Handmade Hair Toys

I made the decision a few years ago to grow my hair out, very long. Only recently have I discovered using hair forks and sticks and I love them, particularly forks! These are usually very expensive at stores and online, so I have been experimenting with making my own.
I have a DIY personality to the extreme! lol! I must try to make it myself before I give up and buy one and I can make so many more when I do it myself.

The picture above is a hair fork I recently made. (I wouldn't be caught dead wearing pink. This one is for a friend.) It's steel, shaped, sanded and painted by me with beads added. Here is another picture of the one above:








I have made several of these. Here is one I made for myself, in my hair. I like copper! It goes with just about everything I wear and I have other copper jewelry to go with it.

The copper wire is not as neatly done as I would like. I was just playing around with old wire I had on hand. I'm going to redo it with neater, tighter wrapping.

I also have them painted with a high gloss lacquer in dark violet, burgandy, rusty copper, burnt red. I hope to acquire other colours soon, maybe some blues and greens! I am going to experiment with twirling the paint colours or just dipping the pointed ends into another, coordinating colour!

Making things yourself is so much more rewarding and fun than buying everything, and cheaper too! I can make one to go with everything I wear and give some to friends!

The one at the top is the only one that I have finished so far. I love the way they look in the hair.

If you want to see a how-to video on the above French roll hairstyle, you can see it as the above tab "Hair Forks and Videos".

These are made with heavy, galvanized steel fencing wire. I sanded it then shaped it. After getting the shape I want, I file all the marks off until it is smooth and paint it with nail polish. Ta-da! Hair forks! Seriously, it is so easy!

World Class Meatloaf!

This is a fantastic meatloaf! It's juicy and delicious with just a slight hint of cheddar flavour. It's Lloyd Gallant's recipe, developed in his kitchen.

World Class Meatloaf!


3/4 lb ground beef
3/4 lb ground pork
1 cup rolled oats
1 cup milk
1/2 cup finely chopped onion
1 cup grated cheddar cheese
1 large egg
2 tablespoon parsley
1 1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon pepper
1/2 teaspoon sage

Mix well, bake at 350F for 1/2 hour covered with foil. Remove foil and bake another 1/2 hour.

This makes a great meatloaf with well browned sides and bottom!

Wintersowing

Well, winter is here, sadly. It's been winter here for about a month now. We probably won't see the ground again until spring. The only way a hardcore gardener like myself can survive this, is to plant in the winter too. I know it's not the same, but at least I am playing in the dirt and sorting through my seeds, dreaming of spring.

"Wintersowing" is a relatively new thing, as far as gardening goes. I first heard the term about 15 years ago, and that is new for gardening terms. It refers to someone planting seeds in containers and putting them outside so they get the freezing winter temps they need to germinate, but are up off the ground and enclosed. These wintersowed containers will warm up and thaw faster in the spring than the ground and the seeds will germinate much sooner.

You could plant these same seeds in the ground in the fall and get the same, eventual result, but wintersowing is faster. It also gives gardeners a chance to plant and garden in the middle of the winter.

Wintersowing is better done in deeper containers. The more shallow ones, as in the top picture from a few years ago, dry out too fast in the spring. Plastic pop and clear plastic juice bottles work well.


Here is one I did today. This is echinacea 'Double Decker'.

I drilled a few holes in the bottom center and cut more around the outer edge with a knife. Then I cut it almost in half, just enough that I could lift the lid to fill and plant but not enough to take the lid off completely. I want it as securely attached as possible outside.

I filled it with storebought potting soil, since our ground is frozen solid, and planted the seeds. Echinacea seeds need a winter to germinate and they also need a little sunlight, so they get covered very little, if at all.

I stuck in a label and put it on my south facing deck with a block of ice behind it to hold it in place during winter storms. I don't have many of these seeds and would be quite frustrated should it blow over and be destroyed. I planted about half of the echinacea 'Double Decker' seeds that I have, saving a few in case these don't germinate. (It's a foolish gardener who plants all of his seed!)

I have a few more seeds to wintersow this year. This is just the first one. I'm looking forward to these special echinacea seeds for the flowerbed. As far as the herb uses go, it doesn't matter which one I have since they all have the same properties. I have single purple ones and the 'White Swan'. These flowers look like this:

Almost anything that needs a winter to germinate can be wintersowed. I plan to do a lot more this month, if I have the time.

Winter Bulb Care

That is my favourite dahlia, growing in the chair in the picture above! It's a 'Keri Blue', called that because of the slight blue tint in the very center. It's beautiful and I take no chances with these during their winter rest in my cold cellar. Also wintered over in the cellar are other dahlias, cannas, glad, 4 O'clocks and geraniums (pelargoniums). Many winters, if left alone, the small dahlias will dry up. Some of the other ones do too. This has always been a great disapppointment to me in the spring!

This year I decided to take steps to make sure that didn't happen! I read that it helps to take them out of storage in early January and soak them for a day or so, then dry well again and pack in cold storage for another couple of months.

I did that this past week. I took out the small dahlia divisions and small new dahlia bulbs, as well as the 4 o'clock roots and soaked them in room temp water for a few hours. I then laid them out on the kitchen floor on newspapers to dry for a few days. Today I repacked them in wood chips in plastic bags in the basement.

I had planned to leave them for a few more days but our wonky male cat, Shadow, who has cabin fever in the snowy winter, spent his morning attacking them and shredding the papers. lol! Since they were dry again, I put them away. It won't help him. He just attacks the little rugs and the furniture, rolling around on the floor and killing them with all four feet and teeth! lol! Abby, the female cat, prefers to play with and carry off any little hard things she finds around. Anything is fair game. Hubby swears that she has stolen a couple of his tiny wrenches from the desk. I have seen her batting other things to the floor and knocking them around, as well as finding wood pellets scattered all over the house in the morning! (I won't be the only one glad when spring comes! lol! We love them both dearly!)

I only soaked the small and new dahlias that would, in past years, be dried up in the spring. In past years I have tossed them down there to be completely forgotten until spring. This year I have new ones that are important to me, so I am tending them carefully, checking on them whenever I am down there and making sure they are not getting shrivelled.

The geranium roots are hanging up, dry. This is the first year I have wintered them over in this fashion. Usually I pot them up and grow them as houseplants all winter, and I did do a few like that, also. Geraniums love spending their winter growing in a sunny window and bloom continuously, right up until they go outside in the spring. I didn't have room for all of them this year. I am considering soaking the bare geranium roots hanging in the basement, too. Has anyone done this and does it help or will they be fine hanging bare root in the cold cellar until spring without intervention?

I had calla lilies and some dwarf white cannas last year, but neither survived last winter in storage. I grew them all from seed and was very disappointed when they didn't make it.

Organic Hair Colour - Henna

One HUGE step in my journey to become self sufficient is switching to organic hair colour. I made this step last week and I am thrilled with it!

I have coloured my hair for decades. My natural hair colour is light brown with reddish tones. It's a dirty dishwater, dull, mousy colour that takes on a greenish cast in the winter, so I have coloured it since I was old enough to make that decision, even more so now that it is half gray. Don't get me wrong, I like gray hair on a lot of people. Long healthy gray hair is beautiful! Mine has a reddish/yellow tone. I would have to colour it gray anyway, so why not colour it red instead, since it looks natural on me. I have the orange skin tone and green eyes. It's the colour that looks best on me, so I have gone permanently, organically copper red.

Natural, organic hair colour is not dull or subtle. It's amazing in it's strength! I'm talking about henna here (lawsonia inermis), the red organic hair colouring herb. There is also indigo, which is black and cassia which is a more subtle golden yellow shade. You can mix them to get the colour you want. I went with straight henna and I love the colour!

You can buy boxes of so called "henna" hair colour in various shades off the shelf these days, but they have a lot more than just the organic hair colour in them. Even the "organic" ones have a mix of herbs with very little henna in them. So little that they are not permanent, but wash out after several weeks and fade. Other so-called "henna" hair colours are not even "organic" and contain metals, salts and some have chemicals in them. These commercial "henna" hair colours are not to be used on chemically treated hair and if you do so, you could end up with a really ugly colour, such as "frog butt green". This is the reason most hairdressers will warn you again using henna, so make sure that you buy only pure henna powder. If you get "body art quality" (BAQ) you can be sure it is only pure henna. Sometimes you can buy it cheaply at an Indian grocery or drug store in your area. It's worth a look. Read the label!

Pure henna, sometimes hard to find, will not harm your hair or give you anything other than a shade of copper red. (Online sources listed below.) You can use it on top of any chemical colour you want and even over a perm and get nothing but a shade of copper red. What shade will depend, of course, on the colour under it. Henna will not lighten at all, not one little bit. As a matter of fact, you will probably get a colour a bit darker than you started with.

If it comes in other shades, its not pure henna. Henna only comes in the one colour, copper red. Indigo can be added to henna and/or cassia to make it darker or used alone to make black. You can add cassia to henna to make a less intense shade of red. You can mix the main three organic colours to suit your hair in any proportions you want. You can also add a few other herbs to shift the henna shade a little, such as paprika, but it takes a LOT of these other herbs to shift the henna colour even a little.

So beware, henna is always a deep copper red, but if that is what you want (and I do) you will love it!

If you do colour your hair with henna, don't be shocked at the brightness of the colour for the first few days. You will need about 2-3 days off work to colour it and let it settle down before you take it anywhere significant. The henna colour is VERY bright and intense at first but it does change a lot in three days.

This is my colour immediately after henna:



This is four days later:



So don't be alarmed at the brilliant colour of orange you will have for those first couple of days. It will darken and settle into a beautiful and natural looking copper.

Another difference between the two pictures is the deep conditioning treatment. Many henna mixing instructions say to use lemon juice. The acid is necessary to break down the leaves to get better dye release but you can use vinegar or tea instead. I made the mistake of using lemon juice (3 parts water to 1 part lemon juice) which is drying and I already have dry hair, so I had to deep condition it afterwards (more on the deep conditioning treatment below). After further research (and after using the henna!) I learned that the acid is not necessary if you mix the henna with water and then freeze it. As you know from reading my wine making posts, freezing breaks down the cell walls and releases the juices and the dye. The next time I use henna, for my roots, I will just freeze it and forego the lemon juice altogether or I might mix in a little apple cider vinegar insead. No more lemon juice on my hair! It's dry enough already! I also mixed in 1 egg just before use, to furter strengthen the hair by adding protein.

Pure henna will not damage your hair in the least. It will strengthen your hair, forming a permanent bond with the keratin in the core. Henna and cassia are both great conditioners and will leave your hair strong and shining! People have already commented on the shininess of my hair since the henna.

Henna is permanent and rarely fades much. I assume mine will fade after a summer in the sun and it will fade after a dip in a chlorinated pool, but very few other circumstances will cause it to change colour. It is permanent. You don't flirt with henna, you marry it. Henceforth (from now on) I will only need to do the roots and brighten up the colour with a little henna mixed with conditioner occasionally. It's this permanence that first drew me to henna as an option for hair colour.

I intend to grow my hair to my knees and keep it there. Colouring the ends repeatedly is just not an option at that length. The longer your hair gets, the older and more delicate the ends become. I would not subject my hair to continuous chemical colouring at that length and it would cost me a fortune, as well.

This is the recipe I use for deep conditioning:

- 4 parts conditioner (I use Outrageous and love it!) Some conditioners with dimethicone will cause this mix to curdle, so a cheaper one is better to use for this.
- 1 part pure aloe vera without alcohol
- 1 part honey, heated to kill the enzyme which produces peroxide or it will lighten your colour. Not boiled, just hot. This will warm the conditioner when added, making it work better, too.

Mix well and apply to hair, coating every strand. Cover with plastic and then a hat to keep it warm. Leave on for 1 hour or all day or overnight. The longer, the better. Next time I am considering adding an egg for the protein. I might also consider using coconut oil on my hair ends regularly. Out of all the fancy oils people use on their hair, coconut is the only one that actually penetrates the hair shaft. I just wish it weren't so expensive!

These are the colours my hair has gone through in the past two weeks:



I am thrilled with my switch to organic hair colour! I am looking forward to having copper hair to my knees! (When I get there. it's a s.l.o.w.w.w.w process...)




Again, I cannot stress this enough: Use Pure Henna Powder!

Here are a few places it can be ordered online in Canada and the US:

Canada
They have different shipping costs, ranging from $5.95 to $12 but, at least, there won't be any customs surprises or duty charges.

Any Indian Grocer or drug store near you...or:

Henna Vancouver = The best deal. Pure Rejasthani henna (from Rajasthan, India). Cheapest shipping.

Mehndiskinart in BC

Mehndiandmore sells BAQ powder $5/cup

Dragonfly Designs in Edmonton

Atlantic Henna in New Brunswick

Henna4you

Healing Body Art

And lastly:
Hennaart in Edmonton. I would not recommend this company. Their advertising is deceptive. They lead you to believe you are getting bags of 100g each when you are actually only getting 50g bags. Nowhere in the shopping cart or Paypal does it tell you the size of the bags, either. They have been very careful not to let the customer know exactly what they are getting. It is a good product, shipping to Ontario is $11 for 300g, but beware, you are only getting 50g bags!

I feel that they misrepresented their product and would not buy from them again!


USA

Any Indian Grocer or drug store near you...or here are just a few more suppliers:

Halalco - Only buy the pure, body art quality henna. Other hair mixes are listed.

Hennasooq

Mehandi.com

Henna Caravan

Castleart

Homemade Detergent Update

A while ago I wrote a couple of posts about making your own laundry detergent and making your own dishwasher detergent. The laundry detergent was a roaring success and I have been happy using it since with no problems! Not so the dishwasher detergent.

I have used that recipe for dishwasher detergent with citric acid for many months. At first it clumped so badly it was unusable. Then I added some dry rice to absorb the moisture and it helped, but didn't eliminate clumping altogether and I didn't like putting rice in my dishwasher. The clumping is the citric acid absorbing moisture which makes it work not so well in the dishwasher.

It did work VERY well when first mixed, however and all the dishes came out sparkling clean with no detergent residue whatsoever. It's the citric acid that does it. Now I use store bought dishwasher detergent or my own homemade without citric acid in it. I keep the citric acid in a small jar by itself and just sprinkle a little into each load - no more detergent residue! We are much happier doing it this way and with very little added trouble. I top up the rinse agent each time anyway.

For those of you who are on the journey to self sufficiency and are having difficulty with the dishwasher detergent recipe, try adding the citric acid separately.

Self sufficiency is a continuous journey, one that starts with the first step. That first step is not all that hard to take, either. I don't believe anyone actually gets there. I don't think it's possible to achieve true self sufficiency. You wouldn't be reading this on a computer if you had...