Information and Inspiration!

***First things first!  Today is the last day to enter our giveaway!  If you haven't done it yet, you still have a few hours left!  Just scroll down to Tuesday's post and read all about it!***

Those of you who thoroughly perused our website will have already seen our links page.  Today we are going to talk a little bit about our favorite hair related resources.  Many of the links you may have already seen, but we are adding a few extras.  Also, later today we will be adding a convenient blog roll on the sidebar so that you can easily follow some of our favorite blogs!

Katie has a tendency to be slightly behind the times when it comes to emerging technology.  It has only been in the last year or so that she has really started to closely follow blogs, in large part due to her obsession with cloth diapers!  (yes, they do have blogs about diapers, many of them!)  The only reason that Katie had joined the Adoption Hair and Skin Care group on yahoo was because her husband told her about it and signed her up.  Thank goodness he did!  Katie has always been reluctant to join the latest online phenomena, like Facebook.  But eventually she comes around.  Maybe one of these days she will even figure out what Twitter is, or maybe she will just leave that one to Steph!

Anyway, the point here, is that Katie never really sought out any other hair resources besides the ladies on the hair group.  One day a few years ago she stumbled upon some hair style blogs for little girls, but they were all of Caucasian kids with pretty straight hair.  Some of them were really great blogs and even though they were dealing with a totally different hair type they still inspired her and got her creativity flowing.  Two of her favorite ones are:  The Story of a Princess and Her Hair, and Adopt A 'Do.  At the time that Katie found these blogs it looked as though there was a real need for a similar type of children's hair blog for Afro hair.

This is where Steph comes in.  She saw that Katie had developed a following on youtube and knew that together they could make a really helpful site for Afro hair.  Katie was reluctant because she was worried about the time commitment needed to make a really good blog.  But eventually Steph wore her down.  In the 6 months it took them to actually get the site put together they found that some other moms had noticed the same need.  While making Keep Me Curly they have come across some other really fabulous hair blogs for children with tightly curly hair!  The Beads, Braids, and Beyond blog is full of really creative hairstyles and is a great place to get inspiration!  Not to mention that the creator's daughter has some AMAZING hair!  It is SO long!  You need to check it out! Steph found the Happy Girl Hair blog and was really impressed with the high quality pictures she had of her little girls' hair styles. So Katie went to check it out and became enthralled with her tutorials on "free" hair. At least that is what Katie calls it, I think the mom on this blog calls it "loose" hair. Katie has always been a little bit afraid of "loose" hair, so this blog has been a big help!  Another mom became a fan of ours on facebook before Keep Me Curly opened and let us know about the cool blog that she and a friend created called Hair With Purpose.  They are doing a giveaway right now for some natural oil products by Macadamia.  Katie also just found a blog from a mom with a cute curly-haired blondy called Curly Hairdo Ideas!  She has some really precious styles AND she loves cloth diapers as much as Katie does!!! Two blogs which are geared toward adults but still contain a wealth of useful info (especially as our little girls grow into BIG girls) are Afrobella for product info and general topics of interest, and The Video Locktician, owned by Phyllis Johnson. Steph is totally in awe of this woman's locs! Someday maybe G's and B's will look like this, if they want. This blog site could help them learn to maintain them beautifully.

There are also some good non-blog resources out there too.  Steph has gotten a lot of excellent natural hair info, recipes, and tips from the Motown Girl website.  This is also geared more toward adult women but it is a great resource for natural hair.  Another excellent resource for biracial hair or how to grow tightly curly hair long and healthy is TightlyCurly.com, the owner's name is Teri and she has very long beautiful hair, and a really interesting story about how she has gotten to this point!

And of course, we can't forget our favorite place to get beads and accessories, Snapaholics! If you live in Australia you can shop at Snapaholics Australia, and if you are in Europe you might want to try Mariposa Import...she carries some Snapaholics items as well as many other products for Afro hair.

We hope this list will be as helpful and inspirational to you as it has been for us.  And don't forget to talk to your kids about what their favorite hairstyles and accessories are.  Look at pictures together and let those creative juices flow!  Together you and your little ones can come up with some GREAT new styles of your own!  When you do, make sure you send us a picture!