Wand It Up: Wanded Curls for Natural Hair

The other day something interesting happened....I conformed, to the greater society.  Weird right? If it's one thing I loathe, it's conforming.  I smized (however you spell this concocted word), and I primped...all beneath animal ears.  Aside from the conformation, some you seemed to take a liking to my wanted curls, so I thought I would make up for my unintended 11 second lack of sense of self and take to some community service, sharing my tips on this hairstyle.  

Now I know before I even start going into this that some are going to be looking for a video.  I'll get back to YouTube when I can y'all, I promise, but right now, my career calls.  If a hair tutorial is truly in need, then hopefully a written post adorned with pictures will suffice just as much as a video.  If it's hair porn you need, I've got you later, I swear.  

So I started my style just like any other week, wearing my hair in twists for about five days.

This style was intended for an event being held on the weekend.  As we naturals all know, we rarely have time or energy to do a full head of hair, dress, and be ready for an event all in the same day.  This is where wearing twists can come in handy.  Washing and deep conditioning and then wearing your hair in twists for the week BEFORE your planned event can:

1. Help keep your hair sectioned, making it easier to part and heat style your hair right before your event.

2. Help keep your hair detangled for the week: I don't even have to explain myself here, y'all already know the deal.

3. Help to dry your hair completely: Allowing your hair to completely dry allows for decreased heat damage when heat styling, and allows for a neater style (we all know what happens when that hair ain't fully dried).

4. Help to keep your hair stretched: If you desire a more stretched style, then twists help to keep your strands stretched until you reach the weekend.  

5. Help to decrease blow drying time: Now I didn't blow dry before this style, because I wanted to limit the amount of heat and manipulation that I put into my hair, but if your heart so desires, making sure your twists are THOROUGHLY detangled ensures a smoother, less tangly blow drying session.

Quick Tip: If your twists aren't long enough to wear in public or you are transitioning, cover your head with a satin bonnet and rock a turban throughout the week.   

Next, I sectioned my head (while still in twists) into four large sections.  

There are about 6-7 twists in each section.

I worked with one large twist at a time.

I unwound each twist, giving me two separate sections to work with, per twist. To eliminate confusion, I'll call them, "half-sections."

I then took one of the half-sections, and divided it into four smaller sections (this means at this point, I should have 8 smaller sections from each twist). I'll refer to each of these eight sections as a "mini-section."

Working with exactly one of these mini-sections at a time, I applied one pump of the Paul Mitchell's Super Skinny Serum as a heat protectant.

I then used a 1 inch curling wand at 330 degrees F to wand each section for about 10 seconds.

Total, it took me about 2 hours to wand my whole head.  Although my results only lasted for about two days, I got through my event, which was really my only goal, and then I stuffed my hair into a bun and got a BOMB voluminous bun for the remaining week after.  

I personally LOVED my results.  With just blow-drying, I get less volume, and more length; with this method, I get more volume.  I hope you'll give it a try if you're thinking of heat styling.  If you do, tag me and let me know how it goes!