Big Daddy

I had this thick lock in the back of my head kinda toward the top/middle. It was twice as large as most of my other locks and 3 times as large as those around my hair line. I called it Big Daddy, but now that I think about it probably should have been calling it Big Momma. Oh well. I've heard about folks splitting their locks and thought I'd give it a try.

At first I was going to start at the tip of the lock, but that seemed to risky. So since there was about 2 inches of unlocked hair at the root (this is why it was a problem, it was so thick it wouldn't lock as quickly as the others, this was the only problem besides the fact that it wouldn't hold a curl if I should choose to curl it), I decide to cut from there. It seemed too thick to slice straight down the middle with my craft scissors. I know, I know, but these were the sharpest ones I had. So, I decided to try to scrape off enough for a brand new lock and leave the rest of the hair to hold on to the old one.

I quickly realized that this was a bad decision and just cut the rest off.

This is what I got. About 6 inches of a perfectly good lock (besides the diameter of course) I will keep it forever because it is a good example of how clean and healthy my locks are and it smells good because I just washed my hair. Oh well. I wouldn't have tried this if it had been located anywhere else on my head.

FO's, Hair, Politics

I was finally able to squeeze some pictures out of my tired camera. So, I'll post some fiber content first.

I told ya'll I got a Stitch N' Bitch Happy Hooker book for Christmas. Seems likes the projects have been flying off of the pages right into my lap, yes Ma'm.

First it was the Bunny Slippers. Done here in a yarn that's NOT meant for walking around on the floor with. So glad I didn't bother to sew eyes and nose on. I sure ain't buying the fancy stuff the book recommends. By mistake, on the first slipper I used the slipper insole for the bottom sole. I like this mistake because it looks better and fits my size 8 foot more snuggly.

Then the One Skein Scarf which happened in just a couple of hours cause I found this acrylic yarn I liked. I got some in camaflouge colors too. Maybe I'll make something for Little Man after all. I love this scarf, I really do. I swear this girl has to be in every picture. I hear her in there being bossy right now.

And finally, Fat Bottom Bag, which only took a couple of days, and which I was able to use yarn from my stash that was gifted to me about 2 years ago and which I am completely delighted with. I'm so glad I waited for the right project for this yarn. My co-workers gave it to me along with a patterns book of some tacky shrugs. I wish I could see them now to show them what perfect yarn they chose for the Fat Bottom bag. Bless their hearts. I only have to find handles and a brooch now.

I'm working on the Jolly Rancher too, but it's giving me problems because I don't like scull and cross bones and am trying to substitute a dirt bike silhouette. Therefore, I can't waste my precious camera energy on it.

This weekend, I tried to color my hair with a "rinse" or as the bottle says, temporary color. I rarely, rarely colored my hair when it was processed, and I've never used a rinse before. The bottle said "Vibrant Color." I didn't want it to be a vibrant Dark Cherry, just a hint of a dark cherry. So, I didn't leave it in there for the full 30 minutes and I rinsed as much as I could out. Most of my linens are white, and I didn't want that stuff on my sheets. I guess that's why there's not one hint of Dark Cherry Jazzing left in my hair. It's like I did nothing. Should I try again?

Today at work I took it upon myself to remind everyone that if they wanted to vote in the Presidential Primaries that in California it is the last day to register to vote. There's one Black employee on our campus. He's from Detroit but has traveled around the country with his family in pursuit of career advancement. He doesn't vote. He didn't admit it to me, but I can tell. He told me that letting everyone know what my political preferences were (voting for the Black candidate) may prevent me from getting promoted as quickly so I should "keep it on da unda."

It went like this:

Me: This is your last day to register to vote if you plan on voting in the California Presidential Primaries.

Him: I'ma register, I'ma register (I've been trying to get him to do this for the last two weeks.)

Me: Well, today is your LAST chance, just do it.

Him: Guurl, you don't need to be tellin' errbody who you wanna vote for. You need to keep it on da unda. That might keep you from gettin yo lil promotion.

Me: If there ever was a time that we need to make it known who and what we stand for, it's now. And, maybe one day soon we won't need to keep it on da unda. Boy, I gotta get that Detroit outta you (I shouldn't have said this).

Him: Oh, errbody in Detroit is fo Barack. They all Black out der, so you know they makin' it known who they wanna vote for.

Me: Ok, so you need to make it known too and just be less....less, what is the term I'm searching for?

Him: You searchin' for the term Uncle Tom.

Me: Is that what I'm trying to say? Is that how you refer to yourself???!!!! You refer to yourself as an Uncle Tom?!

Him: Yeah, you just ack like you not sho whodda vote fo. And den ack like it just seem like most of the best points go twads yo guy.

At this point my eyes start scanning my office, I don't know what I'm looking for. I find it. It's about a 4 foot stick Engineers use for marking gas lines, phone lines, etc. I pick it up. He realizes what I'm about to do and makes a run for it. Thank God there weren't any witnesses. Don't worry, I couldn't get a decent swing because the long stick was too awkward to maneuver in the narrow hallway and he got away. Do you think I over reacted? What's wrong with our people? I really wanted to beat some sense into him.

FO's, FO's Everywhere

Ok, just a couple of FO's. First let me start off by saying that I must cherish every moment left of blogging with images as my camera is failing fast.

This is me giving it a good talking to on the way to Teddy Bear's Christmas program.


You'd better not piss out on me now. You better not.

Second, I've been finished with the Mini Anthropologie for a while now. When I finally got in the groove it only took like a day. I'm using a studded hair pin to hold in closed. I would have preferred a brooch, but I couldn't find one proportionate to Teddy Bear's size. This worked well too because I could pin it to the dress without poking through the fabric and therefore keep everything in place.

Teddy Bear was supposed to have a semi-solo (her and two other kids) but chickened out at the last milisecond. When she got up to the mic she just turned right back around and went to her teacher. Darn. She then played this game of hear no evil, see no evil. Oh well.

Oh, and I love my up do. I am well pleased, can't you tell? I've tried to capture every angle for your viewing pleasure. I know there may be naturalists out there who'd like to criticize my meticulously groomed locks. So sorry to disappoint. You WILL be seeing more of these creative endeavors.

The gathered pullover is a wrap. When I first saw it I thought that it would be perfect for a recycling project. I was right. It looks good on, but I must say that the sleeves look a little wonky when laying flat. Imagine my anguish when realizing that the sleeves may be too small for the sleeve holes (I know there's a technical name for this but I just can't think of it right now). The designer should have put a little note saying something like "Warning, the sleeves may look too small but they are not. You will have to work carefully with them but they will fit. We recommend crocheting them in with a slip stitch." I always crochet my sleeves in, but this method was especially useful this time. By the way, Banana Republic sews all their seams with a crochet slip stitch. Just a little interesting tid bit of knowledge. I just like the rolled edge look in general and it seems like everything store bought with this feature is a little pricey. I wonder why? I also like my sleeves long, so I didn't adjust them.

Almost Done!

Listen while you read...

One more sleeve to go of the Gathered Pullover. I'm unraveling the body of the BR sweater to finish up. I thought that this piece would yield two large balls of yarn, but not so. Maybe I nicked the strands while unraveling. Darn it.
I like the way it fits so far.

And, since I'm ever so guilty of lurking on natural hair blogs but never posting about my natural hair, I thought that I should share. After realizing some time ago that the blogosphere had such a large collection of natural hair journey journals, I decided to jump right in. Because I never viewed my current hair style as a journey as much as I do a destination I think it's been hard for me to keep up with hair posts. I mean, how much can you talk about a hairstyle that rarely changes. It's probably just me. I'm posting now because on Friday I'll be getting my first professional up-do. A style that I found on Renaissance Hairtopia. I can't wait until I have enough hair for a wedding bun. Wish me luck!

Excuse my mess.

Happy Mother's Day

This one especially goes out to the single mother, the mother who just lost a child, the heartbroken, the mother who has to plan her own mother's day celebration (cause God loves a cheerful giver and so do you) or has no celebration at all, and the mother who won't stop giving even though that child could care less. Happy mother's day, ya'll. I feel ya.

I let this heffa at my not so LYS calculate the amount of yarn I would need for my Sloppy Joe sweater. I was like wow, what customer service! I should have known. I ended up with two more skeins than I needed. I mean, I could understand one, but two? Well, now my stash has grown by one skein of lavender Cotton Fleece. That's right, I said one. I took this opportunity to make me and HP a matching set. Oh yeah, I sewed up the side seams completely.

HP went for her "first" retouch this weekend. I quote first because I had to do something before our next appointment. Her new school has this sand box that she just loves. I'm a germaphobe and am extremely concerned about ring worm and the baldness that it could ensue. She's been rolling around in the sand like an animal and the staff seems to think it's soooo cute. Ew, gross. I've threatened to withhold her after-school snack if I find her dirty from head to toe one mo gin. This and putting skirts on her seems to have worked. She doesn't like the sensation of the sand directly on her skin for some reason but doesn't mind getting her pants and new locs encrusted with this sand that doesn't exactly look brand new.

Anyway, I've tried to wipe the sand out but just had to scrub her head on Monday. I tightened the locs the best I could, but she doesn't like to wear a scarf either. So, this is what it looked like by Friday night.


Shannon put it back together on Saturday, and she slept with a scarf for most of the night. A long night it was with two pee-pee accidents and all. Pray for me ya'll, and I'll pray for you.

Now that there are two loc'ed heads in the house, I'm going to have to perfect my self-maintenance techniques. I've done it myself before, but you know how that goes. This time it wasn't too bad. I got pretty much all of them tightened. I thought I'd try to give myself some braid crinkles. Wrong idea. What could have been a good thing, ended up being a display of disorganized frizziness. That's why you see me with the up do in the above pic.

Big Catch Up

A lot has transpired since my last blog. First off, I've finished Sloppy Joe. I think that I've done a pretty good job. The only mod I made was to the sleeve increases. For my size I began to to increase every 5th row after 68 stitches. The other way would have produced sleeves way to long. I have to also give a hand slap to the designer, Louisa Harding that the width of the sweater be 44 inches. What a typo!

The design does include these split sides, but looking at the picture I don't think this suits me. I may consider sewing them up.

I mean, I like the way the sweater fits and all. It's very comfy and I love the yarn, but it's not as sloppy looking as it was on the model. I studied the picture of her and noticed that she wasn't very blessed in the boobs area. Although the sweater does not fit me tightly at all, I definitely think that it's not as loose as it was supposed to be. However, going up one size would have been a mistake. I guess I'm just not that into sloppy. The rib pattern is very cool.

I am also performing a major experiment. I mean, after the post before last you probably new this was coming. So, here's the beginning of my journal on Locking Tots. Hmmm, is this a good idea? Well, here are some pics on how it started out. Here's HP sitting on the couch. She felt very cute on this day and asked me to take a picture with her rocking the fro.

About a week later, she's sitting in the chair of my stylist, Shannon. Every day debris was stored up in the fro.

Here's HP Getting her neck and head massage,

Please take note of the glamorous-ness of Shannon. These perfectly groomed back length locs are exactly what we're going for, so HP is in good hands.

She's just been shampooed.

She didn't fidget or anything the entire time (about 1 1/2 hours).

Here she is half way clipped.

And now almost completely clipped (the reason I pay to have my hair maintained, Shannon is very meticulous and never neglects a single hair.)

Getting her under the dryer was a different thing, we eventually got the 4 pillows to stop slipping.

And, voila. HP loves it, and so do I. She's feeling it.

I must admit though, that after one week, she looks quite scruffy. But she's still just a beautiful.

She started pre-school. Where we live, pre-school is not free. You have to shop around for it like a daycare. She flipped out when I didn't let her out at the same school her brother went to. He-he-he.


Here she is with her new principal. You can tell the locs have shrunken back and stuck to her head a little. I tried to dress them up with barrettes.

She's already made a friend.And, believe it or not, she's sitting in circle time (in this case square time). She asks me everyday, if she's going to school. I'm so happy she loves it!

My Hair, Her Hair

To anyone who cares or who has ever wondered (I'm talking about by family and friends or those who know me personally ya'll), this is why I locked my hair. You've undoubtedly seen me in every hairstyle known to black woman. Because of this, I made a pledge to my unborn daughter to never straighten her hair. When she was born, I new that I couldn't put the responsibility on her alone to keep my pledge. I remember when I was about, oh 6, 7, or 8, Laverne (our beautician) burned me so severely with her shaky hands that I had to go to the doctor to get prescription antibiotics. After I healed up, we went right back to her, or someone else, I can't remember. I can't be mad at my mom, because we (black women) have all struggled with what is beautiful for so long. I don't want to struggle anymore. I promise to stay nappy like God made ME, and to always, when I look in the mirror, see the beauty he did when he created me. If I have one ounce of low self esteem, how will my baby girl ever realize how strong she has to be. This post is dedicated to her and to every girlfriend and cousin who've been programed to believe that their natural hair is ugly. I love you.

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