Guest Post: E is Random

I'm taking my annual beach vacation (keep up with me here) and this week 

I have some wonderful ladies visiting the blog. 

You'll love their posts! See ya next week! Love, Elle

Hi Elle Sees blog friends! My name is E and I blog over at E is Random. I’m excited to guest blog on Elle Sees about one of my favorite topics: hair! Elle Sees is such a great beauty resource and I’m excited to contribute. I consider myself pretty lucky to have naturally curly hair, but I haven’t always felt that way. Mostly because I haven’t always known how to deal with it. I wanted to share a few tips and tricks I’ve learned over the years. I thought I’d start with the basic steps I use to style my hair everyday.

1. Wash hair. I only shampoo once or twice a week. The rest of the time, I just rinse my hair. Make sure to use sulfate-free shampoo. Your curls will thank you!

2. Condition. I slather conditioner on pretty thickly and let it sit for a few minutes. This is the only time I comb my hair. Usually, I just use my fingers, but I have a wide-tooth comb that I use for troublesome knots.

3. Before I dry my hair or apply any product, I flip my head over and gently shake it back and forth, like shaking my head “no,” to release the curls and remove excess water. (If you have dry hair or need extra conditioning, I would apply that product before this step.)

4. Next I apply a generous amount styling product to my hair, scrunching it in from root to tip with my hands while squeezing out excess water.

5. Finally it’s time to dry. I often apply a little more product to my hair and then dry with an old t-shirt or microfiber towel. These are much more gentle on your hair and less likely to cause breakage. To be honest, after this I usually let my hair airdry. If you aren’t lazy like me, use hair dryer and diffuser. Depending on how much body you like/need in your hair, you can either flip your hair over or not as you dry it. I always keep the blow dryer on the lowest power setting to keep my curls intact as much as possible. As I diffuse, I swirl my hair into it, letting it naturally curl around the spokes (if that makes any sense).

When it comes to products, I have fewer recommendations. Curly hair varies so much from person to person and your environment can affect your hair so much. That said, I do have a few products that are tried and true for me.

1. Garnier Fructis Style Curl Sculpting Cream Gel
This product is my very favorite. It gives me great hold, but doesn’t leave my hair crunchy, which is a huge product pet peeve.

2. Curls Goddess Curl Gel ($8 at Target)
This is a product I stumbled across at Target. I loved the hold and thought it gave my hair an extra bounce.

3. Lush Curly Wurly 
This product is a splurge for me. It’s a shampoo that has actual pieces of coconut in it (which can be a pain to get out of hair) that makes it smell wonderful and seem super fresh.

4. Lush R&B
This is a leave-in conditioning product. Another splurge. I absolutely love the smell of it and it doesn’t weigh my hair down.

5. Aussie 3 Minute Miracle
This product, I know, is an Elle Sees’ favorite. My only complaint: it doesn’t come in a larger bottle. But it’s expensive. I usually slather it on while I shave my legs in the shower to give it plenty of time on my hair.

That’s just a few recommendations. Feel free to share some of your favorites products or tricks you use in the comments. There’s plenty more I could add about curly hair, but I’ll stop there. If you have any questions, I’d be happy to answer them, either in the comments or via email.