My product free hair.....

My hair has grown, I mean alot. I had my last perm 1/2/2008. My stylist moved some 200+ miles away and I was more or less stuck. I always had a problem with stylist not really listening to my requests or goals for my hair. My hair grows, but I assumed it was from the trims and care of the stylist, not true. I was kinda giving myself good cae in between visits. I never used heat (I always had a wrap), would slather my head with coconut oil (I loved the smell, my hair happens to thrive in it) and my styilst used quality perms and took her time nevr overlapped. Funny how I thought it was her, "great care" when all along it was me LOL. The above picture is my hair washed and air dried without product. My camera is in my friends car, so I can't upload the image aI want to add right now. I have learned through trial and error over the last year how to make my curls pop. IC fantasia gel, cocoa butter and a little glycerin. I'm still working on the exact mixture. I LOVE Kenra shampoo and conditioners, I wish Kenra had a leave in. What I have been doing is saturating my hair with water, then putting a little of the Kenra back in and kinda rubbing that in, then applying the gel mixture section by section "raking" it through only with my finger, pulling the curls downward. At first the look like the waves in the picture, but as my hair dries it curls up perfectly. The process takes me less than 15 minutes, but it's cute. My 15 year old son said it looked like "a babys curly hair". My fiyah man at first stared at my hair, then said " you do have curly hair". He and I had a conversation about my hair a week or so ago. Another thing I've noticed with the whole hair thing, Hair types become the focus as your hair grows out. I really dont understand it so much, it can become vague and is the source of angry disagreements on the hairboards that I frequent. From what I understand: Type 1 straight Type 2 wavey Type 3 spirals Type 4 curls Each of the catogories is further broken in to sub catagoreis, but this is where it gets stickey. Type 3 curlies follow a size of curl width, however in the type 4 catagories, only the A and B have true curls. Yet 4C and to many 4B have no curl pattern.......like I said, confusing. All this being said, I forgot to mention you must have all natural hair and you must wait at least to have a couple inches of growth to really be able to assess. When I cut my permed hair off, I thought I would know right then. Wrong, wrong , wrong. My hair seemed to have no curl, no clumping together pattern at first, but as it grew a bit I noticed a defined curl pattern all over. My hair grows out, then curls on the end. I grew my hair out in braids and such so I never really saw it unless I was in between a take down. Looking at my hair now. I am constantly playing in the little curls and waves. I cut a tester piece below the curl to see what would happen, the cut peice just curled the same. This goes back to my saying you must grow some out first then assess your possible hair type. Back to my hair up top in the photo, it looks big, whispy like, but everything on the end curls. For more pics, check my Fotki and add me as a friend....I'm MSAJ.