Monday 6 April 2015

Easter 2015 hair changes

Easter 2015 is here already! Time flies when you're having a great year.
Somehow it is already April, and the first part of the term just finished - I'm now on break for two weeks but still studying hard with assignments and essays due when I get back.
This Easter I decided to have a little more fun than usual...
Since doing the no shampoo thing I've been using less and less hair dye. Most recently I experimented with using a prepared hydrogen peroxide solution. I chose that brand because I'd used it years before. A word of warning though - do use gloves and don't let the spray go on your skin. I ended up with some mild burning on my skin around my hairline from using it. It cleared up without needing any medical intervention though, so I was lucky. Always read the label and use how it says to.
I've also tried to use some other mixtures to lighten my hair.
There are pins on pinterest that suggest using things like lemon juice; honey or chamomile tea to lighten hair. While these are all good ingredients on the hair alone - I thought I'd mix them up in a couple of cups of boiling water to ensure the tea could steep, and the honey could melt.
Then I left it all to cool for 24 hours, which turned into 36 hours by the time I'd remembered to use it! I actually popped it into the fridge when it was cold enough just to be sure nothing would go weird by being left on the bench for so long.

I put it in a spray bottle and just applied it like I normally do with my vinegar rinse. Doing it like that makes it easier to apply and you can easily section out your hair to ensure it's all covered.
I left the mixture on my hair (didn't rinse it out) and on the second day after doing it (dried naturally) about 36 hours after the wash it now feels greasy and oily. So for me this doesn't work as a rinse. I'm going to need to adjust it further.
Weirdly lemon juice left on the hair and me sitting in the sun shine, or using a warm hair drier does lighten my hair quite well.
But it seems that Chamomile does not lighten my hair alone.

In future I think I'll stick with the chemical version - with the hydrogen peroxide etc if I feel the need to lighten it drastically. The lemon juice takes a while to gradually change colours so that is worth the wait, I'm just impatient and like changes more drastically and quickly!
Lemon juice lightening seems to bring out my red tints more than anything else, so the Hydrogen Peroxide definitely gets higher points for the ability to make my hair actually go blonder.

So three days ago, on Good Friday I decided to bite the metaphorical bullet and go ahead with the dye I'd had sitting in the cupboard. I took 1 full tube of Fudge Paintbox in the tone of Hawaii Blue, along with 1/2 a tube of Whiter shade of pale (the mixer, toner thing that makes things go more pastel toned), and mixed it all with another full tube of Pink Moon and a 2/3 full tube also of pink moon.


The above image is my hair with just the Fudge Paintbox tone of "Pink Moon". I used maybe half a tube in it in this photo. It was done on totally bleached hair, which was in super bad condition. At this time I was Conditioner Only (a variation of low poo where a Low Conditioner is used, it has no silicones, sulfates or parabens), but the real fix for my hair was cutting it all off about a year later. 
I reapplied the dye again a while later as it had faded quickly and used another 3/4 of a tube worth... That's why I had leftovers - as below;

There are pictures of all three dyes here.

In the link above they made the colours more pastel, but ensuring there was a higher ratio of the Whiter Shade of Pale, I didn't do this and the colour came out a lot differently as you can see in my photos below.

I mixed the dyes all up in a squeeze bottle like those used for condiments. This one was about $3 from a local plastics bottles supply shop. (This dye happens to have been sitting on my bathroom counter for a few days now. I don't know what happens with dye that's been premixed and left to sit. Hopefully nothing is effected. We will see ...)



I ended up applying half the mixture to my hair. I dampened my hair under a hot shower, dried it off with a towel and then applied it all over. I didn't comb the mixture in (because I'm a rebel), but I did make sure it was all knot-free by combing it well before jumping in the shower to wet it and again just before applying the dye.

The shower cap is recommended to help with the processing. It also helped to keep the dye off my earrings, which I didn't remove. *Be wary of doing this as metal can react with dye if it touches them.



After 30 minutes processing time. I rinsed the dye out in warm water in the shower. The tube directions recommend using shampoo during this stage, but I didn't (what?! I'm a rebel!). Just rinsed really well until the water was clear then continued a while longer. 
I like to ensure the dye is totally gone, and kind of massage my scalp during this time.

Below; more shots of my partially dried hair. I used the hair drier just enough to stop it dripping everywhere after towel drying it. Now I'm air drying the last drops of water out:




My scalp is a little purple stained in places, but this will continue to wash out more over time.
Also still some totally blonde looking bits of hair nearer the back where I didn't apply so much dye.




Loving the temporary change.
I also applied a little of the diluted vinegar spray I use for my normal no poo conditioner after dyeing it, which may remove some dye? I'm not 100% sure if it did or not. It may explain the lack of dye uptake. I didn't apply the vinegar rinse before the dye though, that rinse was just to wet hair and had nothing added on my hair before the dye was applied.

Fudge Paintbox dye is temporary and rinses out in 3-30 washes depending on how porous the hair is. Mine is currently virgin hair aka natural and a mix of some lightened parts (from hydrogen peroxide), so some of it will be purple for longer than other parts - I expect the ends which are blonder will stay purple longer, and the roots end will fade faster, or not show the purple for as long or as brightly.





The purple is very very faint, and didn't take well even on my lightened hair. It's really subtle though - perfect if you're working somewhere that doesn't allow unnaturally coloured hair!
I am thinking that I'll reapply more dye in a couple of days time to see how it takes with a second go.
Now that it is dry, I'm absent-mindedly Scritching my hair, and as I do so more of that purple dye residue off my scalp is going under my nails. It's easy to rub off them though.

NB: Fudge Paintbox does contain silicones so sadly it does go against the Low / No shampoo routine, but I can't use Henna due to allergy. I'd rather have a little fun and use them up, than try and sell them or anything like that. Great for a little Easter fun. 

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