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Jessicurl’s Jessica’s Curly Hair Routine

by Jessica McGuinty

In July 2008 I cut off about 14 inches of hair and donated it to Locks of Love. As a result, my curly hair care routine was changed pretty drastically. Here is my current routine, as of Oct. 30, 2008.

I wash it every 2-3 days with either Gentle Lather Shampoo or Hair Cleansing Cream. To wash, I take a puddle whichever cleanser I’m using, rub my hands together and smooth it over my hair like I’m putting it in a ponytail. I then massage my scalp all over to produce a lather, and finger comb that lather through the length of my hair. This gets it clean without causing tangles.

After rinsing really well I like to do a rinse with honey water. It makes the hair really soft and helps the curls bounce up and reduce frizz. It also seems to fade my hair color, so I try to limit it to once or twice a week. Or, I do it more often and just accept that it’s going to fade my color to a lighter red. But by then it’s usually time to color again anyway, so it all works out.

I put about 2 tablespoons of honey in a big cup, fill it with water and slowly pour it over my hair. I apply Too Shea after that and leave that in while I do all the other shower things. 

I rinse that out standing upright then flip my head over and rinse upside down. This seems to really help with volume at the roots as well as curl formation.

While my hair is still soaking wet I put a pea sized drop of Aloeba Daily Conditioner, a puddle of Rockin’ Ringlets and a smaller puddle of Confident Coils into my palm, rub my hands together, and rake that through my hair 5-6 times. I then scrunch (with my head still upside down) about 5 times with my hands and then another 5 or so times with the microfiber towel. I scrunch in another palm full of RR/CCSS, and at the very end scrunch in a pea sized drop of Oil Blend For Softer Hair for extra softness and shine.

I then plunk my curls down into a microfiber towel and leave it on for about 10 minutes. This has allowed me to reduce the time I spend blow-drying. It’s basically like scrunching your hair for the length of time you have it on your head. Unlike when my hair was longer, if I leave the towel on for too long, I find it ends up frizzy, so I try to limit it to 10 minutes. When it was longer, I’d leave it on for 25-30 minutes. You can see a demonstration video of this technique here:http://www.jessicurl.com/Demo/plunkingqt/index.html

Next I blow dry using the Hot Sock diffuser on the end of my blow dryer. I use high heat and it takes about 5-7 minutes. (This won’t last long! When it was longer it took around 20 minutes. I’m enjoying the shorter drying time, let me tell ya!) When I begin blow-drying I also scrunch the hair to get it to form spirals. I alternate between hanging my head upside down, hanging it over to the left and hanging it over to the right. Once the spirals are formed I don’t scrunch anymore. Instead, I switch to an open palmed motion, gently pushing up a handful of curls. This encourages them to be as tight as mine are able to be. Leaning over while blow-drying and scrunches encourages the curls to separate from one another, resulting in fabulous curl definition.

After a few minutes I stop touching it all together and just move the hair dryer around to get it to continue drying. I’m still alternating between upside down, left and right. I then flip my head up to normal and arrange any curls that look weird. I let it continue air-drying for the next hour or so, then scrunch out any crunch I may have. The result is frizz-free curls that last until I go to bed.

Overall this takes 20-25 minutes from start to finish, including showering and getting dressed, so the routine doesn’t take nearly as long as it seems. I just write a lot.

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