Hair Cuts

This weekend Hal and I made some big changes. Biiiig changes. Changes that change the entire way we look.

In other words, we both got haircuts. I've been wanting to cut mine shorter for a while. It's just so stinking hot here, and I wanted to give shorter hair another try. I've been saying I was going to cut it for over a month now. But now that I was going to cut it myself I had to wrap my head around how I was going to do it. I give myself trims all of the time, but cutting off 7 inches, that was a new thing for me.

My hair went from this:

to this:

And I'm pretty happy with it. After having it for a few days I can see some places that I need to fix, but I'd say for cutting off 7 inches myself and bringing all of my layers up, I'm pretty happy with it.

Well then Hal must have gotten jealous of my new do or something. He always is jealous of people with really short buzz cuts. Why, I don't know. He has a great head of hair, why would you cut that off? So I told him he better do it now, before he starts work and has to look professional all the time. Hopefully this gets his longing for a buzz cut out of his system.

He went from this:

To this:

He cut it himself too...except he missed one big spot on the back of his head, so at first his hair looked like this.

Hal got up the next morning and all I heard from the bathroom was "Ugggghhhh. I look like I'm sick!" I think It's grown on him a bit since then.

With our new hairdos, I'm going to say it's officially summer!

How to Not Wash Your Hair Everyday

Most weeks I wash my hair twice a week. That doesn't mean I don't shower everyday. I promise I do. But washing my hair everyday makes it extra oily on top and really dry at the bottom. When you wash your hair everyday your body produces a lot of oil, because you're stripping it of oil everyday.

So when people say they have to wash their hair everyday because it's super oily, I think it's oily because you wash it everyday. 

Before Peace Corps I decided to give it a try, I started washing my hair every other day. I'm going to be honest, in the beginning, your hair is going to be super greasy on the second day while your body adjusts. After a few months my hair was adjusted and things were great.

Then in Peace Corps I washed my hair once a week because it's pretty terrible washing your hair when you don't have hot water, or even running water. But my hair got really gross, and full of dandruff; so I started washing it everyday.

Which meant I had to then go through the process again of lengthening out the days between washing. This time, after each washing I went as long as I could before I'd wash my hair. Some days large hairbands or elaborate hairstyles would hide the grease, other days I'm pretty sure I just looked kind of nasty at work. I think the longest I went was 8 days without washing.

For some reason this time it took longer for my hair to adjust, and I still had dandruff from Cambodia; but I'd say after 3 months or so I could go three days before washing my hair and it wouldn't look bad. I'm now on a pretty steady schedule of washing on Mondays and Thursdays every week. Sometimes I'll go more, sometimes I'll go less.

In my journey I've amassed some tips to making the process of lengthening out between washing.

1. Don't wet your roots of your part on your off washing days. Obviously that's where you're the oiliest, and for me; if I wet my my part roots it makes my hair greasier much faster. I do wet my hair everyday because it's curly and after sleeping on curls, you have to wet them to start over, but if you don't need to wet your hair everyday to have it look good, don't; and it will be less greasy. Shower caps will be your best friend. I get them from hotels and hoard them. I just put the shower cap around the very top of my head to cover my part and then I'm good to shower like normal.

2. This one is going to be terrible for some people. Don't wear your hair up at the gym. I read this somewhere and now I 100% believe it. If you're sweating and your hair is plastered against your head, it's all going to get greasy. But if you wear it down it dries quickly and actually gives it a lot of volume. There are some exercises when I do wear my hair up, but it's rare. Don't believe me? The below pictures were both taken at the gym. The one on the left is one days after washing, and the one on the right is freshly washed that day. 

3. Every once in a while wash with dandruff shampoo. Lengthening out often dries out a scalp, and dandruff shampoo every once in a while on a wash day will fix that right up. I also keep at least two sets of shampoo and conditioner in my shower and switch off to prevent buildup. 

4. Corn Starch is a cheaper dry shampoo. I've heard, and have no idea if it's true that dry shampoo isn't very good for your hair. It can also get kind of spendy. But the ultimate solution to that is corn starch. It works the same, it's uber cheap and a container will last you forever. Word of caution, a little bit goes a long way.

5. Find hairstyles that work on greasy hair. A lot of people just throw their hair in a ponytail when it's greasy. For me that's the last thing I'm going to do. Putting it in a pony just exposes the greasy sides and it looks even worse. A lot of times buns look good on greasy hair, because it is pulled tight anyway, so the greasiness doesn't show. Braids also work great for greasy hair, especially french braids.

And I promise you, if you lengthen out, you will have the best hair days you've ever had on the days you wash your hair.   

2 Minute Low Braided Bun Tutorial Tried

This is my first ever real hair tutorial on my blog, so bear with me as my hair skills get better. I have mad props for hair bloggers after trying to get some of these shots.

This time I tried the 2 minute low braided bun tutorial, found here.

This hairstyle is actually super easy to do, and I actually did it twice. The first time I didn't include the braid, and the second I did. They both looked good and were really easy to do. I actually did this second time on dry hair after it had been down all day, but honestly I think it would be done better on damp hair so there wouldn't be as many pieces poking out.

The steps to this hairdo are really easy, and hopefully these pictures are easy to follow.

1. Start by putting your hair in a low pony
2. Loosen the pony a bit and split the hair above the pony in half to make a little hole. Now flip your pony tail up and through the hole, kind of turning it inside out.
3. Take sections of your pony and pull them up and through again.
4. Keep doing this until you have just a little bit of hair left.

5. Braid that small section that you have left.
6. Pin the braid in place, or any other loose pieces.
7. You can kind of tuck more hair in, or pull on sections to loosen it to make it look how you want it.

And Wallah that's it.

My hair didn't quite look like the one in the photo, but now you can see what it looks like on thicker wavy/curly hair as well.

See the original tutorial here

Hair

Guys, I am so sick of my hair. It's getting warm here in DC and it's been driving me nuts lately.

I've been thinking about cutting my hair for a while. I cut my hair the day before we left for Cambodia, but I didn't feel like I really got to experience having shorter hair because it was so hot that it was up all of the time. And now it's been two years and my hair is as long as it was before I cut it, and I'm ready to try it again.

But my co-worker keeps telling me that I need to post hair tutorials on my blog.

Before I cut it off, I thought I'd try some hair tutorials, and post about my experiences doing them.

Below are a few that I have been thinking about doing before I cut my hair, but I thought it would be fun to ask you guys and see if you've seen any hairstyles that you would like to see tutorials for. Seen any good ones lately?

via

via

via

DIY Headband Holder Tutorial

Hal turned in his application for the Accounting Masters program yesterday. Send good vibes his way!

When we got home from Cambodia I rediscovered all of my girly things that I forgot existed while I lived in the land of constant sweating and pony tails. I didn't want to leave all of my headbands in the box I had stored them in while we were gone. I started doing some searching, and I found this post. Sounds easy enough, so I decided to make my own version, it's a bit differnt than that tutorial.

All you need is a large oatmeal container, and some pretty duct tape.

This is my oatmeal container. If you can find one that's just a few oz. bigger, and therefore just a tiny bit bigger around that might work even better, but this size worked pretty great.

I bought this damask duct tape at target for $1.00. I was super excited, even easier than buying scrapbook paper and modge podge. I just did strips around until they overlapped, and then cut them. Then I flipped the tape upside down and tried to line up the pattern.

And the best part is, you can use the empty inside for all of your hair clips and your soft headbands!

Total cost for the project:
$1.00 for the tape

Linking up with Rolled Up Pretty

Funny Friday

I wasn't sure what I was going to post for funny friday just last night. I didn't take any funny pictures this week.  And then last night something happened that I found hilarious. I hope it's not a you had to be there moment, so I'm going to try and explain what happened.

Hal likes to attempt to do my hair sometimes. When we first got married he literally had no idea how to put a hair holder in my hair. Ah the life of growing up with no sisters. So last night when I was painting my nails Hal put my hair in pig tails.

Well one was looser than the other, so I asked him, since my nails were wet, hey, will you tighten the left one. He literally had no idea how to tighten a pony tail.

Normally it looks like this when you want to tighten your pony tail, right?

Well, when I tried to explain to Hal how to do it: you take the hair in your hand, split it in half, and pull them apart, this is what he thought I meant.

No Hal, I didn't mean for you to just pull on my hair.

I just laughed and laughed and laughed when he did this. I'm pretty sure if I asked my little brother to do this, he would know exactly what I meant, but he grew up with 5 sisters, and he was our slave when he was little. Hal grew up in a family of all boys. Oh the education he's had in the last 5 years being with me.

What silly girl things has your husband had to learn?

P.s. My bro-in-law is coming home from his mission this week. Wish him a safe flight, and a slightly less awkward return!

Lately

Since I've been back from Cambodia I've been doing my hair and nails a lot. I was deprived of prettiness for so long that I've been really enjoying trying out new hair and nail tutorials. I've also been trying out a lot of new recipes, mostly containing things we didn't have access to while in Cambodia.

Here's some of my recent trials

 1. Fishtail Braid 2. Chicken Schnitzel

3. Braids 4. Valentines Day Nails using this tutorial

1. My semi failed attempt at chevron nails 2. Mini Fench Braid 3. Top Knot

4. Twisted Mess 5. Christmas-y Nails 6. Spinach Fritatta

Have any hair or nail tutorials you've found that you just love? Share them with me!

Linking up with Rolled Up Pretty

Dear You

It's time to bring it back. The Dear You posts I used to do. It's been almost 2 years since I've done one! They're my mini letters to rant and rave about anything or everything.

Dear Blogger,
I know I'm so behind on this, but please take into account that I lived in a third world country when this change occured. What the heck? Why do we have to have lame embedded comments to be able to thread our replies? DUMB. I hate every form of comments except pop out windows. It just makes it so easy to continue reading a blog. I want threaded comments in my pop out window. Please fix this promptly.

Dear smarter bloggers,
If you know a way around my above complaint, please teach me your amazing ways.

Dear Selma,
I know you already tried to teach me, but my brain didn't understand. Please try again.

Dear February,
Why do you have so many birthdays? You're a short month, doesn't that mean statistically you should have less? My family has 7 birthdays. 7 of them. I can't decide if I like that, because they're all at once, but then no one has a birthday until mine in May.

Dear Essie,
I love you. Now that we're in love, can I have a discount?

Dear Hair,
Thanks for being awesome. After some really rough times of going longer between washings you've started to shape up. Now my 2nd full day with no washing doesn't look so bad anymore.
P.S. Please continue to get better

Dear Gossip Girl,
You have the best clothes of any show I've ever seen. I'm on season 6 and the dress Blair wore in episode 5 was my favorite so far. It fit her so perfectly, and the back of the dress was to die for. I couldn't find a picture of Leighton Meester with the back of the dress, so here's a picture of a chick from Glee in the dress.

P.S. If anyone ruins the end of Gossip Girl for me, I will cry.

Funny Friday

In continuation with my Funny Friday posts, I thought I'd share this sweet gem of a picture.

Since being back from Cambodia I've been toying with how much I wash my hair. In Cambodia my hair was rarely greasy, so I didn't wash it much, and then I got crazy bad build up thanks so profusely sweating every day, so I started washing it every day.

Coming back to America I had to go through that horrible period where my hair is super greasy as it adjusts back to being washed every other day. Oh and for the first time ever I got really bad dandruff. Now that my hair has adjusted I'm toying with the idea of washing it every third day. I've really been pushing it and pushing it, and some days my hair just looks like a grease bucket. Well it makes for really interesting hair dos when I wake up in the morning, and so for your viewing pleasure...

I know, right? Please ignore the fact that I have total sleep face, and just have a good laugh at my hair. Hal suggested I send it into Duston Todd for a follow up to my sleep picture.

Have you ever tried the whole no shampoo and conditioner thing? Using baking soda and vinegar instead? I'm interested in trying it out, so let me know what your experiences have been.

Have a Funny Friday post? Link to it in the comment section, and if it grows over time I'll start an actual link up.
P.S. I'm headed to my first Sundance movie tomorrow. Here's hoping it's a good one, and that we see someone famous

Hair loss in third world countries

Dear readers,

There's something that we need to talk about, and that's hair loss.

After I had dengue my medical officer said I might experience clumps of hair coming out. I was real nervous because my hair was already coming out. Not in clumps, but every time I touch my head, or run my fingers over my head, quite a few strands come with my hands. My hair is constantly falling out, and I'm finding it in every inch of my room.

You guys should see my bed...it's like one giant nest of hair in there. Sick, right?

So I asked my medical officer about it, she said it's most likely due to a protein deficiency. At site a lot of us are vegetarians since the meat situation isn't the greatest around here. I'll eat chicken occasionally if Bookie makes some, but I just can't bring myself to order a chicken to be killed and then given to me dead and plucked with head and feet still on. I can't do it! We try to eat beans, eggs, and peanut butter as often as we can to keep up our protein intake.

I noticed within the past couple of weeks that my hair is about half as thick as it used to be. Guys, I know this is irrational, as I've seen female PCVs leave will a full head of hair, but I'm a bit afraid I'm going to leave Cambodia bald.

Have any of you experienced this when becoming vegetarian, or when living in a third world country? What did you do? Anyone want to send me some protein powder or something?

Sincerely,
A concerned balding PCV

Update: I made it back to America with some hair. I really did lose about half of my thickness due to a protein deficiency while living in Cambodia. Since being back in America and having a constant access to meat, beans, and other sources of protien, I've stopped losing my hair and it's even started to grow back! It's been 5 months and My head is full of about 2 inch long hairs all over my head! I'll keep you updated on if my full thickness ever comes back.