A Tentative CJ Daily Fix Review

Updated Jan '11: I'm switching this review to tentative status because there's a possibility my experiences with this product were caused be a reaction to medication. I started using this in mid-October at the same time I started getting this reaction. I don't want to judge this product's performance unfairly. I'm currently on a new medication and will re-evaluate CJDF in the spring.

Alright, I feel that I've used this product long enough to finally give a comprehensive review of how it works for me.

How I've used this:

For most of the time, I've used it only once or twice a week, with a co-wash in between. I have gone a week or two without using it.

Pros:

• This is pretty moisturizing, especially for a cleanser. No dry feeling after use. If I detangle before using it, my hair will feel like I did a DT after rinsing.
  
• Leaves my scalp feeling REALLY clean on wash day.
  
• Doesn't smell too bad.
• Gets rid of any itchiness that's going on.

Cons:

• How to put this? I feel like this product has undone two years of CG. My curls are fine - they haven't changed. But I can't go longer than two days without using this or a regular co-wash. My hair is greasy 12 hrs after using it, and it only gets worse. Even when I go a week or two without using, my hair gets greasy with a regular co-wash.
• Even though it doesn't feel dry after using, it DOES dry me out. My hair is way more frizzy on Day 2, and I have a plethora of dry scalp flakes. Not good.

I bought this thinking it would be the best of both worlds - a co-wash feeling with the cleansing strength of a low-poo. Unfortunately it didn't pan out that way for me. I still like the conditioner, and I think the bottle I have will last for a long time. It will probably be relegated to when I need to remove build-up and don't want to use a clarifying shampoo. I most likely won't be repurchasing.

My Clipping Quest Has Come to an End!

After over two years of looking, I've finally found some clips that get the job done! Not only do they work well for creating volume on top, they also help to achieve second-day hair and work well for putting my hair up on off-days.

I'm not sure what they're called, who makes them, or even how much they cost. I'm pretty sure I got them at Target when I was looking for the circular "Octopus" clips, which they were out of. I grabbed these instead and I'm so glad I did! I've had them for maybe three weeks now, so I've tested them pretty thoroughly.

Here's the main reason I picked these up instead of going somewhere else or waiting until the others were in stock. The bottom is relatively flat, so it's able to get in and really keep the roots lifted. It also expands in the middle, so more hair is able to fit.

I really like that these are long. It's almost like having two clips in one. It only takes one of these to cover my part! I use two total; the other one is on the crown.

I've achieved pretty good second-day hair a few times in the past couple weeks using only one of these clips. Instead of doing a full modified pineapple, I wrap my hair in a bun on the very top of my head and use a clip on the end to keep it up there. It's very secure and protects the curls during the night. And since the clip sits closer to the forehead than the back of my head, there's not even a chance of rolling onto it during the night and causing injury.

Has anyone else used these? What do you think?

So Close, Yet So Far Away...

So a couple of weeks ago, my brother came home from college to surprise my sister for Senior Night at her last football game (she's in color guard, not football!). During the course of the weekend, there was a discussion at home about shampoo.

My mom had a list of stuff she needed at the store, and there was a certain "dandruff" shampoo on that list. Now, my parents have used this for years. I've tried to get them off since going CG, but all to no avail. Upon seeing this on the list, I once again brought up how drying sulfates can be and pointed out that it was probably just dry scalp (and that the shampoo was probably causing it in the first place!). For some reason, this finally got through to her. And apparently my brother.

(Side note: During that trip we picked up a Giovanni shampoo for her, as well as some Herbal Essences mousse; she is the second person in my family I've successfully converted! Hooray!)

Fast forward to today. My brother is home for the week and went with me to Target today to pick up ingredients for the desserts I made for tomorrow. While we're walking around, he became really interested in getting me to pick out "the right" shampoo for him. Since he's on the budget, the only low-poo I could think that would work would be L'Oreal's Everpure. Unfortunately, we couldn't find it. I'm not up on low-poos, so maybe it's discontinued? We couldn't find ANY L'Oreal hair products in the store, though. I did show him what surfactant he needed to look for in a shampoo.

After the trip home, he went and got his hair cut.

When he came home, he begged me to go with him to CVS to pick out a new shampoo and conditioner. Again, no Everpure. They did have the Organix line, so he picked out a shampoo. Also got some V05 conditioner.

I was just about to point out the Ecostyler gel to him when he declared he needed some wax to style his hair. Apparently this was recommended to him during the course of his haircut. Because mousse gives him too much volume, and gel is too crunchy. I tried to explain and reason with him - he could try out some of my stuff at home and then get some wax if he really felt he needed it - all to no avail. I pointed out that he had specifically asked for me to consult with him on hair products, but apparently that was just for shampoo and conditioner. There were other people in the aisle with us, so I didn't escalate the argument. He left with, of all things, a L'Oreal wax. At least the ingredients aren't as bad as the other waxes that were there...

So close to converting him, and yet he resisted. Maybe he'll think differently when the build-up gets bad!

Anyway, as far as my hair is concerned: I think I'm over-conditioned, and I think it was the Daily Fix that did it. Weird, I know. I don't have any other explanation. And I never get over-conditioned! ACV rinse tomorrow will hopefully fix it. Daily Fix review coming as soon as I figure it out all the way! This is one weird product!

My Hair Refuses to Dry

It's been a while since I've had a good old-fashioned rant. I'm rambling a bit here, but you can't say I didn't warn you, considering the title of the blog and all.

Here's the problem: My hair refuses to dry.

I'm not sure what's going on. It's like KCCC has become a magical force field that prevents water from leaving my hair for at least five hours. There are times during this process when it pretends to be dry, but that's not the case.

Not only that, but my dryer refuses to attempt to dry my hair. It's only interested in burning my scalp.

Once I figured out that the weird itch and pain I was feeling hours after diffusing was indeed related to the hot air going through the mega holes of my diffuser from two inches away, I started using the medium speed setting. Now it's content to make all the dryer noise and pretend to dry my hair. Twenty minutes after I turn it on, I realize my hair is still wet and I've fallen for it's tricks.

Here's Friday's hair:

This is after 45 min of diffusing time, three hours of air-drying time, and another hour after what I'll call the fakeout-SOTC. It looked good when I SOTC, but ten minutes later it was flat.

I wish I had a picture from later that night. It finally finished drying and the flat sides perked up to give some much-needed volume.

Today I spent another 45 minutes diffusing. After 30 minutes on medium speed, my hair was still cold and wet. That's ridiculous. I upped it to high speed and pretty much glued my thumb to the cool shot button. Two hours later, it's still not dry and no where near ready to SOTC.

I need to get some things done today (like a picture for a substitute teacher badge) but I can't go out with hair like this. I realize that sounds vain, but I've been burned by ID pictures before. Is it so wrong to want one picture to show what I normally look like?

Anyway, I will be writing a full review of the Remington dryer and our love/hate relationship very soon. I just really needed to vent. Right now, I will say that:

no heat/medium speed = my dryer laughing at me

medium heat/medium speed = hair that doesn't dry, ever

no heat/high speed = same as medium speed, but with cool high speed noises

medium heat/high speed = dry hair that will eventually fall out due to burnt scalp

It's like I can't win.

/rant

Haircut!

Today was full of hair-related happenings!

First, I actually got some semi-good results with my Revlon dryer and the horrible diffuser attachment. Typical. I've been using the dryer with the Sedusa attachment all week with mixed results. I like that I can fit all my hair in it and just dry it for 20 min, but I get some wonky "curls." Most of the time it seems to be for straighties who want "curl" rather than for curlies who just want to dry their hair.

A full hour after I finished drying my hair, my new dryer arrived! The diffuser bowl is different. It's like a mix of the one I had been using and can no longer attach to a dryer, and the Revlon diffuser. It's pretty heavy, but it's the quietest dryer I've used.

Then I got my hair cut. I haven't fully redone it with my own stuff, but so far I really really like it. She barely trimmed the length, so it's still long, but also added in a lot of layers. It's so much lighter! The shortest layer is just above shoulder length.

As usual, the only product used was KCKT. Wet cut. By the time I got home, it was almost dry (Sidenote: my hair usually takes 6+ hours to dry! Why does no product = dry hair in 15 min? Not cool!). So I spritzed the crap out of it with water, scrunched in some KCCC and Aussie gel, then diffused for a little bit with the Remington dryer.

The curls are skinny, but I have a lot of volume! And it did clump at the ends like usual. My hair is soft and bouncy. I don't usually like the skinny curl look, but I'm LOVING it right now. I might start using KCCC like this.

I'll probably redo tomorrow to get a true look. If I do, I'll post a picture or two.

Done

Ok, I'm done. No more spending any $$$ on hair products until at least the end of the year. I'm probably set for the next six months.

I did a lot of research and picked a dryer/diffuser. The Sedusa/Revlon combination is working ok for the moment, but doesn't really give me the curl enhancement that a regular diffuser does. I ended up going with the Remington D-2012 TStudio Tourmaline and Ceramic dryer. It had a lot of good reviews on Amazon and on NC.com. No idea when it'll get here though, since I ordered on Wednesday and it still hasn't shipped!

Look how pretty it is!

Sally's is offering free shipping for the rest of the month (code 555202). This is great, since my local store doesn't carry GVP CB. I also had a $5 coupon for renewing my beauty card a few months ago. So I got 3 bottles for the price of two!

That makes me set with rinse-out conditioners. My CJ Daily Fix will last for a long time and I still have half a bottle of V05 when it runs out. Stylers will last forever, no problems there. And a new dryer to round it out. No more PJ purchases!!

I've started shopping my make-up stash to cut down on how much I buy (because I'm already pretty much set for life where make-up's concerned) and I'm going to do it for hair products as well. Should be interesting to see what combinations I can come up with!

Diffuser Shopping

Well, I got my CJ products last week and had hoped to begin reviewing, but my diffuser had other ideas.

First, the Devafuser attachment that I've been using to attach a diffuser bowl to my Revlon dryer died. The little plastic pieces that hold the rubber attachment kept breaking off. The diffuser had been falling off at least three times during the drying process for about the past month. Last week, enough of the plastic pieces broke off so that I couldn't attach it to my dryer.

So I started using my mom's dryer, which is actually what the diffuser attachment I've been using came with. It was billed as being for fine hair, but I didn't really care. The diffuser is the part of the dryer that I care most about. The one that came with my Revlon dryer had short fingers that don't do much for curl enhancement. This was working fine until yesterday, when the dryer wouldn't even turn on. Apparently, it died. Which is great, considering I only bought it for her maybe a year and a half ago.

She went out and got a Conair Shine Ionic dryer last night. I tried it today and immediately came to the conclusion that I need to get my own. Now.

The holes in this thing were ridiculous. I might as well have just left the diffuser attachment off. Case in point: Less than two hours after I finished drying, all of my hair is completely dry. It usually takes at least four hours.

So I think I'll try my Sedusa attachment on my Revlon dryer while I'm researching new dryers/diffusers. I was thinking of just buying a better bowl attachment, but my dryer is two years old already and did not work well with the Sedusa in previous experiments (there were lots of sparks, if I remember correctly...).

CJ's Aloe Fix Light has not impressed me yet. I've only really used it yesterday and today, in the midst of diffuser problems. But still. Not good for morale.