While browsing through photos from The
Africa Magic Viewers Choice Awards (AMVCA) that took place yesterday in Lagos,
Nigeria, I came across this spiral bun like hairstyle worn by one of my
favourite African actresses Nigerian Kate Henshaw. OMG this so beautiful and so
well done I want her hair!!! I wonder how the stylist achieved this style; a tutorial would be most welcome.
Simply stunning!
Sorry for the photo quality I had to crop this one from the one above.
If you are in Lagos, Nigeria the hair was
done at Make Me Beauty Place here is their instagram @makemesalon one of you
ladies in Lagos should please get the stylist to do a tutorial for us:)
I would like to wish all you beautiful,
gorgeous, amazingly talented women reading this and all over the world a very
happy international women’s day. May your stars shine even brighter! Keep on
being you the best is yet to come sisters!
How about I went to bed listening to Smokey
Robinson and woke up listening to Smokey Robinson I blame it on BET Honours
2014 that brought the man and his music fully back into my life! This is my all
time favourite Smokey song…enjoy!
Ok back to topic this is my current fitness
regimen. I do Fitness Blender cardios every Monday, Wednesday and
Friday
Hip Hop abs every Tuesday and Thursday
Thank God for free fitness videos on YouTube:) I workout at home first thing in the morning Lord knows Gym membership would be wasted on me. The sports center where I swim has a gym that I have never bothered to enter don't even know what it looks like inside. Maybe in the future I will get some motivation to go to the gym but until then it's home workouts for me.
The weekends are usually my rest days the
amount of housechores I do on Saturday is enough to burn calories so that is my
substitute but when I feel like it and not too tired then maybe I will do some
hip hop abs then. Sunday is my absolute rest day no work out
on this day. I just love how most hair bloggers are also on a
fitness journey totally awesome! I wonder what other journey food bloggers are
on lol hmmmmm…..
I have always swum and
walked a lot that has been my form of exercise for the longest time though not always consistent
and never watched what I ate so my weight fluctuated all the time. I am also “heavy/big boned” yep true story lol
not trying to make excuses here; I was being weighed as part of a routine check
up by a new doctor about three years ago when he commented that my weight did
not reflect my body size he even weighed me twice just to be sure. In a
nutshell I weigh more than I look physically. I started a proper fitness
journey sometime last year around September/October after finding out that my
BMI was way over the recommended number for my weight. I started small by doing
very low impact exercises so that I can get in the habit of exercising daily I was
working out six times a week then. Slowly changed my eating habits where before I would
eat two cup cakes a day I started eating one and found that I couldn’t be
bothered with eating a cup cake at all with time. I cut out the soda not that I
was much of a soda person in recent years but I heavily cut it out I can easily
go two months and more without drinking soda or any other carbonated/fizzy drinks
these days. I still ate but reduced my carb intake to smaller portions and
reduced my intake of deep fried foods. I have always eaten fruits, veggies
and drank plenty of water so that was not a problem. I wanted my fitness
journey to be part of my lifestyle so I chose to take it slowly one day at a
time and it is working out fine because it has clearly become a part of my daily
routine. My dress size depends on the design, fabric and store so if you are familiar with UK
stores and dress sizes while I can wear size 16 Dorothy Perkins clothes the
same sizes are a tad too tight at Next so I have to get a size 18 at Next but I
can easily fit into size 14 Primark tops just so you get a rough idea. My ideal goal would be to be a UK size 14/16 all
round, I used to be a size 12/14 from my late teens up to my mid twenties and much more skinnier as a child, I am just trying to be healthy and fit not disappear I love my curves:)
My fitness journey at the moment is 50%
healthy eating, 30% exercise and 20% eat whatever want I allow myself a “cheat”
meal a day which most days I don’t even indulge in. So for example a typical
day’s meal would go something like this;
Breakfast
Banana, Mango and Pineapple smoothie
Peanuts for mid morning snack
Lunch
Lettuce, avocado, boiled egg, caramelized
onion, tomato, cucumber sandwich made with whole wheat bread, yoghurt and
natural fruit juice
Any nuts I can lay my hands on for mid
afternoon snack
Early
evening say around 5pm
White coffee and a cup cake (cheat meal)
Dinner
1/2 cup plain boiled rice, steamed spinach
and grilled fish
Fruits for dessert
I drink water throughout the day.
Also when I eat out I try and pick the
healthiest options from the menu so instead of chips (French fries) I will go for mashed or roast potatoes for example
instead, or go for a vinaigrette as opposed to salad cream for my salad dressing. At the moment 70% of what I eat in any given day unless I am traveling or out on an outing/shopping all day is homemade that
way I know exactly what went into it. I love to cook so this helps a lot too so
I would rather buy the fish and grill it at home than get a take away.
The biggest indicator that I am doing something
right has not been the scale or inches gone but the reaction from people. I have
had several positive reactions from people on my weight loss that to me is the
motivation I need to keep going and I will keep going until I reach my desired
size and maintain it from there.
Please click the link below for more Fitness Friday posts.
I first mentioned Ethiopians using churned
butter to condition their hair on this blog in this post back in 2013. So imagine my delight when I came across an
article someone shared on Facebook from The Daily Mail (UK) on this very
subject with some amazing pictorials of beautiful hair and gorgeous people.
Click on the link below to read the entire article.
So what’s been going on with the hair? Well
I took down my last protective style two weeks in because I noticed that the
hair on what would be my widows peak was thinning; I don’t exactly have a peak
nor do I have a proper straight hairline I am somewhere in between but you get
my drift. Every other part of my hair line was ok, perfectly ok apart from this
tiny section so I racked my brain trying to figure out what could have gone
wrong when it hit me! Been wearing the same braiding style from late November! I
have had my hair braided in different variations of corn rowed styles (Ghanaian
braids, tree braids etc) since then with breaks in between of course some long
some quite short. The problem came as a
result of having three different installations in a 10 -12 week period with the
cornrows facing the same direction – all back. .
I had these installed late November and I have had another set done since then in addition to Tree braids in January.
While my edges were perfectly fine thank
goodness I trained by braider on the need to loosen her grip, it seems the
tension of braiding from the same point
three different times in a span of 10 – 12 weeks give or take was too much for
my “widows peak” so the hair at that point started to thin. It’s a similar
situation to how it is recommended not to bun or have a ponytail at the same
spot all the time because the hair at that point may start thinning or breaking
due to the tension on it. To be honest it is not really noticeable I would have
to point it out to most people but I know my hair and I knew something was off
with that spot.
So of course the cornrows had to come down
so I could give the spot some TLC, I have had my hair out for two weeks now
going into my third week and plan to have it out for another two/three weeks before
I get another installation done something totally different laying off the front
to back corn rowed styles for now.I
might even get a sew in and have that section out as leave out hair who knows! Reason;
I retain length better in protective styles plus I sniff some more travel on the way
and the less I have to do with my hair while away from home the better for me. Been
alternating between store bought and homemade deep conditioners on my wash days;
tomorrows wash day is a banana, honey, olive oil, glycerine and avocado oil mix
can’t wait:)
Tomorrow's wash day major ingredient!
Oh the funniest thing happened last week I bumped
into my Aunt shopping one evening while wearing a braid out and after the
greetings she goes “did you just take down your braids?” I was like no Aunty
this is a style we call it a braid out lol! The look on her face was priceless
hahaha she is one of those prim and proper ladylike Aunties and I knew a
lecture on how not to go out with my hair “unkempt” would have followed so I quickly
had to explain this new generation style to her.
That’s all for now ladies till next time
have a lovely weekend:)
