Wednesday, April 13, 2011

Dealing With Different Curl Patterns

Most of you probably know that Syd loves big hair. Wash-n-go styles make her a happy girl because that's when her hair is the biggest. However, that is also one of the hardest styles for us to get looking good because of the variety of curl patterns on her head. I have spoken to a few people who said they chose to relax their hair because of this very thing.

When taking a picture of the big hair for this post last week, I took the picture below, too. Syd was making a weird face so I almost deleted it, but then I realized how visible her different curl patterns are. I know I have talked about this before, but this might help show what I'm talking about.




The hair on the sides of Syd's head curls up much more loosely than the rest of her hair. There's only a small amount of hair with the looser curl pattern and it just lays on top of the tighter curls. This used to drive me crazy (and sometimes it still does) because it means the hair in the back curls up much more tightly and appears shorter than the sides.

Because of this, we have learned to adjust the amount of product we use on the different sections. The sides don't require near as much product. If we didn't use less on the sides, those parts of her hair would be weighed down and appear lifeless. I also keep thinking about having the sides of her hair cut shorter than the rest to help even things out, but I haven't done that yet.

Another method you can use to deal with different curl patterns is to stick with twist outs, braid outs, and roller sets. This helps give all the hair a more uniform look. We don't use this method as often anymore, but that's mostly because of Syd's growing love for big, voluminous hair.

I know most curly-headed people don't have uniform curls all over their heads, but some heads have more varied curls than others. There is always a way to work with your hair without reaching for chemicals or heat. Play around and embrace those curls - all sizes of them!

4 comments:

  1. My hair has litterally the exact same pattern, with the looser curls on the sides, and tighter in the back. never thought of using less product on the looser curls before. Thanks.

    ReplyDelete
  2. my daughter's hair is much shorter than Syd's hair, but he hair does the exact same thing. It has a much looser curl on the side {making it easier to come through} and the back is much much tighter and thicker and therefore looks shorter in length than the front, but if I pull the hair in the back straight it is actually just as long as the front/sides.

    Did you get my email with the pictures of her hair from the other post I commented on?

    ReplyDelete
  3. Cari, I hadn't seen that email. I just checked and for some reason it was sent straight to my spam folder. Weird!

    ReplyDelete
  4. I know this is old, but my hair is the same. I am biracial and have pretty loose curls, but the ones on the top front of my head are really just wavy, almost straight. I put my head upside down and scrunch them with a blow dryer to force more curl in them if that makes sense. Otherwise I would have a head of curls with straight pieces on the front which I hate.

    ReplyDelete

LinkWithin

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...