that I’m not interested in being unhealthy or overweight so it won’t be a problem for me to go back to my pre-wedding eating habits.

So what I’m saying is  that we should try not to be so hard on ourselves. Because you know what happens? We end up putting unrealistic expectations on ourselves which result in feelings such as frustration, anger, guilt, depression and the like. It affects our confidence, our self-esteem and ultimately our happiness. And don’t we all deserve to be happy? I know it’s easier said than done, but sometimes  you just have to tell yourself to deal with it, put on your big girl panties and decide to be happy.

Remember, there’s no such thing as being perfect. Chances are you’ll always have a curl that won’t play along, an argument with a loved one, or miss a deadline. Whatever the case is, try your best to resolve the issue and to move on, even if resolving it will take some time. It helps to have a goal that you’re working towards so while you’re dealing with the mundane you can focus on the prize ahead. Do more of makes you feel good and happy: Eat more ice-cream, give more of yourself to others, travel, dance, exercise, whatever works for you. Right now I love working on this blog and connecting with those who enjoy this site. It’s part of my daily routine which brings me immense joy and like I said, I’m fairly certain happiness is something we all want.

I’m reminded of two of my favourite quotes about happiness.

“If you have good thoughts they will shine out of your face like sunbeams and you will always look lovely” – Roald Dahl

“Happy girls are the prettiest” – Audrey Hepburn

 

 Love your self!

And the winners are…

Oh my word – what an awesome response to my first ever Giveaway! Thank you to everyone who entered, commented, liked and shared the competition.

The lucky winners are:

Simone Thomas from Cape Town

and

Gugu Mboweni from Pretoria.

Winners, please  drop me a mail at eleanorjadore@gmail.com with your physical address so that I can arrange for your prize to be delivered to you.

Again, thank you to everyone who participated. I’ll definitely host more competitions in the future so you’ll have more opportunities if you didn’t win this time.

Lots of love!

My blogging goals for Eleanor J’adore

One of the goals I have for Eleanor J’adore this year is to include a lot more lifestyle related content. Natural hair will always the forte of this blog, but I do have many other interests and I’d love to share those passions with you too. Naturally I’ve given the direction I’d like the blog to take lots of thought and one of those thoughts is to offer you, my lovely readers, a bit more.

I’ve recently become a lot more aware of healthy skin-care practices, trying out natural products, some made at home and others store bought. I’ve also taken more of a keen interest in make-up and have made a few splash purchases, although I’m still testing out the waters in terms of the actual application thereof. And as you may know by now, I adore travelling and will continue to share my travels with you when I’m lucky enough to venture off to an exciting destination.

Photography is another discipline I’ve always been interested in and I try to only include beautiful and well-lit photos on this site. I take as many of my own photos as I can, but sometimes none of my inspirational Instagram and Pinterest stalking is enough to realise my photographic vision when I’m looking through the lens of my own camera. I own a Sony bridge camera and I’m determined to get to grips with all its functionality and to generally improve my skills before splurging on a DSLR. That will hopefully be my prize to myself once I’ve mastered the bridge camera and I actually start to feel limited by its capabilities. I may even attempt to record a half decent video in the near future as I feel that some messages are more accurately delivered through a demonstration rather than through still pictures or words alone.

I’m going to end this post by asking you, yes you Lovely, what you’d like to see more of from me. Like I said, natural hair will always be the hero of this blog, but I definitely see Eleanor J’adore becoming a bit more of a lifestyle home too.

What do you think? Let me know below.

Image via Pinterest