Badass? You Be The Judge

[kkbmustang]

I bought haircutting scissors the other day for $13. My son and daughter are due for haircuts. They usually run $17 each plus $3 tip, total $40 for two kid haircuts. Every three months. That's $160 per year. This weekend I gave the boy a haircut in our den. No driving, no calling for an appointment, etc. took 10 minutes and looked pretty damn good for a first shot. The girls bangs got trimmed. A trim on length is forthcoming. I see cutting my husbands hair in the near future. His cuts tend to be $25-30ish. Every 6-8 weeks. That's a pretty size able savings over the barber shop. Me though  - still going to the salon. I do not embrace my grey. I felt pretty badass on cutting their hair though. And it looks pretty good. I'll watch a youtube instructional video before the next time though.

[Zamboni]

Lol, I'll grant you some badass points.  Plus, you are learning a new skill, which is always a good idea.

Next step: stop coloring your hair, and then you'll be truly badass.

[kkbmustang]

Lol, I'll grant you some badass points.  Plus, you are learning a new skill, which is always a good idea.

Next step: stop coloring your hair, and then you'll be truly badass.

Yeah, I'm not sure about this. Maybe some henna or something at home in between the salon visits. Or barter for services. ;)

[Mrs.FamilyFinances]

Lol, I'll grant you some badass points.  Plus, you are learning a new skill, which is always a good idea.

Next step: stop coloring your hair, and then you'll be truly badass.

Yeah, I'm not sure about this. Maybe some henna or something at home in between the salon visits. Or barter for services. ;)

Color it at home! I use a $11 box of John Freida Color Perfecting Foam( to be fair, I wait for a sale and have a coupon, so its more like $8) and it is fantastic at covering grey hair, isn't patchy and takes ZERO skill. If you can shampoo your hair, you can use this color. I've used it for about 2 years now. My hair dresser is always impressed with the richness of the color and how evenly it blends. I started going grey in high school, and I'm still not ready to embrace any grey...

[meadow lark]

I use henna.  I am a redhead who has started to fade - the henna makes my hair brighter, and it is close enough to my own hair color there are never any roots showing.

[Empire Business]

Wow, maybe we need a thread for henna-heads.  Best DIY cheap hair dye, since 4000 BC or something.

[greenmimama]

Henna is fine, but don't go back and forth from Henna to salon color, it is not a good mix, they are very very different in the way they color hair.

Great job at saving money, I am a cosmetologist so I of course cut my families hair, but I still think about the savings and the less hassle of making an appointment and keeping the little entertained while we get hair cuts. For myself, I have the kind of hairstyle that doesn't need a cut very often and I don't color, so I keep my bangs trimmed and go in once or twice a year for all over cuts.

[hoppy08520]

Judge's ruling will be delivered in

3...

2..

1....

BADASS!

[arebelspy]

You had me until "salon."

Grey is badass, and beautiful.

Go natural, baby.

[impaire]

I'm working on living with the grey (celebrating 6 months hair dye free... painless!) -- want to join me?

I always hated wasting my time in the hairdresser chair (or living with the home-made dye haze around my face for a couple days after a home dye job) anyway. It's freeing not to deal with either things!

[happy]

Anyone got any tips on how to grow it out without it looking like a disaster?

I suffered for 3months...it looked bad but i was persisting...then had a job interview. Bad hair was too bad, so  I got it coloured up again. Based on that experiment I reckon its going to take me 12 months to grow it out :(.   I thought of getting it cut very short, but DH (dear hairdresser) says it will not look good on me and I agree.

[Megatron]

Being Asian, my mother used to just put a bowl over my head and the cut around it. So I had the typical bowl Asian haircut until I was about 9 or 10.

[Endersmom]

At Happy - what colour do you dye your hair? You can change to hi- liting it to break up the roots while it grows out. It will cost more for hi-lites but if it helps you to grow out the colour it might be worth the short term higher cost. If your doing a fairly dark colour you might want to lighten it over time slowly doing the roots lighter or by getting a shampoo bleach to lighten. Talk to your hairdresser they should be able to give options.

[footenote]

I stopped coloring my hair over one year ago and I have been so pleased with the savings and results. My hair is much softer and thicker - I didn't realize until I stopped how tough coloring is on hair. Congrats, Badass!

[Kriegsspiel]

Henna was all the rage in Afghanistan, humans everywhere luv it. To be honest, I have no idea what henna is... some kind of plant. Or occult magic, or fungus... I don't know. I am considering a mohawk when I leave my job, and of course a colored mohawk is a scoche more extreme than just a mohawk.

[sunshine]

Lol, I'll grant you some badass points.  Plus, you are learning a new skill, which is always a good idea.

Next step: stop coloring your hair, and then you'll be truly badass.

Yeah, I'm not sure about this. Maybe some henna or something at home in between the salon visits. Or barter for services. ;)

Most hennas for hair have metallic salts.  Metallic salts can have disastrous consequences  like broken brittle and a horrid shade of green when put over hair dye or if dye is put over henna.  Henna is great but just not on chemically treated hair. I'd advise a semi or demi color on your roots in between colors. Hard to mess up semi or demi as long as it is just regrowth with a little lightly distributed through the ends the last few minutes.

I agree your stylist can start changing your color if you decide you want to grow it in natural eventually. I have done it for many. Though I admit I hate losing color clients.

[mensa]

Anyone got any tips on how to grow it out without it looking like a disaster?

I had a girlfriend take her partner's clippers to my head about 7-8 years ago. Yes, it was very short, but so much better than long white roots under red dye! It doesn't surprise me that you stylist doesn't think you should do this - s/he wants to keep charging you for colour.

I love my white hair, and have never regretting just cutting out the dye.

[lizzzi]

We moved from NY back to the Heartland last year, so nobody here knew what my hair was supposed to look like anyway. I just stopped salon coloring entirely, and had haircuts every six to eight weeks at the beauty school nearby for $6.50. As the color was cut out, it was a fairly gradual process, with no real "oohh noooooo, weird hair" episodes. I had no idea what my real hair color was, but it turned out to be a nice silvery gray that actually looks better with my skin tones and my clothing colors than my dyed/highlighted light brown hair did. I actually planned to have the color put back in after this year of experimentation, but my little grandchildren say that silver hair is the right color for a grandma, and that I should not dye it.  :D  Too funny. So I'm leaving it alone for now, and hair care costs have gone from around $1000 per year to around $45.

[happy]

It doesn't surprise me that you stylist doesn't think you should do this - s/he wants to keep charging you for colour.

Yes I think I am coming to that conclusion. I've been with her for a while and she is very good. However since I decided to grow it out, it was extra for highlights...that didn't really help IMO. Then a disastrous weird much lighter job she did, which is what I got re-coloured.  I'm still determined to do it and the next 3 months or so are an opportunity before I start my next job. Think I'll go cold turkey and if I need a rescue try somewhere else. I think she just doesn't want to do it...I'm sure she knows how to do lowlights etc better than what she did.

[ace1224]

total bad ass! my mom cuts my kids hair, and my bff trims my ends for me until i make it to the salon.  i go 2-3 times a year for a cut, color, and deep condition. 
i don't think i'll ever manage to embrace the grey lol.

[dude]

Nice!  I also recently purchased a good set of barber's clippers ($54) and have done the DIY hair cut on myself twice now.  I am stoked about saving at least $130/year on haircuts. That will add up!

[TrulyStashin]

I'm 45 and have been going gray since age 19.  I've been coloring since age 32-ish.

At age 42, I decided to let the silver do its thing.  I stopped coloring and got about 10 weeks into the reverse skunk look when a very important business trip popped up.  I colored rather than look awful at a meeting I was coordinating among 4 CEO's and the President of Mexico. 

At age 44, I resolved to try again.  I stopped coloring in Dec. 2011 and in March 2012, I chopped my hair off short.  Jamie Lee Curtis short.  I got tons of compliments on it, but really, really missed my long hair.  I started growing it out in June of '12.   

I kept it silver and medium length until mid-2013.   I really, really tried to love the silver.  I really, really tried to feel beautiful.  But... despite all the "should" I just didn't.

I looked like my mother.  Which would be just fine if I was 70.   
 
I started coloring again in June, 2013 after 18 months of being gray/ silver/ platinum.   My daughter is a hair stylist so she hooks me up with salon-quality color for very little cost.  I'm glad to be brunette again.

My point is that our hair has deep connections to our emotional lives and our sense of self.  I have no opinion on whether any other person should or should not color.  Like religion, it is a very personal choice and you won't know how the landscape feels until you get there.

[kkbmustang]

Ha! Thanks for all of the embracing grey comments. My mom is totally silver so I know what's coming. But for now, I'm not gonna do it. I've only got grey on the top of my head scattered throughout my part. But, I am learning how to braid my own hair and do other things that camouflage it so I can go longer in between appointments.

:-)

[Tempe]

Some day I want to invest in some hair cutting stuff for my boyfriend. He prefers it fairly short, which of course means he had to get haircuts more often. ( I do admit when it grows out the puffy hair looks kinda silly)
I did bring up me doing his hair and he went nah, but I may have to borrow the stuff and try it out ones and see if it goes well or not (and look up on the internet how to do it)
My mom did a lot of my trims (often crookedly but ok) I have paid a total of 60$ ever for people to cut me hair. It helps knowing current and former hair stylists who offer for free to get their hands on my hair, or are friends.