Bad Hair Year comes to an end... I hope

First and foremost: Please check out my new header and also my new etsy shop banner both care of Ms. Jessa from http://www.cakedvintage.com/ doesn't it look great? I'm so pleased and grateful that she did that for me. I keep coming back to my own blog just to admire it. Thanks a bunch Jessa!


I've never really been too particular about my hair. I've had friends and family cut and dye it my whole life with many many mishaps. I've buzzed it super short on a dare and I've cut it myself a ton just because. I do, however, always seem to be able to recover from my hair catastrophes fairly quickly. I've discovered that I can kindof pull off a lot of different looks. Or... at least I can convince myself I can even if it isn't true. My hair has gone through quite a few changes recently. It was super thick and pretty when I was pregnant and for a long time, like eight months, after Betty was born. But then things took a turn for the worse. My hair started falling out in huge clumps and I had several bad run-ins with boxed dyes which only made my hair fall out more. On top of that I had a couple bad haircuts:( One was particularly bad - She made me look like Kate Gosselin.

Here's my hair when I was pregnant (obvi) it had some left over highlights (originally a mistake also) in it from like two years before but you really couldn't tell and it was long and full and lovely. I should never have messed with it.

This was my first hair cut after Betty was born. I got it chopped off and highlighted. The haircut was nice but it wasn't what I wanted. My hair was still really thick and healthy at this point though - Betty was four months old in the second picture and probably three months old in the first.
here it was growing out and falling out. not a fun time. I also still had a ton of baby weight to lose so these are not my favorite pictures of myself.

When I say I had some bad run-ins with boxed dyes I really mean it. I bleached my hair once in Juneau and was able to recover by going to a professional but when I did it a second time in Vermont there was no turning back. My sister-in-law, who is a professional cosmetologist, warned me that I was making a mistake but I did it anyway.



So my plan at this point was to dye it red. The ultimate goal was to have a vibrant burgundy. I'm actually not sure exactly what color I was expecting to get but I disregarded the instructions on the box that said not to bleach my hair if I wanted it to stay darker so I ended up with this... Maybe subconsciously I wanted to have katy perry hair... but I don't think so.


Not too cute. I knew it would be an intense color but I was not prepared for this. And when I was washing the dye out of my hair I coated everything around me in dark pink dye.

I tried to get it fixed and it worked pretty well


but then it started to fade.



and after my doctor told me to stop dyeing my hair It grew out into this horrible two-toned mess.

People would actually stop and stare at me and one sweet little boy came up to me just to inform me that my hair was orange... he really thought I needed to know. I've been reluctant to get it cut because I feel like I have so much less hair than I did and because It has honestly been years since I've had a haircut I was happy with but I think I'm happy with this one.

She couldn't get all of the color out but I actually really like the random red ends and I feel like my hair is way more full looking. Today I didn't blow dry it and it settled into a bunch of fun little curls. It makes me think of Molly Ringwald from way back when. Anyway I'm quite pleased and super relieved to not have to worry about looking like a crazy lady with bright orange hair. I won't be dyeing my hair again for a long long long time. Lesson learned. What do you think? Have you had any similar experiences? Let me know!