New Hair Alert!

I am one of those people who doesn’t make much effort with their hair. I wake up, brush it (sometimes), and either leave it down or tie it up – that’s it. What I do like to do with my hair is experiment. I have quite a round face which means I can’t experiment with the actual cut because it makes me look like a munchkin, but I can dye it and I have done quite a few times. I have been black, brunette, ginger and every shade in between. The newest colour I decided to head towards was – drum roll please……. BLONDE!! Yes you heard me right. Blonde. Considering I have always been a dark haired girl I wasn’t too sure what this was going to look like.

I would like to introduce you all to the new me:

 This was straight after I hade dyed it, it was still very white.

So, what do you think? It's very blonde, right? What I thought I would do is give all you dark haired girls out there a ‘how to’ on becoming blonde. I had lovely help from my very beautiful pink haired friend Aimee. She has her own colourful blog here. Take a look, I am 100% sure she will teach a new baking tip. I definitely learned a thing or two.

So what you will need is:

This is how you become a blonde bombshell:

1.       You first have to bleach the hair or the blonde hair dye will not take. This is a tricky process as you don’t want it touching anything but your hair. Make sure you have an old top on just in case. This took quite a long time, but you don’t want to miss a section otherwise it will really stand out.

It was already turning blonde.

2.       After leaving it in for 20 minutes - once your whole head is covered - wash all the bleach out. Again be careful not to get it everywhere. Once you have washed it out you will be able to see how white it has made your hair. My roots were WHITE - so white that you could see my scalp.

What a strange colour.

Look how white my roots are!

3.       The next step is to put the blonde colour on. I bought L'Oreal hair dye. This is just a preference as I have used them a lot over the years and I feel they give a good overall tonal colour. Follow the instructions that come with the dye as they are all different.

4.       After leaving the dye in for as long as the instructions state, wash all the dye out. At this point we conditioned my hair to make it a little softer after all the bleaching. Once washed, blow dry your hair. Then look in the mirror and see the new you smiling back (hopefully smiling, if you like it).

At the very beginning it was still very white blonde but after a couple of days this calmed down and now I love it!! Here is a before and after photo:

The one downfall of becoming blonde is the roots. Who knew hair grew so fast?! It has only been a couple of weeks and my roots are already showing quite visibly. I think that I will let them grow to about 2cm before bleaching the roots again, so I will let you know how that goes.
Currently I love being blonde and it has taken a while to get used to it. I still look at photos and in the mirror and shock myself, but in time I will start to remember.

I would love to know if any of you dark haired girls have gone blonde recently and how you did it, or how you already blonde girls keep it blonde and stop it from going dark.

Craft #005 - Tie-Dye T-shirts

I do love an eye-catching Tee and what better way than a colourful tie-dye top. I have searched a while for the perfect one and I couldn't find it anywhere, so I thought why not make one just the way I want it. It is so simple and fun I thought I would share with you lovely lot how to achieve a colourful tie-dye tee.

Equipment needed:

- Plain coloured T-shirt (preferably white as the colour shows up better)
- Fabric Dye (I used Dylon hand dye in colours Sunflower Yellow and Bahama Blue)
- 250g Salt per sachet
- 6.5 litres of warm water (per colour)
- Plastic bowl or sink
- Rubber gloves
- Elastic bands

 Instructions:

1. Soak the T-shirt in warm water and leaver damp.

2. There are many different patterns you can have on your T-shirt it all depends on how you tie it. I wanted a swirly pattern and to achieve this you have to pinch the centre of the top between the armpits. From this point twist the top tightly until it is in a tight circle.

3. The next step is to add the elastic bands. To achieve the swirls place the elastic bands breaking the circle in to six segments. These will work as a guide later on.

4. Using the rubber gloves, dissolve the dye in 500ml of warm water.

5. Fill the bowl or sink with approx 6 litres of warm water.

6. Add the 250g of salt and dye to the warm water and stir well.

7. Repeat steps 4-6 for all colours. 

8. Now it is time to dye the tee using a jug pour your first colour into one segment of your T-shirt.

9.  Alternate colours until you have gone the whole way round.

 10. Once you have gone the whole way round, flip your T-shirt and repeat the steps on the other side, making sure the segments match up. 

11. Leave your T-shirt for an hour to soak up all the dye. Once the hour is up without untying the elastic bands rinse in cold water until the water runs clear. All you have to do now is hang up the T-shirt and let it dry. 

Then Ta-da!!! you have a new Tie-Dye Tee.

This is how mine turned out and I love it! What is cool about making your own tie-dye tee is that it will come out different every time. As you can see my two colours blended together and created bits of green throughout the top, which adds something to the tee.

Alternatively if you only want a single colour tie-dye tee you can submerge the T-shirt in the dye and leave it to soak for an hour. The tee on the right was done using this process, it was also tied together differently. To achieve that pattern pick up the tee from the centre and twist into a sausage shape and tie elastic bands around the t-shirt to keep it in place.