second henna-gloss (success!!!)

Hey y'all! I've not been online much lately - huge long story about selling a condo, and beginning elder-care for my FIL. BUT...

...I am about two weeks into my second-ever experiment with henna!

I am a natural strawberry-blonde. Emphasis on the strawberry here. I cannot WAIT for my hair to begin turning silver, white, grey... any color would make me happy. But what I seem to be getting instead is just a slow fade. Rather than my hair changing color, it's as if my hair just looks a little bit less bright if that makes sense. I am NOT okay with that!

Since I'm a chicken when it comes to anything permanent and I really don't want to change the color of my hair but simply preserve it's current color I thought I'd dabble with something called henna-glossing. It's where you take just a teeny bit of henna & mix it into either yogurt or conditioner.

My first henna gloss was 2 teaspoons of jamila henna, and 4 teaspoons of cassia (trying to retain the strawberry, NOT add extra red here!) mixed into a cup of yogurt & left on for 45 minutes. This was about 1 1/2 years ago and my hair LOVED the cassia, LOVED the protein from the yogurt - and seemed to be less fragile because of the henna for about 3-4 months. The color-change was very VERY subtle. After the oxidizing was complete, *I* could see a change when looking at before & after photos, but nobody I knew mentioned any change which is exactly what I was hoping for.

For my second experiment, I went with a tablespoon each of jamila henna & the cassia in a PINT of yogurt. Big mistake - there was so much "goop" that it kept dripping down my neck THROUGH a big ol' towel! I only left it on for 30 minutes this time too, because I just couldn't handle how runny it was getting.

The color seems to have completely oxidized now, and honestly I can't see any change at ALL in my hair color! Again however, my hair is so STRONG! I've got naturally fragile hair, so this is such an awesome thing for me to have found something that keeps my hair from breaking every time I look at it! I didn't think to take a "before" photo this time, but I'm definitely thinking of repeating this MUCH sooner the next time and then I WILL take before & after shots!

Seriously though, this seems to be the least "scary" way to experiment with henna as it's so subtle! Loving the results here!

love,
mom

Did you wait for dye release in the henna?
I have started glossing my thin ends so they show up. The silvers are not yet heading me to rust, but I'm watching. Oh, to silver properly!

I make henna paste in a non metal bowl, leave it overnight to release, add yogurt or conditioner to the paste in the morning and apply. Wait 45 mins, rinse using boat loads of more conditioner and cold water ( kitchen sink, obviously-- and gloves).

And good to see you!

Oy, here I am 8 months later waiting for my hair to dry after gloss #3.

With my first gloss, I waited for it to release & used warm water. With the second one, I didn't... HUGE difference in how obvious the coloring was... and possibly with how long it lasted too, but I don't have a great way to measure since my hair changes color with lighting, surrounding colors, wet/dry... but I THINK it lasted longer when I let it release, so I repeated that this time.

Gloss #3 was: 1 Tbsp jamilla henna, 1 Tbsp cassia & 2 Tbsp tap-hot (between 104 & 108F) water. Let sit for 30 minutes to release. Add to 1 cup GREEK yogurt, and let sit in hair for 30 minutes, before rinsing & washing like normal.

My hair isn't even dry yet, but I'm pretty sure I'm seeing more red. MUCH more red than last time. Next time I intend to try 12oz of yogurt... I had enough, but just barely so. DH took my ends & swirled them in the bowl to get the last little bit & really had to be careful to get it covered evenly.

The one thing I KNOW I'm seeing, is that already my hair has that "stronger" feeling. Not sure if it's the cassia, the protein, the henna or all three, but my babyfine fragile hair LOVES it when I do this. Must try to remember to repeat every 6 months instead of waiting quite so long. So... October it'll be!

love,
mom

Oh... the other awesome thing I want to repeat... using Greek yogurt instead of regular. No gloopy glops dripping down my neck; it stayed right where it was put until rinsed out! Awesome!!!

love,
mom

Would any full fat yogurt sit tight? Or is it the slight straining that makes it awesome?

And how does it look.

Yes, red to silver is an unattractive journey. Unless sandy is attractive to you.

Although I'd love to be silver, I think I'll gloss to deepen the red slightly when the time comes. It hasn't, at almost 45, so I'm hopeful.

I now understand why the woman who was my first real life hair idol had a very obvious demarcation line in her mid thigh hair.
She had waited for all the silvers to emerge at once.
I could call it ombré and be ultra hip and fashionable. Or actually ombré/dip dye the ends peacock to indigo to purple, back to the red, and then white.
Because by then I'll be maintaining somewhere around knee/ upper calf.
And I'm totally dyeing unnatural stripes once I'm 75 percent silver/white.

I used full-fat yogurt with my first two tries... and both times it ran down my neck. Worse when it was warm out, but even in winter it was goopy & anything but fun.

As of now, (24 hours after rinsing) my hair is MUCH redder than normal. Bordering on red versus strawberry here. Exceedingly healthy, marvelously self-detangling, and RED.



Here 'tis... this was taken under CFL lighting, and my siggy-pic was taken in daylight. Daylight always makes me look a BIT more blonde, and CFLs tend to bring out a BIT more red, but yeah it's pretty noticeable. I'm just glad it's not RADICALLY different... don't mind a bit of a color change, but I really didn't want it to be an "oh my, you've dyed your hair!" change.

Knee length. Oh, how I envy you your length! Here I sit, having FINALLY after six years of fighting, managed to gain an inch on terminal length... still not close enough to quite count as "nearly classic."

love,
mom

do the light mountain hennas work well...have you ever tried them?

The "neutral" henna, which is a plant called cassia, is a great conditioner.

I get body art quality henna. (BAQ) I'd like to say I go to some faboo vendor online, and there are many, but I gloss on the spur of the moment and hit the middle eastern market a few blocks away. It comes in a green box with only Arabic lettering.

The guys running it think its cute a "white chick" (I haven't been all super Jew-y in there) is getting henna.

Now, I'm only glossing, not coloring, and my mix is thin. But a box is two or three treatments. Since dye release takes a couple hours, I make the paste, let it release, pull what i need, and freeze the rest.
No need to wait on release using frozen paste.

This is for classic to fingertip length hair. Wet, with no waves, it is at the tip of my pinky finger, barely.

I'm being all hopeful talking about knee, but I'm still growing, so maybe.

So you are closer to me than you think, mama!

i just ordered the cassia obovata zenia brand
your hair looks good HSM

My henna is from hennasooq.com. I did a bit of research before picking it up, and I know I chose this company because it had a great reputation, and this specific type of henna because it was body art quality & dyes lighter than the others... but honestly, I'm still using the original 50g baggie I purchased three years ago, and I've forgotten most of why I picked THIS type over any other type.

I probably should have mentioned that to start with - my "recipe" was to cover longer-than-tailbone, shorter-than-classic length hair... baby-fine, but THICK. For those familiar with Fia's hair typing system I'm 1bFii-iii (JUST past 4" for ponytail) which means I'm covering a TON of hair with this.

And thank you wyldwynd!!! It takes a bit of effort because my hair tends towards the freakishly-fragile, but I'm finally happy with it!

love,
mom