How to: Color Your Hair at Home

Wednesday, March 20, 2013









I started this post looking for pictures of myself with different hair colors. Turns out, there was roughly a million. I guess I like to color my hair. But my big secret is that 9 times out of 10, I do it myself. And, thus far, I've only had two mishaps.

The first was during my second pregnancy. I'd received pretty much horrific news about what the rest of the pregnancy was going to be like and I had an appointment with a very important specialist the next day. To keep myself busy and to stop myself from having a nervous breakdown, I decided to color my hair. A dark, chocolatey brown. Yeah, it turned BLACK. Like, black as night. Like, black as the soul of Kim Kardashian. I panicked and made my little brother go to the drugstore for Color Oops while I hid and cried in the bathroom.

The second time was after I dyed my hair blonde the first time. I had it professionally done the first round because I'm smart and know that drastic changes should be left to your hairstylist. BUT I thought I was qualified to do the roots myself. They turned orange. Again, I cried in the bathroom and then called my hairdresser for an emergency appointment.

But other than those two times, I've always been able to color my own hair. And actually do a pretty good job. And I've learned some seriously awesome tips from my adventures and misadventures in self color, so I thought I'd pass them onto you.I'll just tell you how I do it. That way, if you color your hair and totally screw it up, I can be like "That was the instructions for ME!"

Step One: First, the most important thing is to get the color right. BE SMART or end up crying in the bathroom. If you want to color at home, stick to one or two shades lighter or darker than your current color. Anything more and you need to see a pro, STAT. My favorite at-home brands are: L'Oreal Preference for all-over color and a bigger change, Clairol Nice n' Easy for roots and touchups and Garnier Olia for freshening up your color each month. I'm using Olia right now and I'm a fan -- it doesn't smell AT ALL and it makes my hair uber-shiny. And, just as an aside, both times I botched my hair color, I was using Feria. Just sayin'.

Step Two: Once you've got your pretty little box, grab out the instructions and you know, READ THEM. Each brand of color is slightly different, so don't skip it because you've done it before. Also, that's when you get to find your snazzy gloves. Find one of your husband's old T-shirts and put it on. Then be prepared for him to give you a mean look when he realizes that his disgusting hunting shirt is finally destined for the trash. Huzzah.

Step  Three: Grab some Vaseline or lotion and put it around your hairline, your ears and your neck and literally anywhere else that you're prone to sloppage. Otherwise you're going to be left with some seriously gross stained skin afterward and it TOTALLY spoils the effect.

Step Four: Start with your roots. I use a gross old comb for this part. Some use brushes (my mom swears by a kitchen silicone brush for coloring her hair... uh, not that she colors her hair or anything). Start with your hair in a normal part. Now, here's where I go off the rails from the instructions. If I botch the color and it gets blotchy, I'd rather it happen where you can't see it. So instead of sectioning off my hair and doing all the roots first, I color my hair in my normal style first. Does that make sense? Like, I brush it out and cover all of the area of my normal hairstyle BEFORE sectioning with my gross comb. Don't be bashful with that color! Use it up!

If you're doing all-over color, do all of your hair at once. If you're touching up your roots, do them first and let it sit the prescribed amount of time, using up the rest of the color  on your other hair only when you have about 5 or 10 minutes left on processing. 

Step Five: OK, so you know when you have your hair colored in a salon and they pop you under the dryer? Do this at home! Your hair will take the color better, which is especially important if you want results like the box. I just stick my diffuser attachment on my hair dryer (that way you get heat without blow-age) and use that while I'm processing. Flip your head upside down and just make sure all of the sections get equal attention.

Step Six: After your iPhone timer goes off -- because that's the only way to time things -- it's time to rinse out. Now, you're inevitably going to look in the mirror. DON'T PANIC. Your hair probably doesn't look like its final color. Give it a few minutes before the crying starts.

Step Seven: Rinsed it out? Good girl. Now you can blowdry it. I always style my hair after coloring so I can get the full picture of how the color looks when it's styled AND to see if I missed any spots. If spots have been missed, wait a day and color again. Don't use the leftover stuff in the bottle.

Step Eight: Bait your husband and see if he notices anything different. When he gets it wrong, sigh loudly and make him feel bad.

Seriously, I color my hair every six weeks or so. And I've been doing it since I was 14. That's 14 years of color, people. And my hair is still healthy and a natural color, so I win!

So to break it down:
Good color
Lotion on skin
Color your hairstyle first
Heeaaaaat


... and you should have a color that you love.


Alright, two things: Do you have a hair coloring genius tip that you want to share. Or even better, do you have an awful but hilarious after the fact hair coloring story to tell? AND... GO!

8 comments:

Heather said...

I'm a color since 14 person too!

I actually always do coloring at home naked and just take a book into the bathroom to hang out with. I take out all the soft stuff from the bathroom because I make a mess too! (Wipe up any drips as soon as you are done so they don't stain the tile or grout.) I start by doing the roots at my natural part and around my face. Then I just start squeezing it all over. I'm a fan of getting my hands in there and swirling it down to the roots etc etc... When I have long hair, I usually tip my head over the bathtub to do the underside. Don't forget the crown- that's the easiest place to miss by yourself.

When coloring blonde- leave the color on at least 10 minutes longer than the box says. You get orange when you haven't left it on long enough. In fact, I always give it a little extra time. Box kits are not as potent as the hair dressers stuff, so it needs a little more marinate time.

I love Revlon's dye and highlight combo kits. I do the color one night and the highlight the next night. Forget the stupid tools. Just mix the highlight up, section out some hair, gloop some on your fingertips and wipe it through all the way. Start with sections around your face so those become the brightest. I've never had a problem with the highlight transferring to other hair as I do it.

Unknown said...

I have VERY thick hair. If it's near or below shoulder length we always get two boxes. Better to be able to double up all at once than need an emergency trip to the store because there are weird patches of un-colored hair!
My HUSBAND is my colorist. Seriously. I've never had my hair professionally done, but he's game for all sorts of things. I have had super short a few times so he's done everything from full color, highlights, and even a pull cap (oh my land, that was excruciating!!!) We just strip down to the skin above the waist and I wrap an old towel around my shoulders. The towel has started falling apart, but no trying to get a tee shirt off over goopy hair.
When our oldest was 2 years old Hubs colored my hair (using two boxes) and there was a bit of color left. So yes, we totally colored our two year olds hair. I never would have tried such a thing with our two other kids, but she did a super good job of sitting still, leaving it alone,etc. AND since our hair was the same color (and we both have naturally dark eyebrows) NOBODY believed us that our hair was colored, LOL.

Rose said...

Rubbing alcohol works great to remove accidental sloppiness on your face, neck or bathroom counter. I also use it to clean the rat tail of my gross comb.

I find the foam hair color works great when I'm doing all over color. I do that about every 4 months or so and root touch up every 4 weeks.

Jennifer Wells said...

Behold the many faces of Jae!

I wish I could go blond, but I have very Snow-White coloring. I am the palest non-redhead you have ever met. So it would look weird.

But I have gone black, and I have played around with highlights a little. Mostly to hide the silver!

Jae said...

I've wanted to try foam color! Maybe this next time around -- I'm due for a touchup in a couple of weeks.

Nora, I'm very fair and when I went blonde, I was just careful to pick something that had noooo orange in it. lol. I found a buttery color with ash highlights worked best. But I'm not like, snow white fair!

bequi said...

The first time I colored my hair, I was 23. I went to a hair school and asked the girl to dye it an auburn color. I said I wanted semi-permanent so it would wash out since I knew I would never get around to touch ups. She had been going to beauty school for 2 years, so I am still shocked by how it turned out. She took OVER AN HOUR to put in the dye. She pulled my hair like crazy while she was brushing in the color. When she was done, my hair was PURPLE.

It was terrible.

Heidi said...

I have dabbled in the home dyeing process myself for many years too!! I don't have any tips other than what you mentioned, but I do have a horror story... When I was about 14 my neighbor friend decided she wanted to dye my hair. S during the process, she gets to talking and doing less of the paying attention and dribbles a huge glob of hair dye right down my forehead, in a panic she smears it halfway across one of my eyebrows while trying to clean it up. So I was rocking a streaked eyebrow there for awhile. It was awesome.

Unknown said...

I color my hair myself off an on. I usually miss spots. Idk how to stop doing it but it makes me crazy.
Even making sure to saturate 1in sections all around.
Now I just rock it and laugh if anyone says anything. They're my "highlights"

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