Taking Care Of Your Hair | Back to BLONDE ~ Gi & P

Hello lovelies,

As of Tuesday this week my hair is back to it's balayage blonde-brown colour it used to be! Yay!

After months of contemplating what to do with my hair I've gone back to having my natural honey brown hair dyed to blonde balayage (ombre) and I couldn't love it more! The first time I dyed my hair was in January of 2014 where I died it the same. Since then, I regrettingly spontaneously dyed my hair red as I "thought it would be fun"... [see below for more info] The red Live!Dye did not come out as it said it would after just 8 washes and I was stuck with the red hair for quite some time... After this minor hiccup in the life of my hair, it transitioned through a couple of shades (was not a good time for me) and went to a very dark brown. For the past 3-ish months I've been letting my hair recover and attempting to let the dark brown fade [see the history of my hair bonanza below :P ].

SO it's safe to say my hair has been put through a lot and maintaining healthy hair through this was something I had to learn about. Having dyed blonde hair in particular is the hardest to keep fresh and healthy as the peroxide/bleach/chemicals used to lighten the hair severely dries it out. Hair can often be left looking dead and feeling strawy after a few weeks-months after initial dying, but this can often be avoided!

Having semi-blonde hair for 3 years I've learnt whats best to keep your hair silky smooth!
Here are my top tips, tricks and products for having healthy hair!

1. Use a thermal protectant spray

I can't emphasise this enough. I used to think heat protectant sprays were a waste of money, but after using the product when drying/styling, my hair is so much softer and less dried out afterwards!

My current favourite heat protector spray is Tony & Guy Prep: Heat Protection Mist, although I used to use GHD Heat Protector Spray which used to look like the gold bottle, but have recently re-designed their packaging and now looks like the black bottle.

2. Apply a general protector spray/oil often
To avoid having ratty ends, I like to apply just a general soft hair spray or oil every day or so.
My absolute go-to holy grail product is Juuce: Angle Mist. It without a doubt use this every 2 days - possibly every day depending on how my hair is going. It gets rid of knots, slightly de-frizzes and overall leaves my hair feeling and smelling amazing. If my hair is being staticy or frizzy in general I like to use Organic (OGX) Coconut Milk Oil which does wonders.

3. Don't sleep with your hair wound up in a bun!

Now this may not be one for everyone, but as my hair is naturally straight whenever I sleep with it in a bun the ends become all bent. What I mean by this is they become all crinkled and look split, and by sleeping with you hair wound up so tightly it damages not only your hair strands but the follicles as they aren't getting the chance to 'relax' and not be pulled in one direction constantly (which is what happens when we put our hair up in a pony tail for example).

I am one to sleep with my hair up, but its still in a loose pony tail - nothing tight.

4. Shampoo. Condition. Shampoo.

When you wash your hair, it is important to shampoo your hair at least twice. The first shampoo gets rid of all the oils/dirt/etc that is on your hair and scalp, whereas the second shampoo actually washes your hair once this 'protective layer of grime' is gone ;)
Personally I use TRESemmè Keratin Smooth Shampoo along side TRESemmè Keratin Smooth Conditioner.
Most recently I have also been trying out Organic (OGX) Coconut Milk Nourishing Shampoo accompanied by Organic (OGX) Coconut Milk Nourishing Conditioner and it's been fantastic!

Shampoo & Conditioner

5. Never brush you hair wet...

Sadly I am a culprit of this, but it is so so important to always comb your hair with a wide-toothed comb when it's wet! The curlier/thicker your hair - the wider toothed comb you will need.

Hair is much much more prone to breakages when its wet. When your hair is wet its weakened and brushing is one of the harshest actions one can do to their hair.

Here's a little history of my hair bonanza over the past few years:

Blonde hair of 2014

2 minutes before it got dyed red in
April of 2015

Red hair of April 2015

When the red faded and became orange...

Excuse the frowning stare as I try to read my phone through the glare - its the only photo I have the shows how orange it went! xx

...And progressed to a strawberry-blonde

I did put a blonde-ish dye through it to try to alleviate the intensity of the red, but that backfired on me and took me through a 50 Shades of Strawberry Blonde stage.

In an attempt to rid the red my hair became strawberry blonde, and finally I dyed it back to dark brown. I would have never intentionally dyed my hair this dark but I was quite happy with the result, which was a great colour for winter and lightened as the months got warmer.

Dark brown hair of 2015