Water Quality and My Locs

I've been retightening for the past couple of days now and every now and then I'll spritz my hair with a bit of water to make them a bit more pliable, which got me to thinking about the quality of water I put on my hair. I live in Arizona and the first thing I noticed when I moved out here was that the quality of the tap water out here sucks. Its really harsh and drys my skin out after showers/baths so I often find myself needing to take two baths a day: one in water and soap and one in shea butter. Not to go off on a tangent or anything but I swear by raw shea butter. It keeps my skin so supple and silky, sometimes I'm surprised by how soft my skin is. I wish I could put it in my hair but its kinda chunky and only gets to a smoother consistency when I work it around in the palms of my hands. I wonder if I can melt it down in the microwave or stove top? I dunno, sistas and brothas please let me know if you have tried this and what your experience was like. I don't care if you read this post like 3 years from the date I posted it, let me know what it was like for you.

 Anywho, back to water. I use tap water in my spritz bottle, combined with a bit of jojoba/olive/carrot/clove oil. I know oil and water don't mix but it makes my hair smell amazing and when I spritz with just water it looks and feels soft and pretty but it eventually ends up drier than it was before. I want to try different kinds of water and see if it will make a noticable difference in my hair.

And They're Off!!! Let's Retighten ^.^

I GOT MY NAPPYLOCS TOOL!!!

*dances*

Yeaaaaaah! So I got my nappylocs tool in the mail yesterday and I'm so excited to start retightening. Last night I did a few kitchen naps and they feel great. I can't see them too well but they feel good! I'll do a post with pictures soon

1 Month! Lots Of Shrinkage and When and How Should I Retighten?

Yaaay! I've been rocking these twisty/baby locks for a little over a month now and I'm still really stoked about my hair. I play with it ALL the time, I know I shouldn't but I really can't help it-- I feel so free! (^.^) I've been experiencing A LOT of shrinkage, here is a photo of my bangs on day one, they go just past my top lip:

And here's what my bangs look like right now:

Now they go just a bit past the tip of my nose when I stretch them out. My hair is very tightly coiled and I have always experienced lots of shrinkage after washing. Even after blow dry and press it would literally be minutes before I my hair would "turn back"! The shrinkage is kind of irritating and does not to my little bit of length justice but my hair does not like being stretched out or straightened (another reason why I decided to lock) so I'm really excited to continue letting my hair do its thing and see what its going to do next. I'm falling in love with the little curlies at the end of each lock too. I have a head full of them and I have been getting lots of compliments so far. A lady on the bus even asked me if I had Sisterlocks! "No... I did these myself", I replied with a sheepish grin but that is a high compliment in my book. All of the ladies I have seen with Sisterlocks have beautiful locks with very precise parts, I don't think my kitchen handiwork can be put in the same category but I'll accept some positive energy kicked my way any day. A few of the locks in the kitchen have been slipping so over the course of this month, so I have been taking them down and putting them back in until I can properly retighten. 

Which brings me to my next point: How the heck am I going to retighten? 

This question has been haunting my dreams, man. I have been playing around with re-twisting at the root but this never stays and I'm not interested in putting a bunch of product in my hair, so I've decided to interlock. I've been doing a bit of  on research and that latch hook tool looks freakin' scary and big. I've also been looking into the nappylocs tool and watching vids on youtube by some experienced sistas. I have also seen some resourceful and brilliant sistas retighten with a paper clip or those little plastic bead thingies  you get for a dollar at the beauty supply. I've been fooling around with 4 point rotations just using my fingers and no tool and it works! Not that I expected it not to (LOL) but its becoming increasingly apparent that I need some sort of tool to help me retighten so I ordered the nappylocs tool and it should be arriving here shortly. I hope it comes soon because I have some crazy new growth that needs to be tamed! I'm don't think I'll be wait this long between retightenings on a regular basis though.