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Elizabeth E
February 24th, 2019, 05:11 AM
Ugh, I haven't posted here in ages. But I'm very happy to say that after 16 months of growing my hair, I finally, FINALLY managed to make a decent nautilus bun! It definitely feels like something worth celebrating :happydance:

My previous attempts at a nautilus always ended with a lopsided knot sagging to the nape of my neck and though I'd still like to practice making it a little tighter, I am very happy with the way today's attempt turned out. To hold it up, I used two chopsticks which I'd cut a little shorter and painted silver.
https://imgur.com/nJzECqs
https://imgur.com/shdlyoT
https://imgur.com/ffDZktS
Surely, I cannot be the only one who struggled so long??

Katsura
February 24th, 2019, 05:19 AM
Very pretty! Your hair color is lovely too. :heart:
My nautilus buns look puny, or then they won't hold properly.

Simsy
February 24th, 2019, 06:05 AM
Very pretty, and so lovely and fluffy.

You’re not the only one to struggle a bit with it either; I had to modify the hand position and the initial wrap before I could get it to work for me. Now it’s my most used bun, and I have only just started to learn and occasionally use the correct hand position. Once you get it working though, such an awesome feeling.

MusicalSpoons
February 24th, 2019, 06:52 AM
Very nice!

When I found LHC my hair was already too long for a nautilus because it was too thin and compressible (there wasn't enough hair in the first wrap to hold all the rest) so the middle just fell out, and I couldn't do a stable one until I read about double-wrapping. I can now do an ordinary nautilus if I hold it with a 4-prong fork, but I'm still more comfortable with a double-wrapped LWB. You won't have the same problems as me though, with your hair type :)

lapushka
February 24th, 2019, 07:10 AM
Very pretty. I couldn't do a Nautilus until FTL. Leading up to that bun, I wore a LWB all the time, which is a bun you can usually do a little faster, with shorter lengths.

I think it honestly depends on length (and thickness).

eresh
February 24th, 2019, 07:32 AM
Looks great!
I did my very first nautilus bun too this week :-)

Elizabeth E
February 24th, 2019, 08:32 AM
Thank you all!
It's good to hear I'm not the only one struggling. My hair is coarser, so I don't have trouble with buns slipping out of place, but the weight of it tends to make them sag down. It doesn't matter whether I start my buns high or medium, they somehow always end up as low buns :shrug:
Oh and I forgot to add, but I always oil my hair before doing hair styles (that's why it's looking so shiny) otherwise I will never get my buns and braids to be so smooth.

eresh, congratulations! It feels like such a victory.

Groovy Granny
February 24th, 2019, 11:35 AM
Yay for your success :applause

It took me a while to get it also, but now I use it more than the LWB which I must modify ;)

Beautiful hair and bun :heart:

Aunt Rapunzel
February 24th, 2019, 11:43 AM
Beautiful! The bun, and your hair color!

meteor
February 24th, 2019, 03:46 PM
Congratulations, Elizabeth E! :joy: Your nautilus bun looks really beautiful and stable! :applause

(I still can't do a nautilus :oops: , probably due to some issues twisting up a loop and pushing all the hair through a loop..., but that's OK, I have other buns I can work with)


I can now do an ordinary nautilus if I hold it with a 4-prong fork, but I'm still more comfortable with a double-wrapped LWB.

Sorry, what's a double-wrapped LWB? :) Is it something like this (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VNK0EPX7G1Q) or this (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08Sqx1uuCdE)? Or something completely different? :flower:

MusicalSpoons
February 24th, 2019, 03:59 PM
Congratulations, Elizabeth E! :joy: Your nautilus bun looks really beautiful and stable! :applause

(I still can't do a nautilus :oops: , probably due to some issues twisting up a loop and pushing all the hair through a loop..., but that's OK, I have other buns I can work with)



Sorry, what's a double-wrapped LWB? :) Is it something like this (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VNK0EPX7G1Q) or this (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08Sqx1uuCdE)? Or something completely different? :flower:

Kind of like the second, but hand-wrap, stem-wrap, hand-wrap, stem-wrap remaining length rather than 2 hand-wraps then stem-wrap remaining length. It's wispe's variant, detailed here: https://forums.longhaircommunity.com/showthread.php?t=132366&page=2&p=3492603&viewfull=1#post3492603

I would wrap first around my fingers/thumb, then the base, then back around the fingers/thumb, then the rest around the base.

Makes it much more secure for me :) and the only way I could stop the middle falling out of a LWB without doing it ridiculously tight!

lithostoic
February 24th, 2019, 04:17 PM
Yayy it looks great! I still can't do a nautilus, don't have the length to wrap around. Double wrapped lwb is my go-to at hip length.

meteor
February 24th, 2019, 04:17 PM
Kind of like the second, but hand-wrap, stem-wrap, hand-wrap, stem-wrap remaining length rather than 2 hand-wraps then stem-wrap remaining length. It's wispe's variant, detailed here: https://forums.longhaircommunity.com/showthread.php?t=132366&page=2&p=3492603&viewfull=1#post3492603


Makes it much more secure for me :) and the only way I could stop the middle falling out of a LWB without doing it ridiculously tight!

^ Oh that's awesome! Very neat tip! Thanks so much, MusicalSpoons! :flowers: That's an awesome bunning method... I already gravitate toward double-looping (e.g. spidermom's bun, L-infinity...) because it distributes weight a lot better and sits more securely at current length, so I'm really happy to find out about this new style of LWB bunning. Thank you, MusicalSpoons! :D

tlatzoteotl
February 25th, 2019, 09:52 AM
It took me a long time to be able to do a nautilus - I had to grow it out for quite a while, and then I had to hack it, since the way other people do it doesn't work for me. As soon as it's wrapped around my hand I immediately switch to holding the loop with my thumb and forefinger. It's about hip length right now, and it's my go-to everyday bun. And, I'm very excited to say, it's finally long enough to wrap twice! Just barely...most of the time it's too tight and my scalp protests, but when it's close to time to wash it again it's not so fluffy and isn't so difficult. I'm excited to keep growing and try new, more intricate buns. I just need another 10 inches, lol.

MusicalSpoons
February 25th, 2019, 10:41 AM
You're most welcome meteor! I didn't know there were other ways to modify a LWB before you posted those links so I've learned something too :D

bparnell75
February 25th, 2019, 10:51 AM
Congrats, Elizabeth, Your thickness is to be envied. I am in the same category as Musical spoons. Thin so it hardly works. It truly does depend on thickness and length.

I do not like buns that have a butt when wrapped and both a nautilus and a LWB have those when I do them in my hair. So I rejected them a long time ago as styles for me. I prefer Spock, Nessa, and pencil wrap buns on top of my had or Posh buns done low in back of the head.

Elizabeth E
February 26th, 2019, 12:38 AM
Thank you all! :heartbeat
tlatzoteotl, I just realized how similar our hair is in texture and thickness. I'm also nearly at hip-length - hoping to be solidly there by middle April. There are still many bun hairstyles I would like to try as my hair gets longer...

tlatzoteotl
February 26th, 2019, 10:24 AM
Very cool, Elizabeth! Have you ever had you hair highlighted using a cap and had the hairdresser nearly curse the day you were born? LMAO...it's a curse and blessing. I'm just glad that I've finally figured out how to style my hair to get it off my neck and not damage it...I only had to be middle-aged first.

Elizabeth E
February 26th, 2019, 11:08 AM
Very cool, Elizabeth! Have you ever had you hair highlighted using a cap and had the hairdresser nearly curse the day you were born? LMAO...it's a curse and blessing. I'm just glad that I've finally figured out how to style my hair to get it off my neck and not damage it...I only had to be middle-aged first.

No dye or bleach has ever touched my hair and I plan to keep it that way, lol. I've been to a hair dresser only twice in my life for trims and each time got comments on how 'healthy' my hair was. And that was long before I joined LHC and actually started taking proper care of it! My mum and I have always trimmed each other's hair and I recently learned to trim it myself, so...somewhere, a hair dresser is being spared the curse of having to handle my hair ;)

tlatzoteotl
February 26th, 2019, 12:03 PM
It was a one-time thing - my grandmother wanted to give it to me for my birthday. Thankfully I've always kind of intuitively known how to take care of my hair. My routine for the past 10 years or so has been to wash my hair about once a week with Aubrey Organics shampoo & conditioner (I'm steadily on Sundays now), and several years ago I learned about only washing the scalp and only conditioning the ends. I don't use hairdryers often, and I haven't had a curling iron touch my hair in almost 20 years. That's mostly because they have no effect. Hairspray and curling irons be damned, my hair will not stay curled. LOL My hair was relegated to braids and ponytails or just split down the middle straight. It's kinda funny...I've been doing buns with hairsticks for about a year and half now, and it still gives me so much joy.

Oh yeah! I just started doing my own trimming over the past few months! The last time I had anyone cut my hair was October 2017. I've done two self-trims since then, and I was really happy with the way it came out. Although I need better shears.

Wildcat Diva
February 26th, 2019, 10:07 PM
You could always try this variant:

https://forums.longhaircommunity.com/showthread.php?t=131084&highlight=Puffed

Elizabeth E
February 27th, 2019, 12:19 AM
It was a one-time thing - my grandmother wanted to give it to me for my birthday. Thankfully I've always kind of intuitively known how to take care of my hair. My routine for the past 10 years or so has been to wash my hair about once a week with Aubrey Organics shampoo & conditioner (I'm steadily on Sundays now), and several years ago I learned about only washing the scalp and only conditioning the ends. I don't use hairdryers often, and I haven't had a curling iron touch my hair in almost 20 years. That's mostly because they have no effect. Hairspray and curling irons be damned, my hair will not stay curled. LOL My hair was relegated to braids and ponytails or just split down the middle straight. It's kinda funny...I've been doing buns with hairsticks for about a year and half now, and it still gives me so much joy.

Oh yeah! I just started doing my own trimming over the past few months! The last time I had anyone cut my hair was October 2017. I've done two self-trims since then, and I was really happy with the way it came out. Although I need better shears.

Glad to hear your hair didn't suffer too much!

I also wash mine only once a week and unless my lengths are heavily oiled, I shampoo only my scalp. And curling irons never worked for my hair! I completely quit using a hair dryer even before joining LHC because I hated the frizz and how it would leave my hair feeling coarser instead of smoother.
On a daily basis, I actually prefer small claw clips to hair sticks: I put four around the edges of my bun and it keeps it secure like nothing else. It's only when going out that I put in hair sticks.

And yes, self-trimming is great! It saves you the cost of going to a hair dresser and most likely NOT getting the result you wanted.

Elizabeth E
February 27th, 2019, 12:20 AM
You could always try this variant:

https://forums.longhaircommunity.com/showthread.php?t=131084&highlight=Puffed

Thanks for the tutorial! I will try it out soon.