The Crunchy Life

Okay, so I know I already did a blog on dread adornment, but I was so excited by my newest purchase (so new, in fact, that I haven’t even received it in the mail yet) that I felt compelled to make another post about them! Unfortunately, the bead that had purchased that inspired the original post about dread adornment had to be returned. The hole was just too big… as much as I didn’t want it to be, LOL.

I have come up with a ‘theme’ for the next several dread adornments I purchase. With the knowledge that dreadlocks are a sponge for energy and in the interest of balance I decided I want to acquire four beads (maybe five?) to represent the four/five elements; water, air, fire, and earth. For whatever reason I had been really drawn to beads incorporating a theme of the ocean or water so I figured that was a prime place to start.

I was THRILLED when I happened across the awesomely awesome Etsy shop, Beatle Baby Glass Works. whose work, in my humble opinion just completely personifies the element of water. She has mastered the ability to capture the depth of water, using dichroic glass to mimick the effect of sunlight glittering on its surface. The organic, free-flowing shape of her work seemed to communicate the amazing power and force of water. It was just so breath-takingly beautiful and perfect that I had to send her a message asking if she would custom-make me a dread bead. She didn’t have anything with a hole that size so I didn’t know if it would be possible, but she immediately jumped at the opportunity and ideas that I had.

Within 24 hours she had created a bead for me that was just gorgeous, but I stupidly said that it wasn’t quite what I’d had in mind and asked her if she would be willing to try again. Her second try was a no-go… not up to her standards. The third and fourth tries were also beautiful, but by the time she had come around to those I had fallen further in love with the first bead she had made. Although I loved the others, I was ready to take the first bead. In the end it was just too perfect not to!

In the process I inspired her to create a section in her shop for large hole/dread beads, so if you have dreadies yourself you should give her shop a look-see as her stuff is just AMAZING. She told me she is thinking of trying to make fire beads, too, which I’m SUPER excited about in lieu of my idea of a decorating ‘theme’ for my dreads.

On top of that I have also commissioned KnottySleeves on Etsy to create a peyote stitch dread tube for me. Her peyote stitching is the highest quality, most creative ones I’ve been able to locate online. I will post photos of that when I get them, too!

So, to round things out here I am going to wrap up with a video I created on how to use your Loose Hair Tool to help you put on dread adornments. (I wrote a whole other blog entry about the LHT and how to use it to tidy up your dreads.... check it out, too!)^_^ Enjoy!!!

I have been away for so long! I have to apologize for those of you who may have been following along religiously for my absence. However, I assure you that said absence was not in vain! I spent Sunday night through Thursday night putting dreadlocks in for a friend. He has/had beautiful, long naturally blonde hair.... and a big head, literally! To add insult to injury, he wanted to have skinny dreads... about 75 of them. So, I told him when he arrived that by the end of that night I wanted to at least finish his sectioning. Well, it turns out that my 15 month-old daughter did NOT want my friend to be hogging all of my attention, so it took me THREE hours to section his hair into 3/4 inch sections. (Using my trusty rat-tail comb and polyband elastics.) After all of that it was time to hit the hay.
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The next night we only got through 9 dreads after I got out of work and we fell asleep. He had just come back from an extended stay in Thailand so, still jet lagged, he was about passing out while I was working on his hair. So, I took the opportunity to take a nap myself and ended up falling asleep for the whole night! At the right, here, you can see how far we got before falling asleep!

The next day we started dreading in earnest. We worked from the time I woke up in the morning (from about 9:30 through bedtime around 9:30 that night). We had gotten about halfway through his head to having about 32 done. That makes 23 dreads in 12 hours. I was averaging two an hour, but that includes breaks to eat, stretch, and hit the restrooms. It didn't help that in the chair he sat in his @$$ kept falling asleep, LOL. That night my back was killing me and I was grateful for a night's rest before having to go back at it again. To complicate matters I was on a deadline. My friend only came through on his way back home to Erie, PA and his ride was coming to get him Thursday night. This was last minute Tuesday and I was really concerned about getting them all done in time!


The following day we started in the early afternoon after getting through with a half day of work and got through half of the top of his head leaving me with 16 left to complete the following day before having to be ready for his ride to pick him up. In the photo you can see how the hair on his right side of his head is still pinned up.

The next day we got through the whole rest, but his ride decided to come the next day to make sure that we weren't rushed in finishing. So, here are the final photos including the one and only one of ME actually working on his hair!






































The last image is a shameless plug for the dread coils I've started making! You can find them on my Etsy Shop! This is one of the Five Element Dread Coils. Please check them out! My next blog entry (to be posted tomorrow) will be about how to use the DreadHeadHQ Loose Hair Tool as so many people have requested a blog about it! So, stay tuned for that!

Blessings and Happy Dreading!!!

Okay so its been a few days since I updated and I thought I'd let y'all know what I've been up to. I guess the most pertinent news is that I *finally* got my application to apply for DreadHeadHQ Sponsorship. I'm WICKED psyched to finish that up and send it back to KJC. I'm just waiting for Meg (whose hair I dreaded last weekend and it came out AWESOME) to post the photos from her dread party to send along with the application. I am looking forward to seeing where that will take me.

As I just mentioned last weekend I helped Meg put her dreads in. She now has 55 suh-weet dreads. We backcombed and crochet 'em all and pulled all of her ends in right at the get-go. She knows that she will have to frequently touch up the ends as the dreads begin maturing and doing their own thing. It took us, over the course of two days, probably a total of 16 hours or so to put in her dreads. It would have likely taken us much less time if we had just backcombed without the crochet. She started by washing her hair with DreadHeadHQ Dread Soap and then sprayed it with Locking Accelerator. She toweled off much of the excess moisture and blow-dried her hair so we could section it. We did approximately 1 inch sections with the ones around her hair line a little smaller so she can style it a little more easily (like the people who put in my dreads did). Meg has pretty thin hair that's prone to breakage so we wanted to make sure we didn't give her dreads that were TOO skinny. I think their size is JUST right! We used the DreadHeadHQ Dread Comb and Lock Peppa to backcomb and I used my 0.6 mm crochet hook to get 'em nice and tight! Like I said, we took pics on her friend, Elizabeth's camera... I'm just waiting for them to upload and post them on facebook so I can share some of them. ^_^

This past week has been pretty non-eventful. Our condo was shown once with mediocre results. We signed a pre-foreclosure agreement last Thursday saying that if we don't manage to sell this property (short-sale or otherwise) by July 30th they will foreclose on us. Here's hoping it doesn't come to that, but I have to admit I'm not particularly optimistic about it. I did have a dream a few nights ago that we received two offers, one for $90,000 and the other for $96,250 (oddly specific, I know!).... so maybe it was a sign... here's hoping!!!

My mom made an official offer on the house that was accepted for $118,000, and it was inspected a couple days ago. They found termites and some structural damage equaling about $2,000 which I guess the owner is taking care of. And I hear the closing is probably going to be at the end of June. I was kind of hoping she would close a little sooner so we could start moving our already packed stuff into the new basement. We will be, as previously mentioned, moving into her garage. Glamorous, I know. But... as my mother so poignantly put it, it's better than being homeless.

In other news, I have finally gotten off my butt and starting making some dread coils! They are listed in my Etsy shop; Sylph Wings Designs. I created a Seven Chakra Dread Coil with gemstones to represent each chakra. I think I want to tweak it some... but they are currently available! So, check it out! I have plans to also make one with gemstones to represent the five elements (Earth, Air, Fire, Water, and Spirit), and another with gemstones to represent the four directions of the medicine wheel (East, South, West, and North). Keep an eye out for those!

In other exciting news we have a friend coming over to stay for a few days on his way through to Sherman, NY for me to put dreads in HIS hair! I will take plenty of photos to share!

Thanks for reading!

Blessings

~ KnottyMama