The Beginning of My Locking Journey...April 2001

I did some research of different locking methods and the pros and cons of each and discovered that I had the option of starting the locs with thin braids.

I went to bed about 2 in the morning and laid there unable to sleep until about 2:30. I jumped up, went into the bathroom and started braiding. I started out making nice, neat little partings, but after a while, I didn't care. I mean, they didn't look a mess and I tried to keep them as uniform as possible, but I wasn't even trying trip and get hung up on the partings. I mean, organic lockers and free-form lockers don't worry about all those perfect partings...they just let nature take it's course. So, I wasn't going to sweat it.

I made the braids about as small I as I wanted my locs to be as I didn't want them too big. I wanted to be able to roll them up, put them in a roll, etc. Some of them seemed a little too big after a couple of days, so I took them down and divided them and re-braided. The sections themselves may be the size of a pencil (if not a little smaller) and the ones in the immediate front and on the sides are a little skinnier than the ones in the top and back.

I may have been braiding until about 4 a.m. and still was not finished. But, I was tired and had to get to sleep. The next morning, I started on it again and worked on it off and on all that day until I finally finished it. All together, it may have taken me about 6 to 8 hours.

I shampooed it the next day and rolled the braids up on perm rods to make them curly. It was so cute! I got compliments on it when I went to church on Sunday.

To see a bit of my regimen as to how I care for my locs, click here.

Here I am with my starter locs/braids! These were done on April 24, 2001

Click here to see month 3!