An update on the experiment

So it's been what, almost 3 weeks?  Here's the scoop on my Natural Hair Care Experiment.

Washing with baking soda alone has been fine.  I still only wash every other day, with just a water rinse on the odd days.  The soda seems to get the hairspray out just fine, and my scalp hasn't been itchy or anything.

The rinses, however, are a different story.  I've tried a few different combinations to see what works best for my hair, and so far the plain apple cider vinegar gives me the best results.  I tried ACV and honey (for frizz) which wasn't bad... just beer (for body) which left a weird residue and seemed to make it tangle a lot worse... ACV and beer, which wasn't as bad as just beer but not the best... ACV and olive oil, which oh god no.  The day after that one was the oiliest, most disgusting hot mess of hair I've ever had.  I had hoped the tiny, bitty little drizzle of oil would help with some of the flyaways I was dealing with, but it weighed my hair down worse than regular conditioner does.  So in the end, I'm sticking with plain old ACV, with a little honey maybe once a week.  I might switch to plain vinegar, but I like the smell of ACV better.

My hair hasn't looked nearly as fried - it's soft an shiny and so much easier to style, even if it still doesn't hold a curl all day.  My color is holding up much better too, and once my hair is dry it doesn't smell like a salad or anything either.  :-) 

There was one day that I had some leftover baking soda in the cup, so I used it on my face - forget the oil cleanse method, holy cow did this make my face feel wonderful!  It's got just enough grit to exfoliate, and I'll probably only do it once or twice a week, but it worked fabulously.  I still have a whole bottle of Burt's Bees face wash to use up first though.

Natural Hair Care Experiment, Day 1

The fabulous Lani Diane Rich has been writing recently about her experiments with homemade and natural methods for a multitude of things, from lipbalms to dryer sheets.  And I, being the sporadic, lazy-ass, wanna-be blogger that I am, decided to finally start writing about my experiments as well.  I've been meaning to do this for over a year now anyway, so I might as well take inspiration when I can.

First, I'll start with the one that I embarked on today, known in some circles as the "No 'Poo" method.  Me being on the same level of humor as a 12-year-old boy, the words "No 'Poo" just make me think of avoiding the toilet for some unknown 12-year-old-boy reason, so I'm going with the more innocuous "Natural Hair Care" method instead.

The most common recipe that I've found goes something like this:
1 tbs baking soda with 1 c water, to rub into scalp
1 tbs apple cider vinegar with 1 c water, to rinse ends of hair
-- Add honey for frizz
-- Switch to lemon juice for grease
-- Add lavender oil to help with itchy scalp
-- Add olive oil to ends for dryness

Considering the number of "sparklies" (aka gray hairs) I've been noticing, I dyed my hair again this past Saturday.  Sadly some of the grays are already sparkling away in my bangs again, despite the fact that I haven't used shampoo in 6 days before even starting my experiment with the natural ingredients.  I usually only wash my hair every other day anyway, so this week I just gave it a good water rinse to try and get some of the product out of it without using shampoo.  I also figured this might give my scalp a chance to balance out so it might not get as oily throughout the whole transition process, which many people have commented can last up to a month.  I had one day this week which could have been considered a "hat day," but otherwise it wasn't so bad.

So today, here's what I did.

I grabbed a couple of leftover Red Solo Cups (I fill you up... LET'S HAVE A PARTY...) and put my baking soda and ACV in them to take to the shower.  I added a tiny squirt of honey to the ACV - my hair tends towards flyaways using regular conditioner so it made sense to try this right out of the gate.  I filled the cups about halfway with water and gave them a swish with my fingers, then just tipped my head back and poured the baking soda over my scalp.  I took a minute to scrub with my fingers a bit, but it didn't feel particularly gritty. Got some baking soda water in my eye which felt funny but didn't burn like if it was shampoo, so there's another bonus.  I rinsed my hair, then repeated the mixing process with the ACV/honey.  This time instead of pouring it over my scalp, I held my hair up from my neck and poured most of the mix just over the ends, then poured the last little bit over my whole head.  I kind of squished my hair a bit to work the mix through, then rinsed again with water.

I was worried about detangling afterwards, but it wasn't too bad.  As long as I don't rub my head with the towel but just squeeze the water out, I think it'll be okay.  The smell of the ACV didn't bother me at all, but I do want to find out what an occasional beer/egg rinse might do for me too.  My hair felt "sticky" like velcro when blowdrying, not the usual slippery-overconditioned-smooth.  It also seemed to dry faster than normal.

So far, no noticeable negative effects - frizz is of the normal sort, but we'll see what it does over the course of the day.  Too bad there isn't anything to be done about my cow-licks.