How to remove hair colour using household products.

Notes:

You want to make this right when you are going to use it. Do not make it beforehand. Make sure you have at least two hours to spare at home if you are doing this.

This isn't supposed to lighten your natural hair colour if that's what you're looking for. It may lighten it a little bit, but it's not what it's meant for. This is for removing hair dye colour. Also it works only on hair that has been dyed a darker shade, or hair that has been dyed some artificial colour. If you had dark hair and lightened it, your hair will not become dark again with this. You will want to dye your hair again with a darker colour to get your hair dark again! I know it sounds stupid... but some people just don't understand these things!

This may make your scalp itch. Try to bear it. If you can't bear it, wash it off.

You may have "vitamin water" dripping from your hair. Keep some paper towel by you while you're waiting.

I really wanted to take pictures of the whole procedure but I honestly forgot. Shame on me for my horrible memory! But really, this is so easy to do, I honestly don't think it can be messed up.


Ingredients:

Vitamin C tablets (I used Jamieson 500mg Delicious Chewable Formula with Antioxidant Support Grape flavoured, but really, whatever Vitamin C you have at home should work.)

Baking Soda

Shampoo (Clarifying shampoo works best, but if you don't have, use any. I used Quantum Clarifying Shampoo.)


Directions:

1. Take some Vitamin C tablets and crush it up. I crushed up about 20 tablets and ended up using only half of it, so for short-medium hair, I'd say 10 is a good amount. Judge according to the length of your hair. The tablets shouldn't be too hard to crush. I put them in a plastic bag and used the bottom of a small pot that I had to crush them. If you have a hammer, that works as well. After crushing them I put it in a little container and used the handle of a wooden spoon to crush the larger pieces so I would have a finer powder. The finer you can get it, the better.

2. Place the powder in a plastic bowl.

3. Add some baking soda. I don't know how much I used exactly, I just took the box and sprinkled some on top of the Vitamin C powder, but I'm guessing 1/2 tsp. is about right.

5. Make sure your hair is damp before going on to step 4.

4. Add shampoo. I just took the shampoo and covered the powder entirely. Supposedly, it should be a 1 Vitamin C: 2 Shampoo ratio, but I really don't think it matters. Just use however much you think you would need for your hair.

5. Mix it all up. As soon as you start mixing it, a chemical reaction will occur, causing the mixture to lather and foam up.

6. Apply it to your damp hair like you would with shampoo. Lather it up and make sure all the hair is covered.

7. Pile hair on top of head and place a shower cap or a plastic bag over it.

8. Let it sit for about an hour. Use a blow dryer to heat it up if you want.

9. Rinse, rinse, rinse. And shampoo. And condition. When I was rinsing it out, my hair felt like straw! As soon as I shampooed and conditioned it though, it felt normal again.

10. Try to let your hair air dry and not heat style it, but if you have to... like I did...

11. If it did not lift all the colour, or as much as you wanted to be lifted, wait a few days or a week, or as long as you can to let your hair recover, and repeat the process. It may or may not lift all the colour, depending on how recently you coloured it and how many times you have done so.

X-Men: First Class

I finally got the chance to see X-Men last night and it was AMAZING! Though I'm still sort of grudging over the fact that the guy I wanted to see it with didn't seem like he wanted to go so I went with a group of my friends instead. He didn't even say sorry. Actually, he never even told me straight up if he wanted to go or not. He just kept putting it off and making excuses, which is what I'm really mad about. So I haven't talked to him ever since. And he probably doesn't even realize it.

I know... I'll never be happy if I get mad and grudge over such small things. But he hasn't even tried to talk to me ever since either. I just feel like it was completely one-sided love, and he had absolutely no feelings for me. But every time I think that, I just wonder, why did he say some of the things that he did if he never meant it? I just feel like I was trying way too hard and that I was just embarrassing myself. It's the first time I've ever tried to open up to a guy, the first time that I tried to ask a guy out and not the other way around. It's also the first time that instead of me turning the guy down, I was being turned down. Except not even directly. Actually I don't even know, because he confuses the shit out of me. Maybe he didn't even mean to make me feel the way I do. Maybe he didn't mean to make me think that he's not interested. But I don't know... It's like, a part of me just won't allow myself to be happy.

I'm just scared. I'm scared of ending up with a broken heart again. And I just have this feeling that if I were to keep trying and if we were to be together, it won't last forever. He will break my heart. It would be a lot easier to just let go now. Even though I still keep thinking about him practically 24/7... And I know I'll regret later on in my life for giving up, for letting go, for not doing anything. But if I were to try and make things happen, and I end up with a broken heart, I would regret that just as much. So either way, my life is going to be full of regrets.

Or maybe it's better to have loved and lost than to have never loved at all. Maybe I should go for it, and just have an adventure.

I don't know...

Back to X-men, there was something that Raven/Mystique said that really got me thinking. It sort of inspired me, I guess. "How can society accept who you are, if you can't even accept yourself?"

I really liked the movie because I felt like I could really relate to it. Actually, I think a lot of people can relate. Everyone's always trying to be accepted by society. Okay well maybe not "everyone", but a lot of people. Including myself. I mean I'm not shunned away by society or anything, but I just always feel like I don't belong. And I'm always 'hiding'. Everyday before I can go anywhere, without feeling uncomfortable, I MUST take a shower, put on some nice clothes, wear makeup, do my hair, put on some perfume... I will never be seen in public without doing these first in the morning. It has gotten a little better over the past couple years. I don't wear eye makeup all the time, but face makeup is still a must. And everything else is still a must as well. Wow, I probably sound so fake right now... But I guess I just haven't come to accept who I am myself, that's why I need all these things, to make myself "better". And how can I expect anybody to love myself for who I am, if I can't even do it?

Olive oil removes hair colour? Not really...

Yes, as always I am trying to get the hair colour out of my hair once again. It hasn't even been a week! This time around though, I'm not using drugstore bought colour strippers. I'm trying other methods. As of right now, crazy as it may seem, I have completely drenched my hair in olive oil and have a plastic bag around my head. And it's almost 2 am so I really have to sleep... So I am going to bed tonight with olive oil in my hair, and a plastic bag on my head. And a towel on top of my pillows so they don't get all greasy in case the bag comes off. I'm really skeptical that this will remove any colour at all, but olive oil is good for the hair anyway, right? So even if it doesn't do anything for my hair colour, at least it will condition my hair over night. I'll come back in the morning with the results.

I just washed the olive oil out using my clarifying shampoo, and the olive oil was so hard to wash out! I shampooed my hair 3 times, left the shampoo in for a few minutes the last time, and I could still feel it in my hair. I have to say though, my hair feels super soft and silky now! But I can still smell the olive oil... And I HATE the smell of olive oil. I don't know if it's just me, or if it actually does, but I honestly think it smells like fish. Oh and of course, my hair didn't lighten one bit. And if it did, it would've been so little that it's not even noticeable. Maybe it's because I didn't apply heat to it. Or maybe it's supposed to be done regularly to gradually lighten it. But I would probably never do this regularly since it is such a hassle to wash out. Now I know though, if I need a good deep conditioning treatment, this is definitely something I can do.

I do have another plan though, and I'm more confident that this one will work. I'm just trying it out now, and waiting for it to do its magic. :)

Heheeeehe it worked! :)

I will be posting a tutorial for it very soon.

L'Oreal Sublime Mousse (#60 Pure Light Brown)

Okayyy, I finally decided to try out the L'Oreal Sublime Mousse just because it seems so easy to use!

So I just applied the mousse to my hair. I can't stop thinking about how easy it was to apply! In some reviews that I previously saw, people were saying that their mousse wasn't foamy or lathering once they put it in their hair, but when I put it in mine, it lathered just like shampoo! It made it so easy to make sure that every strand of my hair was covered. And the mixture didn't smell all that bad. Or maybe I've just gotten used to the smell of hair dye now. So far, this product has earned a major thumbs up for how easy it is to apply to the hair. It didn't drip at all, no mess at all! I didn't even get any on my skin! And it didn't take nearly as much time as it usually does for me to put it into my hair either. So far from what I can see and feel though, it seems like it is making my hair darker... almost black! But we'll see. Maybe that's just the way it appears at first? And I can already tell, my hair is going to be so dried out from this...

Now I'm just waiting for it to develop, and I'll come back after washing it out with the results!

I just washed my hair, and I have to say, while I was rinsing the dye out, my hair didn't feel all that bad. It actually felt quite smooth, tangle-free and didn't feel dried out at all. But then I applied the conditioner that it came with, and instantly, my hair felt like a mass of tangles and it felt sticky and I literally could not run my fingers through it at all! So I rinsed it out right away. But my hair still felt like that. I put my own deep conditioner on and it felt a little better, but it was still sticky and difficult to run my fingers through. I let it sit in my hair for about 5 minutes and then rinsed it out, and all I could smell was the conditioner that it came with. It smelled horrible! I can still smell it now. I feel like I smell like a man that just went to the gym or something... And my hair still feels dried out. I've put some Moroccan oil in my hair and now it is still damp. I dare not blow dry it today after putting my hair through the colour removal and the dye in the past two days. From what I can see with the colour on my damp hair though, it actually looks darker. It looks like the colour I started with before removing the black dye from my hair. But the lighter streak in the back of my head seems to be evened out. I wonder why I put my hair through so much though, if it would just end up with the same colour. Not even close to the colour on the box! Hopefully it will fade out into a lighter shade...

The next day:
After shampooing and conditioning my hair today, it felt a lot better. Almost like normal! But, my hair still has that terrible scent! I checked out the back again today, and looking at it under proper lighting now, I can see that the colour was not evened out at all. I still have that lighter band running across, though its not that apparent. I was just thinking, if it couldn't cover that... would it be able to actually cover greys? I personally don't have any grey hair, but I sort of doubt that this hair dye would cover grey very well. Also, my hair is still dark. It's actually almost exactly the same as my natural hair colour.

I would only recommend this hair dye to those who have healthy, virgin hair without very much grey and are dying their hair the first time. Also I don't think this dye can lighten hair at all. Not even one or two shades, so if you have dark hair and you want to lighten it just a teeny bit, it's not happening. My hair wasn't even that dark and I chose a lighter shade and it darkened my hair even more! So I'd probably say use this only if you are planning to go dark brown or black.


And now as for my hair, I am not happy with it. I mean, I'm not saying it's ruined or anything, but it just wasn't what I wanted, so I'm going to be trying something completely different with it over the summer and see if I can gradually lighten it in a different way instead. And of course, if it works, I'll share it. (:

Hair Colouring

Since it's summer, after having dark brown/black hair again for the past few months, I've decided to go lighter again. After the horrible experience I had last time with removing the black dye from my hair, I went straight for Colour Oops this time and didn't even contemplate on trying a different brand again. This time around using Colour Oops, it removed all the black dye I previously had in my hair. I am now left with a nice neutral brown hair colour that I absolutely love. No orange or brassiness this time! The only thing though, is that because of how I messed up my hair with that other colour remover way back then, my roots were literally orange before I covered it with black dye. Since then, it had grown out a few inches. Now, where it had been orange, is pretty much a band of lighter brown running across the back of my hair. It's not really that much lighter, but it is noticeable, so I will be dying my hair again to get that perfect shade and even colour I am looking for.

Now the only problem that I have, is I can't decide what to dye it with. I went to the drugstore and picked up two boxes of hair dye. One, is the L'Oreal Paris Sublime Mousse. The other, is Garnier Nutrisse Radiant Browns.

The thing is, that I still want to go a tad lighter than what my hair is now, but nothing too dramatic. So when I was shopping for a hair colour I wanted to find something that could lighten my hair a few shades.

The first thing that caught my eye was the Sublime Mousse. The boxes are just so pretty! And it looks so easy to apply. The colour that I chose was 60 Pure Light Brown. The colour looks gorgeous on the model!

Then I also got the Garnier Nutrisse one in 6.32 Natural Light Caramel Brown because I keep hearing good things about Garnier Nutrisse, so I wanted to try it.

So now I can't decide between the two. I like the colour of the Sublime Mousse so much better, but I'm scared to try it because of the TERRIBLE reviews on it all over the internet. The Garnier one looks more promising, but I don't think I like the colour as much. But then colours don't ever even turn out exactly as they look on the box... But I also want to try the Sublime Mousse just because there are a few good reviews of it out there and I just want to see for myself. But I don't want to damage my hair too much either. I just can't decide!

So here's what the boxes look like:

So yeah, one is sort of cooler and the other is sort of warmer toned. While my skin tone is neutral so either would work on me. I just can't decide...

Review: Shiseido White Lucent Brightening Eye Treatment

Yeah I realize it's been ages since I last posted... I actually had this typed up way back when, and I completely forgot and never posted it. I just wanted to add, that I have now stopped using eye cream completely. The first few days, the skin around my eyes was a little bit tight and dry, but I think it got used to it or something, it's completely fine now. I had noticed that whenever I used lighter or heavier eye creams, I would get more or less milia (white bumps) around my eye area, but they would never go away completely. It's really annoying having the milia because when I put concealer on the area, no matter what concealer it is, it would accentuate the bumps and look worse. It's been about two weeks since I stopped using eye cream, and the skin under my eyes has smoothed out dramatically. My concealer goes on so much better and my eyes actually look brighter. I'm not sure though, if by not using eye cream it will be not so good for my eye area in the future. I hope that it won't mean that I'll start getting wrinkles earlier and whatnot...

"Specially developed with Shiseido's own Spot Deacti Complex, this lightweight cream addresses both melanin formation and poor local microcirculation, two major causes of dark circles. The Dark Circle Targeting Complex reduces melanin and diminishes the appearance of melanin pigments. By gently massaging the cream onto the skin, local microcirculation is improved while a unique mix of Asian plant extracts recover moisture balance. Additionally, it contains Multi-Luminizing Powder with light diffusing properties to instantly bring luminosity to eye areas."

I have tried so many eye creams and this is the one that I keep going back to. It took me years to realize that there really is no "miracle" eye cream out there that will really get rid of my dark eye circles and bags. Note that this hasn't really done anything to diminish my dark eye circles or maybe it has just a little bit, but not noticeable, but it is still my favourite eye cream out there. It is very creamy and moisturizing, yet not too heavy and quick absorbing. I just love the texture of it, it provides a great base for my concealer. Plus, the light diffusing properties does make my eyes appear brighter. And just the smallest amount of it is enough for both of my eyes. By this, I mean, not even half a pump of it is more than enough. So even though it costs so much, it lasts for more than half a year for me.