Blue Gold

the next world war will be over water....

Hair Obsessions

Many people don't know this but like most black women I am Obsessed with my hair. I am always trying to find new ways to style it and help it along in growth.Currently my hair is about shoulder length but I can't wait till it gets to be even longer cause I plan to rock the worlds biggest fro.

I actually use to relax my hair. in fact my hair has been relaxed since I was a weee little girly girl with pig tails.

and it grew but it was always very thin and when I finally got to an age where I could do my own hair I hated it cause it seemed like every ones hair was thicker than mine.

Anyway when I turned 26 I moved away and went to school and I stopped getting a perm on my hair. This is when the real education began. it took me about a 2 years to muster up the balls to actually trim off all the damaged hair.During that time I did a few things. One thing I always wanted was to die my hair so I did. On top of my perm and natural mixed fro and man did it look bad.

then one day i got this idea to get on the internet and learn how to style a fro.I wanted more than afro puffs and I was tired of the mickey mouse ears. I was really to old to be doing nothing but wearing afro puffs. I didn't know how to style short hair though. and it wasn't long enough for one ponytail.

Long story short I found lots of other young women with beautiful natural hair and they were giving tutorials on how to take care of it. Like for example. not combing it when it is dry and not using mineral oil because it makes your hair brittle. I was a victim of brittle hair. Oh and not using sulfate shampoo. I buy organic now.

Recently I have been doing research on how to stop single strand knots. They are all over my head and they caused me to form a nasty habit where I rip them out cause they make me so angry and they can't be removed unless i get out the shears and clip individual knots of individual strands. Some call this dusting and it is a fruitless effort cause they come back in a matter of a few hours!!! GRRR!!!

So I would just clip my ends and well that didn't help either cause I clip the ends of damaged hair and they return and I clip more and more and my hair gets shorter and shorter which is defeating the purpose of having long hair in the first place!!

But I think I found the solution. I tried rolling my hair. and this works, but takes hours and the hair reverts in a few days and then I found a site called http://curlynikki.com .

She shows how to do the curly fro where by curling the ends you can stretch them and eliminate single strand knots. Not to mention it is really cute and a nice style for every day wear. I thought I was resigned to ugly braids or 2 strand twists but I don't like them in my hair so this I hope will be my saving grace.

Anyway I found some videos and thought I would share. This girl has great hair! Oh and I also learned that a fro is a great accessory to your clothes.



God Bless
~Arie

To Hollywood or not to Hollywood.

Sorry I haven't been posting guys. it has been a very rough month. I figured that it was probably best I focus as much energy on commissions as possible but they are still not getting completed as fast as I would like.

I know I haven't spoken here much about it but I have a mentor and I spoke to him the other day. when I am able to animate he looks at my work and critiques things for me. I always feel revitalized when I get to speak with him. He told me anytime I am ready to start getting work He would help me out by putting in a good word for me.

God Bless him and his wife. They are such good people. He told me that he was kinda unsatisfied with the industry for so long, but meeting young people with a fire for animation has helped him feel so much happier and excited about what they can bring to animation in the future.

Knowing he that someone has that kind of faith in your work is so uplifting. It makes me feel like I can do anything no matter how hard. I still hesitate to move to Cali and try yo find work. It hasn't been long since I returned to Missouri and enjoy being able to be around all my old friends and reestablishing those old relationships.

Not to mention I think my mom would be heart broken if I were to move so far away again. I had such rough times when I was in New Jersey. It was so frustrating and lets not talk about Ohio. I question myself if a move to Hollywood for work would be a good choice or not, but at the same time it has been something I have worked so hard for all these years. I mean it could be completely different for me than all the other times.

I am just kinda tired of my life frantically being up and down so much. the chaos is unbearable sometimes.all I can really do is pray about all these things. At the same time I think man if i were on my feet and doing well. Just how much more I could bring to the lives of others around me.

I wonder if other artists have had to make a decision like this. I know moving there wouldn't be forever but no one is getting any younger around here. Especially my parents. It seems like a big sacrifice.