Crikey I am in my 6th month of my dreadlock journey! Still loving my dreads. 🙂 Have to find another person to carry out my maintenance work though as the last two have moved. Is it me?
I have had some more colour added to my arm yesterday. Feeling happy but sore. I have been adding the usual savlon and aloe vera to it which helps.
I had some dread maintenance done a few days ago. I’ve been having problems with tension bumps around my neck and ears the last couple of weeks and approached Nadine (@dreadedmousse) to tidy them up and see if she could provide some advise. She is brilliant and if there is any dreadies in the south of England who are looking for some dread help then I can’t recommend her highly enough. My dreads feel lovely and light and look so much more tidy. I can tie them up again without the pulling sensation at the back of my neck. 😀
Here are a couple of pictures of how messy my dreads were before the maintenance.
And here’s my dreads today, looking a damn site better. Although there is a little fuzzy bit on the side there that is a left over from when the first maintenance when Angie cut my roots as they were merging. So I have some short hair on the top that will probably continue to work its way loose until it’s long enough to lock with the surrounding dreads.
I decided that my hair deserved another henna day so I bought a henna I saw used by the YouTuber Elise Buch. It’s the Henné Color range she used and I chose the Copper Red shade which I think is the same one Elise used. Suffice to say it didn’t come out the same shade on me as it did on her. But my hair is more of a dark auburn. But the experience in comparison to the Lush henna was amazing. So much easier and a hell of a lot easier to rinse out. In fact I just rinsed it out after three hours and didn’t wash it for about three days. The colour was lovely but what really impressed me was how much easier it was to apply and rinse out of my dreads. Seriously if you are looking for a henna to use on dreads this is the one to go for. No mixing with tea or lemon juice just straight mix with hot water, apply and rinse after set time. That easy. Also it’s roughly £2 cheaper than the Lush henna. Bonus 😀
My new earring from bodyj4you It’s made from a teal coloured glass. Love it! 😊
This is a better picture of the earring:
I need my makeup today. I have done two blocks of nights this last two weeks with a couple of day shifts thrown in the middle of the two blocks. My rosaceae has come storming back. 🙁 But on a lighter note, I am off for my first colouring in session on my arm today. 😊
It’s been over three months since I last used henna on my hair which is just before I had my dreads done. So I decided to take the bull by the horn and henna my dreads today.
I buy the henna I use from Lush, their rouge bar. I absolutely adore the colour it leaves in my hair. It’s got cocoa butter in it which leaves my hair so shiny and soft. It is really messy and does have a habit of getting everywhere. I also wouldn’t do it if I were going anywhere that day or the following day as initially it takes roughly three hours to set but then the following twenty four hours it’s still processing the colour. Also because you want to allow it to continue processing it’s generally not advisable to wash your hair too much after rinsing the henna out so your hair will look like a bit of a grease ball for those twenty four hours thanks to the cocoa butter. So all in all it’s a plan ahead event not a leave it to the last minute dye job.
I tried to take photos of how I did it as this is the first time I’ve ever used the henna on my dreads. Fingers crossed I’ve got myself ginger dreads and not undone a lot of the dreading/locing up. *eek*
This is all the tools I have with me in preparation for the mess. The cling film for afterwards, the essential rubber gloves, the drape for around my shoulders to protect my clothes, ultrabland for my skin at the hairline and of course the henna. I broke the bar of henna into a glass bowl, added boiling water and then stuck it into a microwave for two minutes. I aimed for a consistency of a chocolate sauce. But when it starts to cool down it does thicken up and may need more hot water to keep it warm and easier to apply.
Once everything is ready I then apply the ultrabland to my skin around the hairline to ensure I don’t dye the skin there.
I then applied the henna to my hair. It’s comparable to putting mud on you hair. As you can seen it looks like it too.
Once my hair was coated I then wrapped my head up in the cling film to ensure the henna works effectively. I’ve read somewhere if the henna is covered and your head is kept warm by using clingfilm and a towel it increases the redness of the colour whereas if you don’t cover up the colour is a browner shade. I don’t know if this is true but I’ve always covered my head up with any kind of dye I used so it’s more a habit than anything for me. I use a shower cap to cover the cling film and then set my timer for three hours. In the meantime there is the horrendous mess left over from the application. 😦
Okay so I’ve just rinsed out, or rather tried to rinse out the henna. OMG twenty minutes later and there are still bits of the henna in my dreads! Seriously this is not fun. So, even though I said it was not advisable to use shampoo directly after rinsing I went ahead and used some of my dreadsuk shampoo to try and get the henna out. I shouldn’t have worried, I think I’m going to have to wash it at least one more time. I will leave that for tomorrow. I will take a photo and update this blog entry then as the light is very poor right now and my hair looks like a greaseball.
Three days of 12.5 hour shifts… The bags under my eyes have turned into rucksacks. 😕 But at least my dreads are still keeping me happy. My new headband which is from @kodamalife(http://etsy.me/2czOc4H). It’s really comfortable and I love the colour and pattern. I bought 2 and the other one is reversible. Katerina made them herself and the quality is outstanding. Such a lovely lady too. 😊
My baby dreads are 2 months of age today 😊 I am still so happy with them. Angie from dreadendz (@aurora_710) did some maintenance work on them the day before yesterday. Suffice to say I need to carry out a bit of maintenance work too to stop these bad boys from turning into one big dread 😅 They feel amazingly light again. Thank you@aurora_710 xxxxx
Dreaded nurse 