or my hair care products and habits.
I expect so much from my hair. I want it to grow and chop it off and want to to grow again and then I color it with harsh chemicals every 6 weeks or so and still want soft voluminous hair with minimal fly away hairs.
Before I go any further, I should remind you that I have very straight, fine, color treated hair and quite a bit of it. That being said, when I pick out products I want them to care for my hair as it is, not strip it or pile on too much additional nonsense and ideally leave it with a little bit of texture and grip.
The paradox of an Ombre, if you are lightening the ends and not darkening the root, is that you are treating your hair with harsh chemicals at the end that is the oldest and farthest away from your bodies natural conditioning systems. While it is a cool option that is relatively easy to cut off without sacrificing all of your hair, it is also likely to damage the ends even more and if they are not dry brittle or damaged already it will make them more prone to becoming that way. I try to make sure that I counteract this with prophylactic care because there is always a point when you cannot save anything and really do need to cut off what is not salvageable. This can be pretty upsetting if you are actually trying to grow out your hair because it is a setback.
So directly after coloring my hair I use and old shampoo and then my favorite deep conditioner. I talked about washing out the hair color and what I do in that very shower in this post. I have been using Dumb Blond be TIGI's Bed Head for years. and while I have strayed, I keep coming back to this product. It is pricey, but I don't use it as a daily conditioner I save it for a protein deep conditioner particularly for directly after coloring my hair.
Sticking with conditioners: I try to deep condition my hair about once a week or once every two weeks depending on how often I heat style and the weather and how my hair is looking and feeling. I do not condition my hair every time I wash it because I find that it makes my hair so soft that it is very hard to work with and style especially if I want to style without applying any heat. Also I'm convinced that my hair does not need that.
What I do really like are oil treatments. My favorite being a little bit of coconut oil or olive oil from the kitchen that I leave on for a few hours, sometimes even overnight. When I want the same effect but don't have the time I will put a shower cap over my head or a winter hat or hit it with a blow drier for a few minuets before shampooing very thoroughly.
I wash my hair about every two to three days. I try to really only wash it when it is oily, but also leave the natural oils on the follicle as long as I can without feeling weird about it. So when I know that I am staying home and working on school stuff all Sunday and the only person seeing me is my dear roommate who has seen everything then I will comb them and try to distribute the oils towards the ends and then simply tie them up where they cannot bother me. Avoiding mirrors helps. Then I will wash them on Monday morning.
On the other hand I will sometimes wash them the second day even if they do not look or feel oily so that I have at least 24 hours before styling them for a special occasion, because I have incredibly smooth straight hair that will sometimes look really oily very quickly but also likes to defy all styling that i want to coax out of it.
I have never had a shampoo that has completely blown me away or inspired me to repurchase it. I am constantly trying something new. I have however tried out quite a few that I really did not like! From time to time I use dandruff shampoo, but most of the time I don't need it so a bottle does last me quite a while since I will alternate it with something else. I almost always have two shampoos in the shower and one of them is something very simple, sulfate free, that smells nice and doesn't leave my hair squeaky clean but pleasantly fresh. I've been liking the ones from Alverde recently, and might even repurchase the version for colored hair after I use up the apple and papaya one I have in the shower right now.
I don't use a lot of hair products, but if I do style my hair a little more extravagantly or more often I have found no clarifying shampoo works as well as baking soda and vinegar. I don't want to talk more detailed about this process, if it interests you let me know and I will write a whole post on the subject.
To style my hair on a daily basis I use room temperature air and clips or hair ties. Sometimes I will use an end fluid that I still have from just before I cut my pixi cut over a year ago or a tiny bit of the styling creme I used when my hair was really short to give it a little more texture. I find that this is a length that i am often just pulling back of letting fall however it wants because there is not all too much I can do with the time I am willing to spend on my hair.
What I do really like to do however is to give my hair a little bit of wavy curl with a flatiron. And I like the the Elnet 3 day volume spray from L'Oreal because I have the feeling that it really does help me have some degree of wavy-curleyness for at least the following day (weather permitting). I finish that look off by running my fingers through it with a little bit of Matte and Messy structurizing paste from the L'Oreal Studio Line. This is also something I had when I had a pixi and thought I would never use it up as I let my pixi grow out, but it is absolutely amazing for this look.
I can also get a similar messy wave with a sea salt spray, but this tends to be unreliable and quite drying. So that is not an option for daily styling.
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