updaaaate

I started a new job over the summer and it's sucking the life out of me. Basically my life is this: wake up, get dressed, go to work for 10 hours, come home and eat dinner, shower, go to bed. My work commute is long and just adds to the exhaustion.

Now I am job hunting, trying to find something closer to home with a more steady schedule so I can have some sort of life outside work. This unfortunately means I have to tone down my hair. I got rid of the pink at the end of summer by fading it and applying Manic Panic Electric Lava which gave me a lovely orange ombre and I would've left it alone if I wasn't trying to find a new job.

Any way, I wanted to stick with red and wanted it to still be bright. I took my inspiration from L'oreal Feria Mango Intense Copper. I'm allergic to PPD used in permanent dyes (and did not want the extra damage) so I could not actually use the Feria dye. I created a similar shade with Adore colors. I used Ginger, Orange Blaze and Paprika. Next time I dye I will use less Orange Blaze and Ginger and more Paprika because it took 3 attempts to get it to look more brown and less traffic cone orange.

The color on the Feria box looks more muted than pictures of it on hair, a quick google search shows how bright it is.

Conair You Curl and Garnier Wonder Waves

Recently picked up the purple Conair You Curl curling wand. I never ever ever curl my hair because every attempt usually winds up as a big fat fail! I just can't do the right side of my head with a curling iron or a straightener so this curling wand thing was my final attempt at having curls/ waves. (I also have those bendy foam stick things to curl with out heat but they are super uncomfortable to sleep in and give me large tight curls that make my hair shoulder length.)

As you can see, I am totally able to use the You Curl! I will do a proper review of this thing after vacation, one with pictures of the product and all LOL. I can't guarantee you will see pictures of me using it since I haven't mastered taking a photo on my phone with my foot, but there will be before and afters at least.

The styling product I use to hold the curl is Garnier Wonder Waves. It holds them really well but I don't like how it makes my hair feel. My hair gets dry and kind of crunchy and I have to wash it out at the end of the day. If I sleep with it in my hair gets tangled very badly. Ugh, but NOTHING else seems to hold curls for me. Well, at least my hair looks soft.

Hair Dye Primer

This is going to be a brief explanation of the different kinds of hair dye- semi, demi, and permanent. The terms are often confusing and can cause people to choose the wrong dye.

Ombre Hair

Been working towards lighter ends and making a red-orange-yellow ombre instead of going Napalm Orange. Special Effects STILL is not producing or shipping colors regularly. I make my own neon orange by mixing Sparks Orange, Sparks Yellow and N'Rage Bubble Gum Pink.

I'm not sure my ends will be able to go as light as I'd like due to the hair being old and possible staining from all the red and orange dyes used previously. They are down from a level 4 to about a level 7 now so I think that's pretty good.

Preventing Hair Color Fade

Adore Paprika dye used here

There are few things in the world that catch my eye like bright freshly colored hair (especially when it's orange). Shiny, vibrant, beautiful... until you wash it then it's a drab murky mess...

Hair Bleaching Tips

Lightening your hair has the potential to go very, very wrong. Nobody wants chewy, stretchy hair that looks like mozzarella cheese. [video link]

I am by no means a professional and I don't have any professional training. The following tips are compiled from research I did before bleaching my own hair and from personal experience. 

Hair Update

I love playing around with different dyes. Right now I currently have a mix that is about 70% Adore Orange Blaze, 20% Sparks Orange Crush and 10% Manic Panic Electric Lava. These pictures were taken after one wash.

The Adore and Sparks dyes don't quite have the sticking power of Electric Lava, but EL is one of those dyes that stains hair and doesn't like to budge. The fade is a little patchy because the front section of my hair has been dyed a zillion more times than the back but it's not too bad.

My work place had a policy change that allows us to have visible tattoos and piercings and have any color hair we want so I am tranistioning to a more "in-your-face" bright orange. I plan on doing a bleach bath to lighten up my ends a bit more and get everything brighter.

I'm not totally sure whether it was Special Effects Fish Bowl or Manic Panic Atomic Turquoise used on the clip but I'm thinking it's most likely the Manic Panic. This poor clip in extension somehow wound up stuffed in my junk drawer and became a horrible matted mess. I was able to salvage it but so much hair fell out of it I was sure it was destined for the trash. Neutrogena Triple Moisture mask is a god send for extensions both human hair and synthetic!

Tresemme Split Remedy Serum Review

Tresemme Split Remedy Serum is one of several Tresseme products that contain polyquanternium-28 and PVM/MA copolymer which make up the PEC complex.

As we learned from the PEC post (thanks to the Beauty Brains), the PEC complex is a proven winner for sealing split ends.

Despite knowing that the PEC complex works I was hesitant to try this product. I honestly do not have good luck with Tresemme products and I tried the Split Remedy Leave In Conditioning Treatment and HATED it (that product has the PEC complex too but made my hair feel disgusting).

This product was purchased by me at Walmart 

The PEC Complex- Hair Repair That Works!

Please visit this very informative post over at the Beauty Brains. Be sure to watch the video and see it in action.

How to keep bangs/ fringe looking perfect with an oily forehead

Bangs and an oily forehead are generally not a good mix, having hair over your face can increase oiliness and result in greasy gross hair. With a bit of effort it is possible to avoid this.

don't let this picture fool you, my forehead could join OPEC

Start with your skin by applying an oil reducing primer or lotion. I'm fond of Clean and Clear Finishes Mattifying Moisturizer because it is not overly drying. After applying my makeup I finish it off with a mattifying powder like Fyrinnae Fluff, Mattify Cosmetics Mattify Ultra, Maybelline Dream Matte, etc. This will help keep the oil at bay for as long as possible.

Next, it's prepping the hair. If your hair is already greasy it's best to wash it, if not move along. My "secret weapon" of sorts is Fyrinnae Fluff, it's a silica powder for your face but I like to powder my bangs with it. It keeps them looking fresh ALL DAY with out the white cast that dry shampoo gives. Even when my forehead has become an oil slick Fluff helps protect my bangs from absorbing it.

Speaking of which, it is inevitable that your face will regain its oily shine eventually even after all this prep work. Blotting papers are one of the best solutions as they actually remove the oil from the skin. They are rather cheap and pretty easy to come by as well. After blotting away as much oil as possible I re-powder with whatever mattifying powder I have available (usually the now discontinued but amazing Hard Candy one since it lives in my purse).

While conventional wisdom says you can't have bangs with an oily face I say go for it if you really want them.

Ion Color Brilliance Powdered Lightener and 30 Volume Sensitive Scalp Developer Reviews

Previously when I bleached part of my hair I used a Manic Panic Flash Lightening Kit because it was what was available where I got my Manic Panic hair dye. I was never that fond of the MP bleach kits and I had a hard time lightening my hair with it. Since I had nothing left of it I decided to hunt for something better to do my roots with and touch up the parts of my hair that were still rather dark...

I turned to Sally Beauty this time and picked up two products from Ion, Color Brilliance Powdered Lightener and Color Brilliance 30 Vol Sensitive Scalp Developer in the giant sizes since they were on sale for like $5 a piece. I also got a giant bottle of the Ion Color Defense conditioner, which is a bit silicone-y but does seem to make my hair dye bleed a lot less.

The Ion Color Brilliance bleach and developer work so so so so much better on my hair than the Manic Panic bleach. Instead of being a slightly green light brown after a freaking hour my hair is golden after 30 minutes, roots are platinum in 15 minutes. Ion Color Brilliance makes my root touch ups much less daunting since I am able to be done in about 10 minutes.

These products are safe for on scalp use, but it's still bleach and 30 vol developer and this needs to be done carefully. I try to keep it off my scalp as best as possible because chemical burns are no joke. So far I have done 4 root treatments and I have not had any redness, flaking, weeping, burning, tingling or any other issues. My hair doesn't feel gummy or fried directly after rinsing but it is noticeably dry, this is to be expected with bleach though. After I finish with conditioning Manic Panic dye my bleached hair feels about the same as the virgin hair at the nape of my neck (this hair doesn't get dyed, teased or straightened).

Over all, I can't recommend this stuff enough. My hair typically resists lightening but the Ion products do the job and don't leave me with muddy and patchy results. I widened the red-orange section of my hair and didn't get any greenish or brassy bits down the length of my hair, it was such a pretty bright golden color I almost didn't want to dye over it.

L'oreal EverCreme Cleansing Conditioner: First Impressions

 L'oreal EverCreme Cleansing Conditioner is an alternative to shampoo. The idea behind washing with conditioner is to strip less moisture from the hair and leave it softer, shinier and less frizzy.

Garnier Fructis Sleek & Shine Moroccan Sleek Oil Treatment Review

Could that product name be any longer?

This is an argan oil treatment but it also contains apricot oil and carrot oil (and a bunch of other ingredients that are not oil). It comes in a 3.75 fl oz bottle, which is perfect for storing in my purse and half of why I bought it. I need something to tame frizzies on the go because my hair hates me! LOL not really, but my scalp refuses to produce any oil of its own (probably because my forehead has enough to join OPEC) so my hair is very dry.

This product claims to be instantly absorbed and that it will condition with out leaving your hair oily. I agree with those claims, this stuff is absorbed FAST- I have to move quickly to keep my hands from soaking it all up. It also doesn't make my hair feel greasy, just smooth and shiny.

I must note however, this product has enough fragrance to down a horse and kinda smells like "old lady". The scent does fade but not as fast as I'd like it to.

Real Hair- Black Berry Juice

From about the age of 12 I wanted to dye my hair blue but my parents would never allow it. Then, around the age of 16 I wanted pink hair, but again, wasn't to be until I could move out. At 17 I enlisted in the Air Force so even though I was now out of my parent's house Uncle Sam wouldn't allow me to dye it any unnatural colors. Since then my hair has been various shades of dark red and brown and black. BORING.

Cut to last year when my enlistment ends and I'm finally free to dye my hair- or not. My other job won't allow it either! Now in addition to not being able to dye my hair anything fun I have developed an allergy to PPD. I thought I was going to be stuck with my dull brown-black hair for life.

Recently I was struck with an idea- what if the unnatural color was so dark that nobody would notice enough to say anything at work... With pink and blue out I decided to attempt a color I once tried to get from a box dye and failed (it turned candy apple red): black berry juice, purple-black!

But wait--- how was I going to get black in my hair with out PPD!? CRAP! Cue sad face. I began a search for a PPD free black that lead me down a few dead ends, everything just made my hair several shades short of black. I wasn't going to attempt henna and indigo either as a renter in a stark white apartment. Like a moron I forgot about what I knew all along- Manic Panic makes a black dye that's PPD free! 

Here's how I achieved my purple-black hair:
I started with my "virgin" abused but unbleached dry hair and applied a nice thick coat of Manic Panic Raven. I left it on for 30 minutes and then rinsed. I did not used heat or a plastic cap because I did not want my hair to become jet black.

Once my hair had dried I was please to see it was the soft black I was aiming for. *insert success meme here*

The next day I applied a nice thick coat of Manic Panic Ultra Violet, the blue based purple. I originally wanted Special Effects Deep Purple but I just grabbed Ultra Violet when I got Raven.  Any way, I left Ultra Violet on for 2 hours. I was going to apply heat but decided not to since my hair is damaged and I'm trying to avoid heat. My hair did came out the color I wanted with out using heat.

One thing I love about Manic Panic (and similar veggie dyes) is how conditioning it is. Unlike dyes that need to penetrate into the hair and thus rough up the cuticle veggie dyes are basically tints and sit on the outside of the hair. This type of dye is non damaging and really makes my hair feel soft due to the extra conditioning ingredients. One more thing I love is my hair is STRAIGHT again and I didn't need to use a flat iron. Not sure if this effect will last since the "hair gets wavy in your mid 20s" gene runs in my mom's side of the family.

My hair is just purple enough to not be boring black and hopefully not so purple that I'll get in trouble at work.

Das Haar

Want to know more about my "hair"?

Quest For BIG Hair- Not Your Mother's Girl Powder Review

My hair is thin, fine, limp, dry, frizzy and relatively lifeless in its natural state. As a result it has spent most of its life in a pony tail or bun (due to military service), but I am bored with all that. In my quest for big hair I have tried a lot of "volumizing" products and most just don't do anything for me. Volumizing shampoos and conditioner are too drying and make my hair feel like straw.

Using deep conditioner and coconut oil I have conquered the dryness and frizz for the most part. Now I need to turn my hair from limp and blah to at least normal hair volume. Today, this is where Not Your Mother's Girl Powder Volumizing Powder comes in.