#hair henna

[podracerbarrelroll]

Dye your hair red with henna: a guide

This comes from my own personal experience with dyeing my hair red because someone recently asked me for a step-by-step, and I'm writing it down because think it might be helpful to others.

Some things to know first:

Henna adds dark red color on top of your natural color. So if you start out blonde to light brown, you can go red. If you are starting darker than that, I'm sorry, but you may only get a red tint in certain lights. I have very straight white people hair and my natural color is blonde. I don't know how well you can make henna work on different hair colors and textures.

You cannot apply henna on top of hair dyed with synthetic dye. If you already have synthetic dye in, I'm sorry again, but it will fuck up your hair. Your only option if you want to do henna is to wait for your hair to grow out so there's no synthetic dye left.

Henna is very, very permanent. I only ever dye my roots, and I wash my hair in hot water in the shower with head & shoulders shampoo. It stains the follicle rather than coating the strand, so it does not come out. It will make your hair red, but you must be sure you want your hair red and you want it to say like that for awhile.

So, to dye your hair with henna:

Wash your hair with your regular shampoo. Do NOT use conditioner. Allow to dry completely. I usually do this earlier in the day when I shower.

Get your supplies. These are: hair henna (it's a powder), lemon juice, hair clips to section your hair, plastic gloves, a disposable plastic shower cap, saran/plastic wrap, an old shirt, an old sweater or jacket or towel to go around your shoulders, and ideally, someone to help you apply it. I've never applied it by myself.

Mix the henna and lemon juice together until the henna reaches roughly the consistency of pudding. It will be brown-green in color. You don't want lumps, so if I need to open a fresh box of henna, I do this earlier in the day and let it sit. You can let it sit on the counter all day; it won't go bad. Do cover it if it's sitting for awhile so it doesn't dry out.

Section your hair with hair clips. The person applying your henna (ideally not you) will remove these section by section.

Apply the henna. Wearing the plastic gloves, remove the hair clip from the section you want to start with and completely coat the hair with the mixed henna. Go from root to tip, unless you're only touching up your roots, in which case just do the roots. Repeat for all sections.

Wrap it up. Have the person applying your henna gather your hair up, and then put it inside the plastic shower cap. Once that's done, get the saran wrap and go around your head a few times to make it tight.

Clean up. Any spots of henna left on your skin will make it orange for a few days if left to dry, so take some wet paper towels and get any that fell on your face, neck, and ears. Also clean any that might have fallen on the counter or floor etc. The hair clips you used will probably have henna on them and can be rinsed with water and left to dry.

Let it sit. Here's the downside. Henna needs to sit in your hair for at least 4-6 hours for your hair to turn red. For this reason, I get my henna applied right before I go to bed and sleep with it in. I wrap an old jacket around my head so none gets on the pillow or sheets, and then I rinse it out in the morning.

Rinse your hair. I do this the next morning in the shower with hot water and a comb. Henna does tangle my hair, so I need the comb to work through that. I've also learned to work my fingers through the fine hairs by my ears because little dried chunks of henna like to get stuck there. When that's done, I can wash my body free of henna dirt...and then wash the shower and tub, because I usually do get henna dirt all over it.

DO NOT wash your hair with shampoo until 3 days/72 hours have passed. During this time, my scalp is sometimes a little itchy, but nothing too bad. After 3 days have passed, I go back to shampooing and conditioning my hair on my normal schedule, which for me is twice a week, and that's it until it's time for me to do my roots again

If you have leftover henna, you can freeze it for next time. It freezes well, and just needs to thaw for a few hours before you use it. If you're doing it for the first time, you may need a whole box depending on how long your hair is, but if you're just touching up your roots, you may be able to do that two or three times before you go through a box.

Hopefully this can be helpful to someone else, even if that someone is only me the next time I get asked about henna!

Pictures beneath the cut.

I usually use this type of henna, but any hair henna should be fine. Some will make your hair darker.

Comparison of my hair from before I started using henna and after.

[nectarishes]

that trend where people draw hatsune miku in different cultures but pakistani miku (hijabi vers. under the cut)

[pbnmj]

what was supposed to just be pavitr and meera jain spiralled into a LOT of spiders in formalwear/red carpet outfits.... most of them referenced off met gala outfits and then adjusted to suit my own tastes LOL

[garlandedspirits]

Kate Bush + Dante Gabriel Rossetti

[yuviur]

"HA! Welcome to Thargelion yourself"

Haleth and her wife, facing a now slightly flustered Caranthir

[oldcoottalking]

[bemusedlybespectacled]

I was legit worried that dyeing my hair would mean that my clothes wouldn't coordinate anymore, color-wise, but if anything I think they match better with the new red

[meirimerens]

>dressing warm to get back to the countryside 4 work

>puts on my new pair of sage green pants, love it

>puts on blue sweater that i usually wear @ work

>cold temperatures ahead, puts on my thickest jacket, brown

>usual brown boots

>

> ...

> .....

one of us is gonna have to change

[batrogers]

Perhaps our lives would have been (will be) different, had we met in another time...

(Post-Game Ocarina of Time, Ganondorf and Link as partners and lovers.)

[luna2-5]

🩷So sad that my henna is almost gone 🥹

[youreorangeyoumoron]

well. just had a very embarrassing adult phone call so now I must join the witness protection program. bye guys

[taashed]

if bioware really loves me they'll add a highlights option for hair so that i can give muireann blue streaks

[void--angel]

i.....kinda miss being blonde ☹️

[frogonamelon]

Very Much resisting the urge to spend the night coloring this

Just read the new chapter of @sodaspons's Atlas and just... I can't believe she cycled through the whole range of Encanto songs between Waiting on a Miracle > Surface Pressure> What Else Can I Do?

Good for her get help Queen <3

This probably needs some explanation huh?

Top right is April O'Neil and Angel Jones (taking heavy inspiration from both 03 and the IDW comics for her design with a healthy dose of Rise! April with her weapon)

Bottom right is Karai with her badass new sword (lightsaber) pulling an Anne Amphibia (if you've seen the Amphibia season 3 lightsaber fight). She's wearing the chest and forearm armor as well as the turtleneck of her main outfit with her casual jacket and a pair of cargo pants! Getting away from the Shredder and Splinter= more piercings and midriff baby <3.

As for her hair, I decided to have it grow out a little bit during the last three months and it takes on more of a wolf cut. It's hard to tell but the longest part between her ears is supposed to be the grown out bleached underside.

On the left side is my take on a human design for Vee. I noticed the replacing of her mask braid with a shorter loose one and immediately ran with apocalypse emergency cut. Her facial structure on the top/ younger/ early season 1 one is very much Yoshi's but the bottom is more influenced by Kirby (minus the cheekbones- she just looked too old with 'em) and Casey's probably broken nose.

Her clothes were as close as I could get to the way I draw turtle!Vee with the strap, tank top to mirror her plastron, and baggy pants with a tied belt. This time I made them jeans since they have a better chance of being functional. (This is the second time in a row I've forgotten her scars noooooooognkdnfkd)

If I had colored it, it would be easier to tell but Vee has bleached blonde hair on the bottom one as a representation of her mask (and mild newfound identity). I was originally going to give her a piercing but decided that the kraang (or possibly the Shredder's forces) could've put an ear tag on her like you would with livestock. They cut it off.

[bemusedlybespectacled]

guess who went auburn today (it was me) I’ve wanted to try going red for a while because I never dyed my hair as a kid/young adult and I think it was a good choice

(it’s kind of patchy because I was doing it myself with henna) (but I can always redo it later and anyway I know I like the color now) (though we’ll see how it is in a few days after it sets)

(not pictured: the big grey streaks at my temples that I wanted to get rid of)

[lucydacusgirl]

Well you know what they say about pain. Ouch.