Happy, happy

Hey, I can tell you that I was one happy girly on Sunday :)

I was preparing a future post about hair extensions and as I took the few prequisite “before” shots, I had the chance to compare my natural hair with some shots took earlier in the year.

This was my natural hair in July.

This is my natural hair now.

Yay, happy dance!

There is certainly some extra length there.

Now I’m not sure why. It may just be normal growth or maybe it is the Moroccan Oil and the less heat I consequently use on my hair or the fact that I am no longer wearing the heavy sew in extensions but exploring other methods such as the clip ins or taped. Or just maybe it is the Hair Growth and silcia tablets that I have been trying to pop daily.

Ok, so I still need extensions of one form or another to leave the house but I finally feel as if I’m getting there. My hair is getting longer and who knows? Just maybe by this time next year, I will dare to leave the house with locks that are 100% mine.

Spookily Nicoletta did a fab post on hair growth at the weekend. Have you got any tips for hair growth?

X

Magik results!

Hey, it seems that my recent ‘hauling’ did not end with fashion.

I have suddenly hunted down and stashed various goods in a final (some may say, desperate) frenzy as my mission grows ever closer to a year of age.

These include to name a few, a Kiehls eye cream; the Origins mushroom moisturiser; the Liz Earle cleanser; the Lush Mask of Magnamity and these little gems here.

Last night, I used a couple of these products. It was, in fact, a return to a couple of products that I raved about in one of my earliest posts, a shampoo and serum from Dead Sea SPA Magik.

The shampoo and conditioning products that I have mainly used for about the last eight weeks or so, have been the Rainforest shampoo and body butter from the Body Shop. Now although I have no complaints over the product and, indeed, am impressed that the products have lasted me so long. It seems my hair has now decided that it is stalemate time. For the last ten days or so, my hair has appeared increasingly blah. Lifeless and dull, I guess.

It may be that all it needed was a good clarifying shampoo but of course, since I’ve used these paraben free products such as Phyto and The Body Shop, I have suddenly become a bit too fearful of more “chemical” products. It is a silly psychological side effect but still I kept putting off finding a nice harsh shampoo because to me clarifying surely equals lots of scientific, tough, unforgiving ingredients to give the barnet a proper going over and clean the locks properly.

Giving the holy grail status that the Morrocan Oil Treatment has so deservedly earnt (in my opinion), I was very tempted to try the rest of their haircare range. With my main qualm being only the price.

So there I was in Holland and Barrett the other day, looking at face masks when the Dead Sea Spa Magik products caught my eye. I remember been so impressed last christmas with the products especially the serum that really you have to agree, I had nothing to lose by forking out just two pounds ninety five for a couple of sachets. One of the shampoo and one of the serum (they come together, the shampoo one is meant to be a freebie).

Now last time I remember my focus was on the magic serum (It really is called Hair Magic Serum and apparently it was voted best conditioner by Woman magazine) and the gloss and shine that this was to deliver. I also wanted the ‘thirst quenching’ ingredients that the products claim to contain. This time my hair is probably more hydrated maybe even slightly weighed down with conditioning products.

Therefore my focus was on the revitalising promise. I do remember the life that this brand gave my hair before and it just seems lately that my increasingly flat mop of hair, especially the roots, is crying out for some life and to be frank to, dance again.

Dead Sea Spa Magik claims this shampoo revitalises hair and wow, it really did. Again! My hair actually had proper volume (even after my normal mandatory application of moroccan oil) and looked a lot thicker after using these products. And in a strange but good way even though it looked like I had more hair (I love the way it bulked my layers out and made them look longer), my hair actually felt lighter and freer. It seemed easier to get the brush through and style.

And as if this was not good enough, it looked glossy. Yay. I think the serum may have had a hand in that.

I used the magic serum as a conditioner and massaged it right in to the scalp and down the length of the hair. I then left it about five minutes before rinsing out. Trust me, this stuff is magic and it probably would not be advisable to leave it in too much longer.

I shampooed generously twice and I still have maybe half the sachet of both the shampoo and serum left which I will be stowing away very safely.

I am really torn now between the moroccan oil haircare purchase plan or just buying the full size of these products. They really do seem to be that good.

Oh and yes, these Dead Sea products do claim to be made from the mud, salt and mineral extracts of the dead sea with some certified organic ingredients and no parabens.

So a volumiser, a clarifier and a moisturiser; these products could be billed magic and amazing. Maybe that is where my worry lies. In the long term, are such results too good to be true?! What do you think? Have you tried this brand? Do these products sound of interest to you? What haircare is making your hair sing and dance at the moment?

X

Chezspiration!

Ooh, have you seen Cheryl Cole’s new hair?

Picture from http://www.marieclaire.co.uk/news/celebrity/494814/cheryl-s-new-long-locks-love-or-hate.html. You can read more about Cheryl there.

Love!

Btw, I love the colour of her dress too.

As unoriginal as it may make me, Cheryl is one of my style inspirations.

This image was found through a Google image search. It is from http://anythinghollywood.com/

I have tried a few different tutorials based on Cheryl’s look and in celebration of her new hair (and health), I thought that I would share a couple of them with you.

This first one is based on a couple of tutorials on the Barry M website http://www.barrym.com/lookz/. It was one that I wore out (that is why the photo is blurry. Oops, it seems I was not the only one drinking!) so I did tweak it a little to suit me.

This look uses the Barry M dazzledusts.

I used mushroom (51, my favourite dazzledust) on the lid and chocolate to contour (53). You can see I also used a lot of black shadow and liner. I’m sure for once I actually managed to stick a pair of false lashes on (whoo!) but interestingly they are Nadine’s and not Cheryl’s from the orginal GA lash collection. I think you can see that I tried to wing the shadow and liner out a bit as Cheryl has that cat look going on. I remember it all got a bit messy and as usual when using dazzledusts, I did the eye look before I did the rest of my face (phew). Hmm, dazzledusts are messy but there is something (maybe the dazzle) very starry and glitzy about them!

I have also created a Cheryl look based on a Pixi2Woo tutorial http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NCVyEHo5AGA. I was trying to see what colours worked together.
This time I used MAC Sable, Jest and Carbon with lots of liner and mascara to make up the eyes pictured above. Tanya used the MAC lipstick, Girl About Town. However I improvised and used another lipstick, Barry M 144. I love this lipstick but I never really wear it. Well, not outside the house. It is such a beautiful, vibrant colour. It is quite classy too. 

Sometimes it can be hard to find a strong pink that does not look too tacky and indeed, lasts. This pink is blue toned and original. It reminds me of a very, very full on Creme de la femme even though they do not look that alike when swatched.

However, there seems to be a some resemblance between them on the lips. 144 is very, very bright but as I’ve said before, I like it a lot and would like to wear it out and about. However, I still have one problem. Look at my inner lip here.

I painted it but lipstick just doesn’t seem to stay in this area and I always end up with these horrible patches. Does anybody else have this problem, what can I do so that I can wear these beautiful colours?

So what do you think of Cheryl’s new hair and her look in general? Who are your style inspirations?

X

Cheating my way to silkiness!

One fact about me, dry shampoo has always disappointed me. I did a review earlier in the year https://essjay23x.wordpress.com/2010/01/30/batiste-dry-shampoo/  and my biggest concern was that I had trouble brushing the flakes out and when you have brunette hair and you are using the tropical Batiste or Boots own brand, this can be a bit unsightly and annoying. Even if I was using a Brunette Batiste, I’m not sure if I like the idea of flakes in my hair.

I wanted to write a post today that revealed a great product that you can use instead of fallible dry shampoo. I was very excited about sourcing a ‘find’ and an ‘exclusive’ of my own. I found a spray with a fine mist instead of lumpy flakes to silken my locks. A perfect subsitute for dry shampoo, I wanted to post. However, I now realise that unfortunately it would be a step too far to advocate the product in question that way.

Lately I have been trying to wash my hair as and when it needs it. Apparently the longer your hair goes between washes and the more frequently you employ such gaps then the more your hair manages to maintain itself and the less washing/ ‘baddie’ products are then needed. Get in!

Sounds a great idea except for one thing . . , my hair is not very cooperative. It can look fresh, clean and soft before I go to bed one night and the very next morning, I can wake up with greasy roots, quite crunchy ends (Sorry but it is the horrific truth)and little time to spare. Eurgh, what a great start for the day ahead.

At that time of the morning, I never have time to wash, dry and style my hair from scratch so I have to look to my hair products (yes, what I was trying to avoid in the first place) for a helping hand and yes, I have quite a few hair products but that doesn’t mean I can rely on them to save the day.

Most of my products -bar the dry shampoo- are to actually flatten my hair further because it is so puffy after a wash.

However I have recently been employing one little product to help and it is Hair Extensions Maintenance Spray from ion moisture solutions.

I used to use it on my clip in hair extensions to freshen them up and make them silkier and softer as they aged.

One day I noticed that it can be used on natural hair too and blimey, does a spritz of this make my hair soft again! I’ve been trying to find out how it works but have drawn a blank so far. However I think it works as a bit of a moisturiser and you can see from these photos that my hair just looks so much healthier and less wiry (indeed silky) after a spritz of this.

BEFORE

AFTER (spritzed, fingered through, left 2mins and brushed)

I’m so impressed that I was tempted to use this as my dry shampoo subsitute and tell you all about it but no, I can’t.

This spray just doesn’t do enough for the roots to equal a dry shampoo. My roots may feel a little softer after some of this but they still fall on the wrong side of lank.

I have worn my ‘I need a wash’ hair out after a spritz of this and I got away with it maybe because the rest of my barnet looked so fresh but it is not enough because I do not feel that I have clean hair and you can see I’m right if you look at my roots closely enough.

Saying that I am glad that I have this spray, it is a great product to have. It has a nice pleasant fresh, possibly slightly floral, scent and there seems to be no product build up. I can not recommend this product enough if you want to silken/detangle hair (extensions or real) as a ‘pick me up’ occasional product.

I think it could work as a daily moisturising treatment too for the lengths and ends but the only thing I would say here is that I have only used this product occasionally and am a bit wary of the ingredients listed alcohol denat, butane, isobutane, propane, cyclopentasiloxane, dimethicone. I am tempted to use this product daily because it makes my hair so soft but at the same time, I’m sure many would see these ingredients as ‘baddies’ and could this mean evantually with such frequent use, it would dry the hair out instead of rejuvenating it?

Going back to occasional use, you could maybe even use this product to change your hair style from day to night. After all, it seems to break down product ok and leave your hair soft but personally I find it is more of a maintanance/polish product rather then a cleanser.

When the lank roots need a wash, I think they need a wash more because of physiological waste such as sweat and oils. This ion spray will not clean such hair but then it was never designed to, extensions don’t have to deal with physiological issues!

Dry shampoos do though and dry shampoos haven’t really worked for me yet so I’m just starting to wonder if there is such a thing as a short cut or even a quick fix just to get you through the day when it comes to matters of beauty.

I got my Ions Hair Extensions Maintenance Spray from Shear Beauty (http://www.shearbeauty.com/). It is currently £8.99 there. You could google other retailers too.

So for me right now, it is either get up earlier and wash my hair properly as required, or try out the Big Sexy Hair products that Nicoletta http://nicolettasbeautyspace.blogspot.com/ has recently posted about!

Do you believe short cuts ever pay off? What do you think of dry shampoo?

X

Making the best of a bad hair day!

Oh, I had a bad hair day today.

It was my hair appointment day. I normally have one about every 10-12 weeks. New hair extensions and a cut.

I hate the process. The hour or so when my old extensions are out, but my new ones are not yet in, is agony. It sounds pathetic but without the security of those extra inches, I do not feel like me and of course, in the hairdressers there are all those silly mirrors and all I can see is this reflection that does not look like me at all. It is horrible and really throws me. For that hour or so, I act differently and squirm a lot. I’m not always the most confident or bubbliest of people but there I am so, soo lost, so awkward and completly dazed. I guess for more then four years now, I have worn extensions everywhere. I even made sure my clips in were in securely when I did a parachute jump in Australia. For me, they have become like a piece of clothing (and more), without them I am naked and very self-concious.

I don’t really know how to explain it. I know how silly it sounds but I can’t help the way I feel. Somebody said maybe I feel how those girls feel who get their nails done every week or so and then for some reason stop.

I know it is a silly thing to get so worked up over and I know, that it is all relative. If, God forbid, I had some awful news at the salon about my health or somebody close to me or some other real ‘crisis’ happened then I know that my hair would be forgotten just like that. I know there are many people in the world with real, real worries that I can not even comprehend but when it is just me, my hair and the mirror then I can’t help it, a switch goes off and I do not think about that and all I think about is my hair. It is not necessarily that I think the extensions look better. It is just that I identify myself now as somebody with all that hair and when there is some reminder that I haven’t really got all that much hair then something in me gets confused. I’m not sure, it is difficult to explain. I think if you’re thinking of getting extensions or indeed any kind of fakery, you should consider the addiction factor and what that could cost you both in money and confidence.

Anyway, never mind, normally it is just a hour or two and before long, I’m skipping out of the salon with my extra inches and for the first two weeks or so, that new hair is so shiny, soft and silky and basically I’m a very happy girl.

Normally . . .

Not today!

Old extensions out and then argh, I’m told my new hair hasn’t arrived and I have got 24 hours plus au naturalle.

Oh and by the way, au naturelle was cut quite nicely at the back (free of charge, for obvious reasons ie. I had lost half a barnet!!!) but the front (where the work was so badly needed) had to be left until extension time for blending reasons.

My first thought was rush home, lock the door and cry (again pathetic, I know).

I didn’t cry (maybe because my Sideways Cross necklace was waiting for me) but I did rush home and I did think about getting my clip in extensions out but then I thought, this is bad. Nobody can see me and well, I’m not planning on having short hair for a while so make the most of it so I had a bit of a play. Styling my hair this way and that and I have to concede that my natural hair is slightly more versatile then I feared.

This is my favourite style of the day.

I love this look. I think it is really girly, pretty and timeless. It took me two minutes at the most.

I can do it with my extensions but normally don’t bother as it takes, at least, three times as long and is a bit more complicated. I had a bit of help from the hairdresser with this version (shown above) last year. It is all that trying to backcomb the hair without matting or getting it caught/tangled in the rows, pulling the sides of the hair back smoothly while trying to keep all the rows concealed, trying to find and attach a clip (or combination of clips/bands) to keep all that hair in place.

So in conclusion, I will be going back for my extensions tomorrow but the surprise break we had from each other was maybe not as painful as I imagined.

Maybe in fact, it was a very, very, very small step on the road to recovery from my chronic addiction which is good in light of the infamous Naomi Campbell picture which hit the newstands recently. It is alleged that she may have some form of alopecia due to adorning hair extensions.

Like some smokers and many people addicted to all different things, I do intend to give my extensions up. One day!

Have you ever had any shock, horror experiences at the hairdressers? Do you change your hair often or is there only one way/colour/length you would ever have your barnet styled?

X