I’d seen rave reviews about Vanessa Half Wig La Jay (Color 1B)
I ordered from Amazon.com and the total cost ended up being around 24 dollars. I always get the same color as my natural hair since my goal is to emulate my own hair as much as possible.
It arrived promptly and once I tore open the bag, I saw how huge this sucker is. I’d seen in the reviews that it was a lot of hair, but seeing as I have a lot of hair anyway, I didn’t think I’d be fazed.
It is a lot of hair. Even to me. Especially for a half wig.
I was fluffing it up and getting a better look at it when my 12 month old comes toddling over, points to the wig and said “dawg”, gave it a pat, and toddled away. Silly girl, she doesn’t know about Mommy’s hair obsession yet.
There were some frizzy areas on mine which is perfect. I didn’t find it to be particularly shiny but I did pat a little cornstarch on it just to be safe. It is a synthetic wig and has two combs that attach near the crown and at the nape, though I may be cutting out the comb at the nape.
So I decided to go ahead and try it out. Warning, this first time was a disaster!
I washed my hair, deep conditioned, rinsed, and set to styling. After applying moisturizer, I did some ill formed, terrible looking cornrows.
Sopping wet, huge cornrows! Next time I think I will do them on dry stretched hair. (Side note: A lot of you newly natural ladies write to me about how you feel like you just can't style your hair and you wish you could do your hair like I do mine. For what it's worth, when I tell you that you just have to practice and experiment, you really do! I've been wanting to learn how to cornrow for a long time. I have not been practicing it and that's why I still suck at it. This is the closest I have come to getting it right, but the main thing is that I know that if I keep trying, I will get it right! And you will too!)
Anyway, even though they looked horrible, my hair was moisturized and protected in the area the wig would cover.
I thought long and hard about whether or not I should trim the wig. First, I was afraid of messing it up. Sure it was only 24 dollars, but, shoot it’s a recession (I have been waiting to say that!)
Second, I wasn’t sure how it would look on my head anyway, so I thought it best to wear it out first and see how I felt about it as it was. I have a big head so what might look huge on some people looks appropriate on me.
I viewed quite a few suggestions online as how to wear La Jay. I settled on a puff-like style. I hesitated to do a puff because my ends are still recovering from the horrors of postpartum shedding, but I knew if I didn’t pull it back too tight, I’d be ok.
I just applied moisturizer to the front of my hair and tried to scrunch the ends a bit. I then applied the wig and brushed all the hair back lightly, followed by an ouchless band to make the puff. At first, I thought it looked great and blended pretty well with the rest of the hair.
Then it dried.
The difference in the textures looked pretty obvious in the mirror but once I took pictures, I was a little ashamed that I’d worn it out like that! I was also surprised because several people thought it was my real hair. I also realized, after I took picture, that I had a bit of a cornrow showing. Bleh!
That looks a little better but you can see the start of that darn cornrow above my ear. Fingerparting is getting me in trouble, lol.
In addition to my own mistakes, the wig also was too long for my taste. My fro does not fall like that so I took it off when I got home and got to cutting.
As you can see, I didn’t cut that much but what I did cut made a world of difference.
The next day, I tried again. Oh, and here is how much hair I left out.
I loosely braided it up over night.
I thought about trying the style I’d seen in this video because I thought it would be easier to blend. I may still try that style, but I ended up rewetting and using Fantasia IC gel and my Denman to define my curls in the front. I really didn’t want to use a gel and I can’t tell you the last time I’ve used one, but I was curious to see if it would work.
I’m no expert on wigs, but I’d say it turned out pretty well!
Back--None of that hair is mine...very pretty though!
I just used a few bobby pins to pin my hair back from the forehead area.
My edges are growing back nicely, so I pretty much left them alone instead of brushing them back. The wig and my hair ended up covering them nicely.
Overall, I give this wig 2 thumbs up. I’ll be wearing it the rest of this week and also a lot in the near future. I’ll try to update how it holds up to wear and tear and any other styles I try out with it.
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