Tuesday, July 31, 2012

A Great DIY Hair Treatment

I would like to share a DIY hair treatment that I have recently tried and really like. It's not my creation, but it does do a really nice job of treating hair, especially color treated locks. This treatment was created by a woman named Carrie using a user name carekate. There are a number of her DIY skin, hair, and other treatments on a notepad in MakeupAlley.

The following is carekate's recipe:

"Recipe for Dr. Holland's Hair and/or Lash Protein Treatment:

 
 What you'll need:
  • Small, clean plastic or glass bottle (4-oz in size, or less)
  • Jojoba oil
  • Avocado oil
  • Grapeseed oil
  • Coconut oil
What you do:
  • Fill bottle up 70% full with Jojoba oil, then
  • Add 10% Avocado oil and another 10% Grapeseed oil, then
  • Add 10% of liquified Coconut oil, then
  • Replace lid on bottle and shake well to ensure all of the oils blend together.
How you use it:
----------------------------------
Boil some water then submerge bottle containing homemade protein treatment in this boiling water for a few seconds in order to warm the treatment. You can also place the bottle of protein treatment in the microwave and nuke it for a couple of seconds, but be very careful as you don't want to microwave it so long that the bottle melts!
If you are applying the protein treatment to your hair, you want to wash your hair and then towel dry then work a small amount of the protein treatment through your hair from scalp to ends, ensuring that all of your hair is completely saturated -- the longer your hair is, the more protein treatment you'll need to use. Leave protein treatment on your hair for at least 30 minutes or as long as possible -- personally, I sleep on mine and shampoo it out the next morning.
If you color your hair, apply the protein treatment to freshly washed hair and apply the hair dye mixture directly over the protein treatment for spectacular results!
Please note: coconut oil solidifies when it is cold so you have to heat it a bit for it to become liquified. Therefore, I always scoop out a bit of the coconut oil solid and place it in a microwave-safe dish and nuke it for a few seconds until it becomes runny and liquidy at which point I mix it with the other oils which help prevent the coconut oil from hardening back up into solid form."


It cost me about $25.00 to buy all the ingredients (they could probably be purchased for less than I paid at a local health food store), but I still have a lot of everything except the Jojoba oil and will be able to make quite a bit more of the treatment. I haven't even used up all the original batch. Also, the coconut oil is food grade and can be used for cooking or anything else coconut oil is used for. I bought a plastic hair color bottle at Sally's. It has markings on the side that allowed for easy mixing of the ingredients.

I bought some 4 for a dollar shower caps at the Dollar store and used one to place on my head after I applied the oil so that I could leave it in overnight. Although carekate said you should wash your hair before applying, I did not and my hair looked beautiful after I shampooed it the next morning. The thing I really like about this treatment over those commercially available is that it has almost no scent. So many of the oil treatments I looked at purchasing were quite scented.

I hope that this helps someone else who is trying to find a homemade natural hair treatment.  Let me know if you try it or if you have some other great concoction you use.

15 comments:

  1. Thanks Debbi, this definitely sounds worth trying. My hair is so, so dry right now that I am down to a once per week shampoo. I like all the natural oils.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Patti, my hair has been really dry after bleaching it so much in the past few months. This treatment made it feel silky and healthy again. I am sold on it. I have read that the argan oil is wonderful also, but the smell is too much for me as is the Moroccan oil that the celebrities swear by.

      Delete
  2. Debbie - I'm in Kansas too! I've been following your posts for a while.

    My adult daughter has been teaching herself to use these oils so I benefited from her experiments. Anymore, I don't even bother with any mixing. I have a small bottle of coconut oil, one of jojoba and one of apricot(seed?). Once every couple of weeks at bedtime I just choose one and squirt a little in my hand. Rub it into the ends of my hair - from the ears down - nothing above that. I also put a little under my eyes and rub the rest into my hands and cuticles. I sleep on it and then shower in the morning.

    I think we learned in our teens (at least I did) that oil was the enemy. But I certainly like using it now. I also hike up my leg to the bathroom sink these days and use coconut oil to shave my legs. Easier, quicker (than trying to do it in the shower), no mess and my legs have been clean shaven all summer which is unusual!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hi Kitty, it is great to hear from another Kansan! I would never have thought of using the coconut oil for shaving. What a great idea. It would solve my problem of having such dry legs. When I was young, I never had dry skin or hair, now I wish I had a bit of that oil back!

      Delete
  3. Sounds like a great treatment. I need to find a source for some of those oils, I've wanted to make the switch to using oils for face moisturizer too, but we don't have a lot of health food stores in this town. ;P Maybe a trip to Nashville is in order.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. We are supposed to get a Whole Foods Market here late next year. The local store is a bit expensive, but I am thankful to have it close by.

      Delete
  4. Mother swore by olive oil but it seemed too greasy...
    I like the sounds of this recipe.

    I might need to send my husband out for the evening...
    Come back darling later and then run your fingers through my hair!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hostess, that is truer than you imagine! After a treatment I run my fingers through my hair a lot. It feels like silk!

      Delete
  5. Debbie, your timing is perfect for me...I have searched for a treatment I really like to no avail..they all seem to be so similar or really, really expensive. I am going to five this a try..I would love for my hair to feel like silk! Thanks for the post! Have a fabulous day!

    ReplyDelete
  6. thanks Debbi--i'll have to ry this out!!

    ReplyDelete
  7. Holy cow, Makeup Alley is still around? That warms my heart; I used to hang out there so many years ago.

    I did a lot of heat-styling my hair for a few months there, and my ends could use some serious conditioning. I think I might even have most of the ingredients to hand!

    ReplyDelete
  8. I was thinking your hair looked really good in Monday's photo, now I know why.

    I have very cranky drains, I'm not sure about rinsing all that off into my sink.

    ReplyDelete
  9. Thanks for the recipe. I wonder if it might tame my frizz a bit? This hot weather is taking a toll, as I'm sure you know in Kansas, too.

    ReplyDelete
  10. I have found my other half thanks to Seeksenior.com – Which is an effective dating site especially for people over 40. now i want to tell more people to check it out

    ReplyDelete
  11. Such a great tip. Its safe to use and chemical-free. I can't wait to try this and see its effectiveness.

    ReplyDelete