I love the Curly Girl routine! XD I've been doing it since about... mid-September. I even got my boyfriend to start doing it, though he's juuust about as curly as I am.

It's improved the condition of my hair /dramatically/... and decreased my amount of fall-out, though that could be partially because one of the conditioners I use is designed to do just that. The increase in the strength of the strands is amazing,  too,  and they just get stronger as I continue to use products containing protein.

You gotta love being able to /pull/ on a shed strand of hair quite a bit before it finally snaps.

The no-shampoo routine explained in Curly Girl, by Lorraine Massey, has you using conditioner and friction to clean your scalp, instead of shampoo, and has you wash in a manner that doesn't disturb the natural lay of the hair. You also do not use a brush or a comb, or a ton of styling products -- if you follow the routine, all you need is gel, if that. And most silicones are not something you want to use if you're following this routine, unless they're water soluble, or maybe not even then. Since you aren't using shampoo, the non-water soluble silicones can build up.

The conditioner you use is supposed to contain protein, humectants, emollients, and... uhm... I forget the fourth thing. ^^; You cleanse by putting conditioner on your fingers, and then basically giving yourself a nice massage over your entire scalp. Then you rinse out, and condition the length of your hair. If you need to, you can either not rinse all your conditioner out, or apply more after the rinse -- Ms. Massey recommends using regular conditioner as a leave-in, since most leave-ins are not moisturizing enough.

Since I've started following this routine, the health of my hair has improved dramatically. It's not as dry, it's much stronger, and I have less fall out. (But that's partially because the conditioner I cleanse with is designed to prevent fall out...) I saw results within a week, literally. And other people started noticing within about three weeks. And I gotta admit... it's cheap!

$10 for the book, and then $5 every 6 weeks for another bottle of my regular conditioner (I go through it fast.), and I haven't used more than... half of the bottle of the conditioner I cleanse with (which was $17)... and my gel costs me $1.50, and will probably last as long as the cleansing conditioner. I like having nice looking hair, but I have better things (like books!) to spend my free money on.

I haven't totally managed to follow the whole thing yet - I'm too addicted to getting it untangled before going to bed 

But, it has now reached a point where I can comb out the tangles in a couple of minutes, rather than taking a brush to it for half an hour.

I'm still using plain old Suave naturals conditioner, too - I used to go through 2 bottles of shampoo for every bottle of conditioner, so when it went on sale, I stocked up, and now have 5 huge unopened bottles left before I can buy something else.

Whoever mentioned Suave's aloe gel - that stuff is awesome.  I also use Johnson&Johnson's kids spray-in detangler....a life saver on windy days.

The only time I comb my hair is when I'm going to wear it braided -- I get it wet, add some extra conditioner with a pinch of sweet almond oil (because I have a little lying around.), then I comb it out and braid it.

I don't comb it dry nor when I want to wear it curly, and I never brush it. To help hold my curls, I sometimes use a little gel. Weirdly enough, I've found that using one of my regular conditioners as a leave-in works just as well as gel does for me.

I just measured yesterday. It's 24.5" inches.

It's /very/ curly when it's shorter -- when it's around my shoulders, it curls up past my chin in tight ringlets. In the dry winter cold, it curls up to give me about a 4"-5" spring. (If I pull it straight, then measure the difference between where it was when it was curly vs. pulled straight, I get that.) Once it's warmer and more humid, it's more along the lines of 6"-8".

I get more curl out of my hair when I scrunch it, especially when I've gotten it soaking wet. Have you tried that?

Scrunching is grabbing handfuls of your hair at the ends -- well, more like gathering the ends in your palm. -- then pushing it all up against your scalp. I usually do this with a towel when my hair is wet, to dry it.

I've been deliberately growing my hair out for... Uhm... *thinks* Almost three years. Only really been taking good care of it for a year, so it's amazing that I don't have a ton of split ends.

Do you curly-heads find it easy to leave your hair down whenever you feel like it?