Update on Everything Under the Moon

Hello, Magickal People!  I have been pretty much MIA here for the better part of six months and I'm sure I have some 'splaining to do. Hopefully, you all haven't abandoned ship and this post is being read by someone! 

Let's start way back with last summer.  Most of you know that we had just moved and were settling in nicely here on campus.  The girls were keeping me busy and we were growing a lovely little garden.  I thought I was done with the baby business and was getting into the rhythm created by our little family.  Then Superman had a premonition.  I know. I'm the witch. That's suppose to be my department, but Superman holds his own pretty well in that particular area.  He just knew that if we were to have one more child, he would have a son.  The man has 5 daughters.  Well, I can't deny him anything, particularly not a son, so we decided to try again.  I was tandem nursing the girls and thought that would buy me some time, but with in two weeks I was pregnant with our little boy.  At the time of this post he is now three weeks old and completely amazing of course.  Miss Busy is a great helper when she wants to be and even advises me on how to do my job.  Little Moon loves "bruber," but is feeling a bit out of sorts with her new position in the family line up.

 

 

 

Because we were becoming a household of five, the campus housing regulations required us to move into a larger apartment.  Initially, this move occurred back in November and was a smashing success.  At first.  Soon after Christmas it became apparent that there were some major problems with our new apartment and after trying for over two months to rectify them with us in residence we had to move again.  Thankfully, the apartment across patio was open and we were only required to move next door.  It is safe to say that we cut things pretty close though.  Our first night in the new apartment, I went into labor.  This time I had the premonition and knew it would happen that way.

So, on to my locks.  To tell the truth, they are still significantly more of a mess than I expected them to be at 13 months old.  I love the wildness of my dreads, but some days it seems like I have the "woman lost in the woods" look going on.  Note: I am not very good at this selfie business and just make random faces at the camera while trying to capture the state of my dreads with out looking like a total idiot.  A good portion in the center of each dread is knotted up nice and tight, but there is an inch of loose hair at the top of each another 2 to 3 inches at the bottom just whisping around. Back in January, I bought a dreading hook tiny crochet hook with the goal of having them all tidied up before the baby arrived.  Unfortunately, I didn't do a very good job of figuring time into the equation.  I am rather slow at the business of crocheting hair and with the girls to help me out, I'm doing good to get one dread tidied in the span of an hour.  So at this point, I have 8 rather neat tidy dreads and about 25 very messy ones.  I'm not going for perfection, just manageable.  Maybe I'll have the look cleaned up in time for a 18 month update. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

***It took me three days to write this blog post and it is now April Fools Day.  No tricks here, just my own lack of foresight.  

Wild Woman Hair: Six Month Dread Update

Sometimes, it's hard to believe how long I've already been on this road.  It's been six months since I set my baby dreads and they have been such an up and down experience.  It seems like they can go from looking like a horrendous mess one day to tightening up over night and suddenly looking pretty fantastic the next day.  Since I washed and dried yesterday afternoon and separated this morning, I felt it was a good time to do a few selfies and update.  Let's just over look the blurry eyes.  It's been a hectic week. 

With my hair is still growing faster than my dreads are shrinking, I have far more open end than dread right now.  Also, it is a bit of a motley crew of dread styles.  Like I said before, I started out with twist and rip dreads in February, but now have a few back combed dreads in stubborn areas that didn't want to hold a dread and several free form dreads in the back where dreads fell out and I just didn't get around to putting them back in.  I am kind of partial to those extra messy little guys, too. I am still washing only with Dr. Bronners and a combination of baking soda, peroxide, and vinegar.  With one exception.  I have learned to put a few drops of essential oil into my soap every few weeks when the frizzies start building up. At this point, I still want my hair to be dry to help form the locs, but there really is such a thing as too dry.    

 

 

Here I am!  All put together for the day, wearing my favorite cardigan and scarf.  The cardigan is vintage Liz Claiborne circa 1980's.  I picked it up at a church thrift shop for fifty cents.  Whoot! Whoot!  I am really happy with my look.  I find that there is almost a spell like quality to my dreads that gives me a great boost of confidence in who I am.  The funny thing is, Superman's new co-workers are picking me out of a crowd in an instant.  They know I'm a witch from talking with him and I guess I just look witchy these days.  To sum it up.  I feel completely me and I feel like a BOSS!

 

Meanwhile Across the State

If I start writing about this past month, things are going to get ugly.  Like really long and boring.  So, I decided to do this update with as many photos and as few words as possible. 

 

Dread update first, since I am a month behind.  These are just freshly washed and dried and just over two months old.  Superman still isn't sure he likes them.  I adore them. 

 

 

Now for the really important business...

We are here!  The beautiful Gallatin Valley, where even the parking lots have a view. 

Our living room window has a great view of the mountains, even if it is a bit dirty.  BTW...we are now in a second story apartment great excuse not to wash the windows.  Should I change the name of my blog? 

 

 

We've had snow twice since we got here April 9th.  I am looking forward to gardening, but we only have 92 frost free days here.  It's going to be a garden sprint. 

 

 

 

 

Our apartment overlooks a nice common area with a full playground and sandbox.  The girls are loving the outdoor space.  This picture was taken just a few days after one snow storm and a few days before another.  Hopefully, we are heading into the warm weather for good now. 

 

 

 

 

This "I Love Montana" mural is a downtown center piece.  It was painted by a local artist with the assistance of a group of elementary school children.  I hope to take more photographs when the sun is not casting shadows over the artwork. 

 

 

Yarnbomb Bozeman! 

 

So far, I am absolutely in love with this place!  Of the many places I've called home, this one is by far my favorite. 

 

 

 



Changes and Making Progress: 3 Month Dread Update

Let me just come out and say it.  I gave up on free form dreading.  Although the messiness and uncertainty didn't bother me at all I actually kind of liked looking like a hot mess all the time, it did bother Superman.  He's quite OCD about things being neat and tidy and the extended messy, in between stage of my hairstyle drove him bonkers.  So, in the name of love I decided to step in and make locs happen. 

What I have now is a head full of twist and rip baby locs.  As one friend pointed out, anything that involves hair and ripping sounds horrendous, but it's really not.  In the spectrum of dread installation, twist and rip is one of the most gentle methods.  Since my hair is quite short, I do have bands on the bottom of my little creations that I will leave on for a few weeks.  I am still going natural in the sense that I am not using any product besides Dr. Bronner's soap, baking soda, and vinegar. 

Overall, the look is neater and I like it.  My little sprouts of hair sticking out in amazing randomness make me smile one is particularly naughty and doesn't know which direction he wants to go.  There are a few of these little guys that are barely holding their own and will need reworking after all there is a learning curve, but since I started at working the underside of my hair in the back they are not noticeable.  I also should have viewed this particular video before I started the one I watched was not nearly as good because I did a bit too much twisting at the onset and my locs are quite loose at the root.  Fortunately, they will tighten up in time. 

I am completely loving my new look and am once again putting my massive collection of scarves to good use. 

Free Form Dreading and Embracing Myself

 

It's been six weeks since the last time I brushed my hair, eight since I have conditioned.  I'm looking pretty wild right now and I love it.  Already this journey has taken paths I never anticipated and I am learning more about myself everyday.  I am becoming more empowered to be completely, totally, and honestly me.  Because I have now taken the drastic step of completely rejecting societies standards of beauty, for the first time in my life I know that I am pretty.  Really, I'm not trying to sound egotistical, this is a big break through for me. From my husbands loving influence, I use to believe I was pretty.  Now I simply know it. 

 

Growing up in rural Montana, I saw dreadlocks in person for the first time when I was 11 or 12 years old.  They were being worn by a blond girl of 17 or 18 and I wanted to be her.  To me, she was the epitome of beauty.  Not only was her hair magnificently wild, but everything about her spoke of natural ease.  Of course, I only saw her from a distance, but it was one of those slow motion cheesy movie scene moments.  It is completely correct to say that I was drawn to dreads, although at the time I could not put my finger on any other reason than aesthetics.  Since my super conservative parents weren't about to let me dread my hair, the idea went to the back burner and continued to percolate for over twenty years. 

 

As I grew older and begin learning more about the culture of my ancestors, I found that my longing for dreads was calling to me from a time long ago.   I am a proud descent of the ancient Celts (Lowland Scott) and Vikings (Finn and Swede) on my dads side of the family, with more Viking (Swede) mixed with Sioux (Mandan) and German on my mom's side.  It is fair to say that the majority of my ancient ancestry likely wore their hair in some kind of natural matted style.  If we want to be completely frank, most prehistoric people probably did since there was no means to brush and maintain their hair in an "orderly" fashion.   Having always felt like an old soul and needing to connect with those who came before me, the desire to grow dreads makes perfect sense. 

Spiritually, my decision to dread goes beyond ancestor reverence and is an extension of my relationship to nature and my kindred the Elementals.  It is an acceptance of my true self similar to the way many witches take on a spiritual name, the girlish woman who still loves to dance barefooted and who wraps herself in the wind.  It is showing the Universe that I am happy with who I am and love the person I was created to be. 


**Since some of you are bound to notice, I do have five twist and rip dreads tied off with wool.