30 minutes no-heat curls/waves

          As a long-haired person, styling my hair is a chore. Of course, it's nice to have hair that is polished to perfection, but after 45 minutes of wrapping locks around the curling iron and realizing that I'm not even half through the process, I almost want to chop it off (but I won't). Not to mention the damage and the burns. Ugh. So I tried nearly every method that will give me curls or soft beach waves in the summer without big fuss and fried hair (a.k.a. heat-less methods). I won't sleep with plastic rollers in my hair ever again, it's extremely uncomfortable, they always slip elsewhere and I need about 50 of those! The sock bun was a failure, my hair is too long and thick and I end up with a bun that's double the size than my head. The headband method only curled my front strands, because, again, my hair is too long. With bobby pins it takes ages and the curls are too small. The only way that seemed reasonable was wrapping my strands around pieces of cotton, but I had to figure out how to do it fast and without looking like Merida from The Brave. No offense, but it wouldn't look good on me. So... I present you the 30 minutes no-heat curls/waves tutorial!

 1. Comb your hair well. The method works on any kind of hair, no matter if it's freshly washed or not. Mine was.

 2. Take a hair tie and put your locks into a high ponytail. Don't tighten it too much so you don't damage the curls when you take the tie off.

 3. Spritz your hair until it's damp (not soaking wet!). You can skip this step if it's still damp after the shower.

 4. Find some pieces of scrap fabric (or just recycle and old T-shirt). You are going to need 2 for waves (my case), 3 for big curls and 4 for tight curls.

 5. Divide and conquer! (Here, I split my hair into two sections. I have also tried with 3 and 4 sections and it works out great). Slide the piece of fabric underneath the hair tie, hold the end with a hand and wrap the section around the ribbon with the other. This will give you waves, rather than doll-like curls you would get if you rolled the hair around it.

 Keep wrapping. (Donuts!)

 6. When you finish, just tie both ends of the piece of fabric together. Repeat on the other side(s).

 Ta-dah! 

7. Now do whatever you want for half an hour. You can eat, change your clothes, check your emails and so on. You can even sleep like this, it's not uncomfortable or do this in the morning. The more you leave it in your hair, the more defined your curls will be. For me, 30 minutes was enough to get waves.

 8. Unwrap 'em!

 9. Remove the hair tie carefully and add any hair product you like.

 Voilà!

 (Excuse the frizz, I have only combed it with my fingers and I didn't even look into the mirror, haha)