Sunday, October 16, 2011

Conair Instant Heat Hot Roller Review + GIVEAWAY *CLOSED*!!

So the surprise is here!  I'm having a GIVEAWAY for an awesome set of hot rollers by Conair!

This is going to be an extra long post due to this--I'm going to post my review of these rollers and then down at the bottom will be the giveaway rules and forms.  So check it out!

The Conair Xtreme Instant Heat Rollers heat up in just 75 seconds and come with clips instead of the traditional pins.  

Here are the hot rollers I received for review!  They come with twenty ceramic rollers in three different sizes:

Pink rollers for the win!
Here's what they look like out of the box.  The set of rollers are all in a heated compartment along with a separate heating unit for three clips at a time.  I really like the idea of clips because my old set of hot rollers uses pins that you pretty much have to dig into your scalp to get to stay in. 


Here are all of the clips that come with the set!

Three different sizes: 6 medium .75", 6 large 1", and 8 jumbo 1.25"!
Now that you've seen all there is that come with these rollers, I'm going to show you my hot roller how-to:

Here is what my natural hair looks like, dried with no product.

In desperate need of a hair fix.
Now here's how I used these hot rollers--I've actually used them twice, once I started when my hair was already dry and the next time I used them right out of the shower in a different configuration.  I'll describe that later.

First, let the curlers heat up.  When the curlers are fully heated, one of them has a heat sensor that will turn from red to white.  They only need 75 seconds to heat up fully!

Heat sensor dot in the bottom middle curler
While you wait, you can apply some product to keep the curls in.  If you're like me with my zero-natural-curly hair, you'll need it!  If your hair is dry, lift up sections of your hair and apply hair spray!

I'm so excited about hair spray.  I used cheap Suave hair spray!
OR if your hair is wet, you can follow the following three steps:

Mousse and dry completely!  I used Victoria's Secret So Sexy Mousse because it smells soooo good.

Next take small sections of your hair, put the roller at the end, wrap your hair around it, and roll towards your scalp:

My face was too weird for this picture, so I just zoomed in on the important part :)

Then clip in place!


Finish rolling up 1" to 2" sections of your hair until it's all in rollers:

Bathroom lighting was terrible...
Now, if you want looser curls, you can leave the curlers in for less time.  If you want tighter curls, leave them in for longer.  Each time I have them in I left them in for about 10-15 minutes.  The tightness of your curl also depends on the configuration of your curlers.  Obviously the smaller ones will also give you tighter curls, with the tightness decreasing as the size of your roller goes up!

Initially I tried these curlers with the smallest curlers in my top layer of hair and larger and medium ones underneath and here's what I got:

This is what it looked like relatively soon after I took out the curlers
After I brushed out the curls with my fingers, it loosened up a bit and ended up like this:

Less Bo Peep---more natural looking curls!

The next day or so, I tried these curlers again and used jumbo curlers on top and the medium ones on the bottom and ended up with looser curls in general:


Personally, I like this much better.  You just have to play around with the size of the curlers and how long you leave them in and find what best suits your hair!

Overall, I loved these curlers.  They are so much more comfortable than the traditional hot rollers with pins that I have.  Not to mention that since the clips are heated, you get heat not only from the roller, but the clip as well.  Since my hair is super layered, the clips also helped curl the stray hairs that normally stick out when I use hot rollers, so it all looked more even.  AND the clips also help keep some of the heat away from your scalp.  I don't know if I'm just a spaz or what but my old rollers got so hot and would lay on your head and just burn.  These don't do that.

My only issues with these curlers were that the clips made the rollers feel very loose.  However, since they only need to stay in for about 10 minutes, it's not a big issue.  I still could've easily applied make-up or gotten ready without a problem--just no working out or anything with them in ;)

It also would've been cool if there was a secret drawer underneath the product to store all the clips since you can only put 3 inside with the curlers, but I found a cute bag to put them in--so whatever!

Overall, not too much to complain about since they heat up so quickly and end up being so comfortable!

If you want to know more information about the curlers, you can check out their website here.  They also have a handy how-to video if you didn't like my tutorial :)

Onto the fun part!

The nice folks at Conair decided to allow me to host a giveaway for another set of these hot rollers for one lucky winner!  Here are the rules, please read them before entering!

1) You must be 18 or older to enter or else have your parents permission to give away your address if you win
2) This is open to U.S. residents only
3) Enter ONLY once, if you enter more than once you will be disqualified.  If you can't remember if you've entered, shoot me an e-mail at EStyles.WW@gmail.com and I'll let you know!
4) This is open until November 11, 2011 at 11:59 p.m. EST!
5) To enter you MUST be a follower via GFC.


You get 1 automatic entry for being a GFC follower and filling out the form!  Here are some ways you can get additional entries into the contest:


-Follow @ElementalStyles on Twitter [1 entry]
-Tweet about the giveaway (provide a direct link!) [2 entries]
-Follow Elemental Styles on Facebook (provide Facebook name) [1 entry]
-Blog about the giveaway (on sidebar, giveaway page or blog entry--provide a direct link) [2 entries for a link, 3 entries if you use one of the pictures]
-Add Elemental Styles to your blog roll (provide a link please!) [1 entry]
-Answer the extra question on the form [1 entry each]

This giveaway is now closed!  Thanks for entering :)

Also be sure to check out Conair's Facebook Page for cool product information!
 
<3 Whitney