Show Us Your STUFF!!! Giveaways for the winners!

So, our topic is STUFF and how we deal with it. It's pretty major. Stuff is a big deal in my house. I moved from about 2500 square feet down to maybe 900 or 1000. Needless to say, cabinets and storage bins that hide lots of little things are big in my place!

With regard to hair stuff, now that we have locs we are a little more happy go lucky. Also, since I run Snapaholics, bling is but a package-rip away LOL!

I would LOVE to tell you that I am the epitome of organization...both now and before we had locs. I would love to tell you that when I used to take a beaded hairstyle out I immediately put all the beads back into their little happy places and containers and drawers. I would love to tell you that I didn't de-bead and de-snap and put everything into a little tupperware bowl and set it somewhere and leave it there for....uh....some time. But, well, that would be a lie if I did :)

Here is the most organized that my bling has ever been:

Ha. Yep, it's only organized because it's my Snapaholics inventory :)

So what's a busy mom to do with 5 or 10 thousand in-use beads, snaps, bands, and not a ziploc baggie to be found to organize them all??? If I were that mom, I would buy this:

or this:

or if seeing all your bling excruciatingly sorted and organized floats your boat, this:

 

or:

with this little guy on the side for taking with you on trips:

The point is, there is a LOT out there to help you, you just have to seek it out. Start in the fishing tackle box section or craft section of your local big box store, JoAnn Fabrics, or Michael's. We are also putting a lot of the items you see above in our Amazon store, which you can find in the sidebar of this blog. Support us by shopping our store!

If I were the organized Mom I always wanted to be, I personally would have that cool red one stacked with that cool blue one (yes my boat would be very floated by seeing all those colorful beads in the drawers!), instead of managing my removed hairstyles like this:

this one is from half-cornrows and box braids, March, 2008 I think. Yep. Here's proof:

Dug it out of a box of random beads. Now y'all know my dirty little secret. :)

SOOOOOO, now on to the giveaway! We would LOVE to see your bling organization photos. To entice you, this Friday at 5:00 PM EST we will choose three winners who will receive a coupon code for MORE BLING at Snapaholics! We are going to be completely subjective and just pick the three winners we like best. Could be best organization, most creative, coolest bling, whatever. We will post the winning photos and tell you why we liked them so much!

Please email your photos to keepmecurly@gmail.com! The winners will be announced on Saturday morning. Try to keep your submissions to no more than three photos per person.

Show us your BLING!

Where Do I Put All Of This STUFF!?!?!?!?

That's right friends, today and tomorrow Steph and I are talking about STORAGE!  Storage for all that goes along with keeping our little gals and guys hair looking spectacular!  

I wish I could say that this post is going to show you my beautifully, cleverly stored hair bling and other hair paraphernalia but it's NOT!  I hope you aren't disappointed.  This post is actually a bit of a cry for help.  Maybe you readers have some great suggestions for us!  We have some ideas of our own.  Yet, we haven't actually put all of our ideas into action.  I personally don't have much money for storage/organization items, but I sure wish I did!  Because organizing things makes me happy.  The Container Store would be like heaven to me, so I just don't go there.  

Also, in this post I am going to get really honest with you all.  I have taken pictures of the different closets and cupboards that hold our hair stuff and I didn't do a thing to make them look prettier before snapping the pictures.  I was really having to hold myself back here!  I am a super perfectionist, and it is tempting to only show you the perfect Katie.  But I think you deserve better than that.  You have all been so wonderfully supportive.  So lets get into it....

This is our hall closet that has all the bottles of things that don't get used on a daily basis.  I clean and organize this closet about once or twice a year, when I can't take the chaos anymore, but somehow a week later it looks like this again!

It's a deep closet so you can't see all the stuff in there, but we have Soft Spikes in the back.  Some Apple Cider Vinegar is hiding back there as well as a pile of little travel sized toiletries.  Our big bottles of Taliah Waajid stays there to refill our small bottles that are in the shower.  You can see our new bottles of Tate's too!  There is also a flat iron that has only been used twice!  

This is the cupboard under the bathroom sink that houses most of the things I use during a hair session with V.

Combs, Gel, Rubber Bands, Shea Butter/Coconut Oil Mixture, Clips, and Latch Hooks.  You know, along with the toilet paper and tub toys!

This is the closet in the girls room where we keep all of the BLING!  We do actually have some nice storage pieces in there, but it just doesn't fit ALL of our stuff!

The black and clear drawers are a really nice way to store our beads, but unfortunately we need more separate compartments.  Some of the drawers are just too big for what we have in them and we have way to many different kinds of beads, that I like to keep separated.  Then the blue boxs on top hold clips and ballies and snaps and hair ties.  On top of those we have our Sidewinders that have not yet found another home, plus more shea butter/coconut oil and our sock bun holders!

You can see here, that we have had to keep some of our beads in plastic baggies so that I can stick them in drawers with other color beads and still keep them separate.  Although we have such a huge purple barrel mix that it takes up a whole drawer on its own!  (so does the pink)

Still other drawers. like this one for our square beads, also hold our beaders and a bag of BGP's.

Then we have the really big drawer that holds all of our headbands and large ponytail holders.  It is nice and roomy, but you really have to dig through it to find what you want, and I am not even sure I remember what is at the bottom!

The drawer right above this one holds our most frequently used pony holders, ballies and barrettes, because it is (a little bit) faster and easier to get into this drawer than to get into the blue boxes.  

Here is the inside of one of the blue boxes.  This one holds the pony holders, extra rubber bands and snaps (all bagged up to keep the different styles sperated.  Now that I think of it though, I have extra dividers for this container.  I could probably use them in here and put each kind of snap in their own compartment - DUH!)

This is the blue box that holds all of our barrettes and ballies (and cut up ballies turned BGP's).  The first picture is what it looks like after a 2 year old has gotten into it while my hands were busy braiding so I couldn't stop her!  Then after taking that picture, I just couldn't stand it - I had to sort everything out and take a picture of what it is supposed to look like!

So that is the bulk of our stuff, but it doesn't include the bottles of product in our shower, the daily hair spritz that is in the cupboard behind the mirror, the bag of yarn in the girls closet, or Little E's stash of clips, baby headbands, and hair ties that are all over my bathroom cupboard and in a basket on her dresser!  Do you ever feel like the hair stuff has TAKEN OVER YOUR HOME?????  

Sitting here putting this post together I am seeing that I am more disorganized than I thought.  I think with a bit of reorganizing I could stream line things a bit without even having to buy anything new.  

Hopefully tomorrow Steph will have some good suggestions for us all on things that might keep us more organized (even though she tells me that she isn't actually organized at all!)  But we are also going to be asking for you to send up pictures of your genius storage ideas!  There might even be a prize involved, so please come back tomorrow!  

Katie

Pass it on!

A few weeks ago we got this AWESOME idea from one of our Facebook members!

Melany wrote:

"just thought i would post this idea...don't know if anyone else does it. anyone have any worn out ball balls?? i did!!! soo....cut the strings off and you have perfect homemade "BGP" balls that i add to her hair like beads!!!! example... (might not be for everyone...but i LOVE it)"

I (Katie) happen to think that Little Miss N is adorable AND that Melany had a GREAT idea!  I have some seriously worn out ballies!  

You can see the ballies on the right are normal and then the ones to the left are all stretched out!  I think these ones are the worst!

So I got out my scissors and went to town on the worst offenders:

I wasn't ready to cut up my whole stash of ballies yet - I need to test this out first!  

It might be hard to tell but the pink and turquiose ones are little hearts:

Turns out these have holes that are smaller than a normal bead, so If I use these it will have to be on some pretty small braids, but these were in such bad shape I went ahead and cut them up!

My new stash of BGP's!  (that is what Steph named her Big Giant Pony beads!)

I was so excited when I read this tip, unfortunately I haven't had a chance to try it yet!  V's current style is sort of a blingless one and the twists I think would be too small to add these on.  But I wanted to feature this great idea this week while we were talking all about hair bling!  As soon as I get a chance to try this out, I will let you all know!!!

Steph also had a good idea for how to recycle worn out ballies:  

Go to your local sewing store or big box retailer with a fabric section, plunk down a buck or two, and get this:

You can restring MANY ballies with this stuff. It's just round cord elastic. Usually comes in white or black. Guaranteed to stretch well and last longer. And the cool thing is that because you are restringing it, you can make it as long as you want based on your child's hair thickness. Don't you hate it when ballies go, say, twice around (too loose!) but three times around (can't quite make it!)??

Katie

A Celebration of Hair Bling!

To accompany this weeks Snapaholics giveaway we would like to show you a few of our favorite hair bling pics!

You know how sometimes you just really love the way a bead combination comes together!  Or you look at a picture from a year ago and you think - I LOVE those colors together!  I have to do that again!  Or you are at the grocery store and you see someone else's little girl and you get some serious hair bling envy!

Maybe you are hair bling challenged?  You can never quite figure out what hair accessories to match with other accessories.  You have tackle boxes full of bling and you don't know what to do with them!  Maybe some days you know exactly what to do, but other days you find yourself scouring the internet for some good blingy photos to help you out?

Well, we are going to look back through some of our old photos and share some hair bling inspiration with you!

These are pretty old pics - how cute is my baby V!

We use A LOT of pink and purple hair accessories because they match most everything the girls wear.

So I really love to change it up once in awhile and I think the BLUE is really cute!  And actually quite versatile as it will match anything with jeans.

These braids are ended with star snaps I got from Snapaholics!

Look at how short V's ponytail is!

I have always loved how dark colors like this pretty purple look on V's hair.  They stand out so beautifully against her dark hair!

This purple bead mix with matching purple heart ponies were also all purchased from Snapaholics!

This is one of B's very first styles.

Don't you love how cute it is with the pastel flower beads in between each section of the piggyback braids!  

Here is a picture of G with piggyback braids with heart beads in between.

Steph - Did you get this idea from me?

(Steph here: yer darn right I did Katie!)

For added length and color Steph also has some yarn falls ballied in there...she will be doing a post about how to make these!

I like the black snaps at the bottom, they are understated and let the colorful hearts stand out!

Here is a cornrow ponytail on B before she had locs!  

The only beads are on that cornrow across the front.  But my FAVORITE part is the princess like ponytail holder around her little puff!

Don't you think Steph should carry those???

One summer V had a very large amount of pink and orange clothes.  So I came up with a number of pink/orange bead combos.  And I LOVED it!  I think those colors are so bright and summery!

Doesn't it kind of remind you of candy?

Here is a typical pink and purple combination.  

This was an Easter hairstyle.  The pink and purple flower beads matched her Easter dress perfectly!

What do you do for holidays?  I often coordinate my styles to go with the season/holiday.  

One Christmas I gave the girls matching styles, but with different bead combinations.  The different beads matched their Christmas outfits of course!  

V was wearing the Green and Red combo.  And this is B with the Red and White. 

The Style was piggyback braids on top with box braids in the back.  But the COOL part was the piggyback headband going across the top!  I love the red and green flowers!

WHOA!  Look how much V's hair grew!  And this picture is probably a year old!

Do you like to use A LOT of beads or just A LITTLE?  

This is probably about the most beads per braid I will do. I see lots of little girls out and about with beads going all the way up the braid, but that's not my style.  I like to see more of my girls pretty hair!  

How do you feel about rainbow style beads?

I like them!  These are pastel colors.  I like rainbows with bright colors also.

I know you can't really see V's hair in this pic, but that's ok because this post is all about the bling!

Just had to add this picture with my square beads from Snapaholics because they are SO cool!

I also feel like the square beads have a very slightly larger hole than regular ponies.  I seem to be able to slide them over the rubber bands easier.

Looks like I have matching flower beads on the ends of these braids.  And you guessed it!  I bought those from Steph too!









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So time for some G shots. As you know from G's Story Chapters 1 and 2, I have frequently been guilty of overblinging. It's a disease, I tell you. But sometimes I feel like I hit the mark! If only her hair had been longer!

Katie already posted one of my crazy favorites above, the yarn falls with black and rainbow colors, with hearts in the piggy back braids. Loved it! And just because her face is so darn cute, here's the front shot of that hairstyle:

Despite her shorter hair in back, I really liked this style. Part of the reason was the triangle parts I made, but part was i just loved how the butterflies and barrell beads set each other off. Alas, I look back now and say "too many beads!" I should have gone for 3 per braid instead of 5!

This also illustrates something important about the oft-overlooked Style #3 snaps, the black flowers. When you want the focus to be on the bead pattern, choose a plain black snap. It is very understated and the beads stand out more.

This is the front and back of the same style. I loved the rich bright color of these beads set off by the plain white heart snap. And I ADORE G's attitude in the front shot! This is one of my favorite photos of her. If you notice the single red heart bead in the back, a fun thing to do (I got this from my friend Michelle in Minnesota) is place one single red heart bead somewhere in each hairstyle, meaning that this style was done with love. I think that is a great little idea!

I think my signature style seems to have been puffs with three bangs! In these two photos, I loved the color combination and how they matched her dress. These are the square flower sheen beads and I had cube ballies in the top photo. The bottom photo are the pastel starflowers, and I happened to have a set of mini ballies in the same three colors, so I put three ballies in each puff. Matched great! This is also a very easy way to change bling every day to match outfits. Puffs and a few bangs with bling.

(Katie Here:  I can't resist telling you how much I LOVE this white dress!  I am kind of scared of white clothes on my wild kids, but this is beautiful!)

This was G's first grade photo hairstyle. If you haven't tried cubes yet, they give a whole different look to the hair. I LOVED this one, and the way all those beads sounded together. When I did this style, I had not put lots of beads in for awhile, so I missed that clicky clacky sound!

Another fave. And no, I don't carry these at Snapaholics! :)

Now we want your help!  We know you have plenty of good ideas out there.  Inspire us!  Please email your favorite hair bling pictures to keepmecurly@gmail.com and we will put together a post of all of YOUR pictures!