my week in pictures 42

monday 2/3 - sunday 2/9

I have one word for you... SNOW.
Snow, snow, snow. So much snow(ing) this week, non-stop for three days, and I loved it! In fact, almost all of my pictures are of snow, because we got 18 inches and I was pretty much snowed in all weekend since I dropped Pat off at the airport on Thursday for New Orleans. (Did I say snow enough times?) I also messed around with my hair to perfect my ombre look (which I missed since letting it grow out), tried some really weird home remedies, and attempted/failed to shovel our driveway solo. Luckily, one of my super nice neighbors came over with his snow... blower... thingy... to help me out so that I could go to work on Monday!

[[ before all star pat always gets one nice dinner in, early valentine's day. he really loves shell fish... work day at br. the start of the snowpocalypse. our neighborhood on day 2. working on a little ombre action. experimenting with super weird home hair treatments... yes, thats ketchup, the blonde looked a little too ashy, and it worked! chillin with some festive socks. the massive amounts of snow on day three. attempting to shovel the driveway to free my car. super nice neighbor coming to help. our beautiful backyard. the official measurement. ]]

turning in to bonnie

As I mentioned in my Weekend Adventures post, getting my hair to look somewhat accurate was quite the extensive process... This of course came as no surprise seeing as I have a ton of extremely unruly hair. I used this very basic tutorial from The Beauty Department which showed a few pictures with a brief write up as to how to get the look at home, so this was my basis.

(I apologize for my super awkward facial expressions in all of these pictures...)


1) I started by splitting up the bottom and top halves of my hair to eliminate some of the bulk. I then took the bottom half, split it into two, and made two little pigtail braids, which Tiffany helped me bobbi pin flat against the back of my head.

[[ before starting. braided hair. ]]

2) Next came the curling process, which definitely took the longest because you have to use a tiny curling iron no larger than a quarter inch. Keep in mind that I was only working with the top half of my hair here... but just the left side took me about an hour. I was lucky enough to already own a tiny curling iron, but I think for future endeavors I will invest in an upgraded version considering mine came from Claires about twelve years ago. Anyway, for this step I took tiny sections of my hair, wrapped them around the curling iron, holding them in place, and then used bobbi pins to pin the little curls up against my head. The instructions of my tutorial specified to angle the iron towards your face the entire time, which I found a little confusing, but I did my best to figure out. Eventually with Tiffany's help I was able to get all of my hair pinned up.

[[ all of my hair curled and pinned up. ]]

3) Ordinarily you will want to leave your hair in this state for as long as possible for the best results, but since we were on a bit of a time crunch I attempted to expedite the process by holding a hair dryer over my head for as long as I could stand it, which was somewhere in the area of fifteen minutes. At this point we started taking all of the curls down.

4) After all of the curls were let loose I had to brush them out towards my face. (Tread lightly on this part, because you only get one chance at it). The instructions said to be rough, but I took a more gentle approach, which seemed to work out fine for me. If you have thinner hair you may need to rat it a bit, but at this point I looked like a lion/clown, so I was good to go.

[[ after taking out the curls. after combing them out. ]]

5) Now for the tricky part... In order to create the bob look we had to tame my hair and sort of shape the curls in to place so that they looked more like finger waves. Next Megan and Tiffany helped me fold the bottom of my hair under and pin it to the rest of my hair to finalize the illusion. You will want to use a ton of bobbi pins to keep everything in place.

6) Finally take a bottle of hairspray and throw as much of that chemically loaded hair product as you can handle all over your hair. The nastier it feels when you are done, the better your chances of keeping the hair style in tact for a night. Needless to say, I was thrilled when I could shampoo my hair in the morning.

[[ the final product. ]]

And that was that, I pinned my beret to my head, put on my dress, threw on some eye makeup and a red lip, slipped on my vintage looking kitty heels, grabbed my handgun, and was ready for action. Surprisingly my hair turned out really awesome and even held up for the night! Thanks largely of course to the help of my laaaaadies, Tiff and Megan. Thank you ladies!

new year, new hair my first attempt at ombre

Like I mentioned in this Midweek Inspiration post, I have many hair crushes, and my current love affair is with various types of ombre. Not the super dark on top and then super light with no blending, but I love love love it when the color fade is more towards the bottom. I finally decided to bite the bullet, and set up a hair appointment to get my very own.

We were initially running off of this example where it is more of highlights blended underneath. So, after a few hours at the salon I walked out with blonde highlights towards the bottom of my hair which just were not what I was going for. Feeling sorry for myself, I started researching various DIY techniques and came across this tutorial by LLYMLRS, which I found to be the most helpful. Armed with confidence I ran off to the store to pick up a high lighting kit to play with when I got home, but, I totally chickened out and opted not. I woke up the next morning with a "whats the worst that can happen?" attitude and figured why not?! So, into the bathroom I went kit in hand, tutorial on phone, ready for action.

[[ hair trials at the salon. ]]

Because I was so nervous of the end result I snipped a small chunk of my hair to test out in the mixture first which turned out a nice color, but did not really give me a proper indication of time, so I decided to start small with only 10 minutes on the undermost layers of my hair. It soon became pretty apparent to me that I needed to leave the bleach mixture on for a lot longer, more like twenty minutes. I am sure foil, or using more of the mixture at once would have increased the result in less time but I was too nervous to try. After I finally got the undermost layers done, I let more of my hair down and repeated the technique before finally placing a smaller amount of bleach on just the very ends of my hair for some added lightness.

[[ experimenting with the highlighting kit. ]]

It turned out better then I thought it would considering I had never dyed my hair before, and it helped blend in my "highlights" so that they look much less random! The only thing I don't like about it is that since my natural hair contains so many different colors, the transition is not always as noticeable as I would have liked it to be, but for a $12 box of highlighter I can certainly add in some more. I would definitely recommend doing this yourself rather then through a salon unless they specialize in an ombre. I will most likely give it another run sometime in the near future for added effect.

[[ an example of my diyd ombre hair. ]]

It is seriously as easy as the tutorial makes it seem, but if you are nervous then just start on the under layers like I did and work your up to more time and the rest of your hair. I wasted a lot of the solution rinsing it off every ten minutes, but trial and error is key. Just make sure you buy a highlighting kit (not a dye), and follow the kits instructions. 

Ultimately I am really happy with the way it turned out (for now) and proud of myself for finally doing it! Like I said I will most likely give it another try in the future, that is how easy it is.

.

midweek inspiration 30

Happy Wednesday... this week is going by quick. I really love my hair, but I have been bored with it for a long time. Though I do not want to cut it short or dye it all, I have thought about doing a bit of an ombre for a while now. Nothing so intense as Drew Barrymore's messy renditions, but just a little bit at the bottom. Either way I really need a haircut, so I guess you will have to wait and see what I decide when I get one on Friday. :) I am a little nervous though! I have only highlighted my hair once or twice in high school and that was a long time ago. I guess you could say I am a bit of a baby when it comes to commitment even when it is just my hair.

Here are some pretty examples I have been envying. 

1. image from Story of Style 

2. image from haironthebrain.com

3. image from NHY-PHEN

4. image from jenhammer.com

5. image from Fashion Toast

6. Rachel Bilson image from Pinterest (original source unknown)

7. image from coolspotters.com

8. image from Zoella

9. image from Pinterest (original source unknown)

10. image from Pinterest (original source unknown)

gettin my hurrr did.

I am still playing catch up this week with posts from Christmas & New Years. Here are some things coming up this week/next: Weekend Adventures 13 & 14, shiny new toys and pretty things, New Years Eve Celebration, and my 2011 Resolutions... I am still working on these a bit.

First things first... before going home for Christmas I decided to try something new with my hair. Nothing drastic, as I am quite attached to its length, color, and easy styling. But I do have a little more bang action going on... now, if only I could figure out how to style them properly so that they stay in place. I sort of look like a mess more often then not as of right now, but I will get the hang of it soon enough.

[[ bangs. megan in the background being a fool. some spoiler pictures for new years. ]]