The Awkward Stage's Braiding Primer

Since I have written about braids at one point or another, I wanted to make a comprehensive post that links all of my tips about getting and maintaining braids. This primer will cover everything from braid preparation to choosing a style that works for your hair to washing them. Hopefully, by having all of these posts in one place, it will keep you from having to hunt down the posts on the blog!!

Happy reading!!

Braid Prep
The Awkward Stage's Guide To Prepping Your Hair for Braids


Style Selection
Selecting the Right Braid Style for You


Washing Braids/Twists/Etc.

Because Low Maintenance Doesn't Mean No Maintenance (Washing With A Scalp Cleanser)

Washing Braids/Twists/Whatever, pt.2

General Braid Maintenance Tips

My Braid (Extension...Whatever) Rules...
Caring for Cornrows
Tree Braids and Other Random Things

My Kinky Twists!

The Awkward Stage's Guide To Prepping Your Hair For Braids

Happy Sunday lovelies!!


With summer now making its mark and the mercury (significantly) rising, many of you have probably said 'Man, bump this hair thing' and have ran out to get your hair braided. While braids are a perfect low manipulation style, if you are using braids as a protective style, there are certain things you have to do to prep your hair for the braiding process. Since your hair is going to be put away for weeks/months at a time and braids can stress your hair, you want to make sure that your hair is in the best possible condition. Here is what I do when I am preparing my hair for braids:

1) Shampoo. This seems like a no brainer but you would be surprised at how many people don't do this step and roll up to get their dirty hair braided. The key thing that I aim to do during my shampoo step is to clarify my hair. That is, I want to remove everything that is on my hair: dirt, oil, -cones...everything!! With braiding, you want to remember that whatever is on your hair when you put the braids in, will be on your hair when you take your hair out. So if you have a nice coating of silicones on your hair prior to braiding, they will be on your hair when you remove them...and you will have dry hair to boot. So, one lather with a clarifying shampoo (ORS Creamy Aloe and KeraCare Sulfate Free 1st Lather shampoos are good for this) should be sufficient. Follow up with a moisturizing shampoo. Don't rely on your braider to do this step. Please don't.

2) Do a protein treatment. Braids are stressful on the hair. Seriously, they are. You're putting these extensions on your hair which puts extra weight on them and the whole braiding process is a lot of tugging, pulling, combing, etc. For those reasons alone, you want to make sure that your hair is strong enough to withstand all of those stressors. If your hair is in fairly good health, using Joico K-Pak Reconstuctor (or the Sally's version) or Aphogee 2 Minute Reconstructor is sufficient for a treatment. However, if your hair is on the more damaged side (and you don't want to/can't wait for your hair to get a little stronger), use Aphogee 2 Step Treatment.

3) Deep Condition w/ a Moisturizing Deep Conditioner. Definitely take this time to infuse the strands with the moisture that they need. Although you should be moisturizing your hair while your hair is in braids (with a nice braid spray or leave in), you want to make sure that you start out you braids with moisturized hair. It just seems like the right thing to do. Don't forget to put a nice moisturizing leave in on your hair when you finish!

4) Stretch Your Hair. You know what I can't stand? Folks ripping through my hair. Since I typically get braids when I am around 8 weeks post relaxer, I have a bit of new growth. And I don't want people ripping through it. So to prevent this, I will blow dry my hair straight. I will air dry for about an hour (to cut down on blow drying time) and then blow dry my hair. It takes about 30 minutes and it leaves my hair straight enough to braid without incident. I'm sure that there are other ways to stretch your hair, but blow drying is the most efficient way for me to straighten my hair.

5) Trim Those Ends! You want to make sure that you retain all that growth that you will get while your hair is braided up and you can't do that if you start with raggedy, split ends. You can actually get trimmed or do a 'search and destroy' (with hair shears!) to make sure your ends are split free.


That's it! These are the things I do to ensure that my hair is in the best possible condition for braids. I think these tips will also work well for those who are prepping to get a sew-in weave. The key thing to remember that with braids (and any other protective style where your hair is hidden away for extended periods of time) is that they aren't as 'no-maintenance' as people like to think that they are. While the day to day component of styling your hair is removed, you still have to ensure that your hair is getting what it needs...and this care starts from the moment you prep your hair for braids.

Ends Make Inches Tip #1: Soak Your Hair Ties and Bobby Pins in Oil

Happy Hump Day lovelies!

Lately, I have been doing some thinking. When folks talk about their hair journeys, the focus is always on the major changes. I mean how often have you heard about stretching, protective styling, using less heat, etc? Probably more times than you care to think about. However, I'm finding that the further along that you go in your hair journey, it is the little things that add up and can potentially do damage to your hair. More often that not, we don't really think about what that hair tie, what those bobby pins, or what that comb is doing to your hair. So, I wanted to make a series of quick hits that illustrate some of the things you should think about as you go about the business of styling your hair.

If you guys are anything like me, with the mercury rising you have probably started to bun consistently. Personally, I prefer to bun using a good hair tie (sans the metal clip in the middle) and a handful of bobby/hair pins. However, my hair ties and bobby pins present a problem: friction. It is that friction that rubs against my hair and causes the breakage I see when I take either of these items out. Of course there are ways around this. You can substitute the bobby pins for a Goody spin pin or bun without a hair tie. But what if you don't want to do either of those? Well, you still have another way to use these items without the breakage.

Soak your hair ties and bobby pins in oil.

It can be any oil that floats your boat: olive oil, castor oil, coconut oil....whatever makes your boat float. With the bobby pins (assuming you are using pins that have the rubber ends and are coated), that oil reduces friction you get when you place them in your hair (or take them out) resulting in no breakage. When you soak your hair ties in oil, not only do you reduce friction but you ensure that the section of hair that your hair tie is wrapped around stays moisturized (meaning: your hair tie won't take the moisture away from your hair) and minimizes breakage.



Pretty cool, huh? As you can see, oftentimes the little things we do to our hair on a daily basis can make a huge difference in retention. What do you think about this tip? Have you tried it? What were your results?

The Awkward Stage's 3 Tips to Healthy Relaxed Hair

Happy Wednesday lovelies!

In my day to day comings and goings, my hair is often looked at as an anomaly. Outside of this hair blog/ hair forum world, a lot of AA women look at long, relaxed hair as something that is impossible for most. Something only achieved if you have 'good hair.'

And that makes me sad.

In my experience, growing relaxed hair to great lengths isn't impossible. With a little bit of knowledge and a little bit of care, achieving long hair becomes possible.

In my opinion, meeting that goal is pretty easy, especially if you follow these 3 tips that I tend to follow in my own hair care practices.

1) Relax less frequently. Trust me. You aren't doing your hair any favors relaxing your hair at 4, 5, or 6 weeks post. There is barely enough new growth and if anything, you are merely relaxing already relaxed hair (which can ultimately lead to breakage). So do yourself a favor, don't relax until you're at least 8 weeks post. If you can push it to 10 weeks post-great. And 12 weeks post is even better.

1a) Since we're here, when you do your relaxer touch up, don't do it from root to tip. Again, all you are doing is relaxing previously relaxed hair, which is a recipe for breakage. I don't know who spread this lie that relaxers had to be done this way but it needs to stop. Seriously.

2)Limit the heat. Back in the day, before I knew better, I used high heat every day (via curling iron, flat iron...it didn't matter). EVERY FRIGGIN DAY!! And my hair suffered for it. Since I've started my journey, I have learned (and re-learned) that my hair can only handle 1 type of direct heat, once a week at that. So if you are using heat every day, try and cut back to 3 or 4 days a week and see how much better your hair feels.

3) Moisture is key. And moisture is not grease. Moisture can come in the form of a great moisture based DC ( like ORS Hair Repair Nourishing Conditioner) ,an awesome water based moisturizer (ORS Carrot Oil and Qhemet Biologics AOHC are great ones), a great leave in (Jane Carter Solution Revitalizing Leave In and Kinky Curly Knot Today are my faves), or a combination of all 3. It is key to remember that our hair craves moisture and when you relax, even more so. If you do all you can to keep your hair moisturized properly, your hair will thrive.

Those are the three things that I think contribute to healthy, relaxed hair. When I first started my hair journey, those were the first 3 steps I took. Once I got those down, thing like protective styling were easy to understand and conquer.

What do you think contributes to healthy relaxed hair?