So I really wanted to do the ombre affect without paying a crap load of money to get it, because I'm just bored, not DIEING to change my hair colour, since I've been a natural brunette (with really healthy hair!) for about 9 years now. Why dye your hair if at some point you're going to get grays and then hair dying will be a necessity???
Anyways, back to the ombre. I thought I would try this method over other methods because after a little OCD researching on the internet, peroxide alone would take a few weeks to get to any results, and who wants to sit with peroxide wet hair for 8-9 hours a day/night anyways just to see results after 30 days???
Then I came across a faster method, mixing with baking soda and leaving on your hair for 30 minutes. I liked the idea of a little honey as well, since it is a good moisturizer for your hair, and since I was literally going to burn my hair with peroxide I needed all the help I could get.
First round: I mixed peroxide with baking soda to make a thin paste. It's up to your discretion, you really can't mess this up. Just know that if its too thin it will run off your hair, and if it's too thick it will clump up and you will have weird dye problems... then just add a big scoop of honey to the mix.
After that start scooping and plopping into your hair and running it down the hair. I put the tips in the bowl to completely saturate them, and put my hair half up and only dyed the underneath (just in case it turned out awful) After that just wrap in tinfoil and leave for 30 minutes.
My hair looked lighter, but still natural.
If you don't notice a huge gradient (as I didn't since I only died the bottom) I spritzed peroxide on the middle half of my hair and the lower half twice over 2 days, this lightened the dyed section slightly and lightened the non-dyed section a bit to blend in with the dyed bit.
Second Round: After a few days I decided I wanted to go a little lighter at the tips - DO NOT re-dye your hair right after the first round, or leave it on for more than 30-45 minutes at a time. This is very drying already, and you might end up with broken hair - So I re-dyed 3 days later, same method, and noticed a change that I really liked. I'm not going to go any further since my hair seems much more dry and brittle (but not destroyed, just slightly straw like (for a girl that hasn't dyed her hair in 9 years...) but I do notice there is a red tinge to my dyed hair. Some people like this, and I don't MIND it, but I purchased a colour neutralizing conditioner (either for blond or silver hair, I got the silver hair one) which has a hint of blue in it so it will neutralize the red and look more blonde (hopefully???). I didn't purchase the shampoo because I don't want it to colour neutralize my roots, just the middle and ends, where I use conditioner. I will post about those results as well before you decide to go waste money on the product.
Cheers and happy dying! It's really a fool proof method (I have never dyed my hair myself before...) and very easy and cheap (I already had all these ingredients at home!) So go ahead, try it! :)
