Make your hair a cocktail!
My hair has undergone a constant journey toward health and happiness.
(As has my soul, but that’s another story.)
So, when the good people at The Vitamin Shoppe sent me some products to try out, I was excited to see new hair goodies among the flock.
Desert Essence Organics Italian Red Grape Shampoo and Conditioner is made for people who molest their hair (as I *perhaps* have). The formula contains a blend of ingredients extracted from red grapes native to Italy, including organic grape extract, resveratrol, and red wine extract. This stuff is full of antioxidants, which act as UV filters, and are also 100% vegan, and void of sodium sulfates, phthalates, silicones, glycols, or petroleum. (If you recall from earlier posts, the absence of sodium sulfates is especially valuable in maintaining the keratin protein within your hair.)
Aside from impressively shiny and bouncy results, this product smells really nice - making it a welcome addition to my (overstuffed) collection.
All our hair can use a little more nature - and giving it a cocktail a well is just in perfect spirit with the season!
Vitamin Shoppe has been kind enough to offer several awesome products to give away, and this is the first in the lot. So, I have 5 shampoo/conditioner sets, to the winners who best answer the following questions:
1 - What do you sing in the shower?
2 - What is the weirdest concoction you ever put in your hair?
Deadline December 31!
Fun fact! Aly Walansky wrote this story just for you on December 28th, 2007 |
December 28th, 2007 at 1:04 am
1 - What do you sing in the shower?
I usually take my showers late at night (due to those awful 8AM college classes and ridiculously long hair that takes 2 hours to dry), so I need ANY poppy, upbeat music that will keep me from falling asleep in the shower. Even if it is cheesy, it gets the job done and keeps me awake for another half hour. =)
I sing quite a few different artists in the shower, but most likely you’ll find me howling away to catchy music from the Spice Girls, Britney Spears and Paris Hilton.. though I can’t believe I’m admitting that.
2 - What is the weirdest concoction you ever put in your hair?
What haven’t I put in my hair?! I have long, dark, straight hair that hits halfway down my back, so I’m always trying to get it to look shinier and healthier.. even if it means using smelly, weird recipes. So it ranges from mayonnaise and egg hair masks and white vinegar rinses (which smell even worse than you could possibly suspect) and coffee rinse (it’s supposed to make brunette hair richer looking). Can’t say any of these have worked all that well, unfortunately. =( A quick rinse of COLD water at the end of showering seems to have worked best for me.. but it’s TOUGH.
December 28th, 2007 at 1:14 am
Aw man, I love your giveaways!!!
1. My absolute favorite stuff to sing is from the musical Rent. I seriously think they made that entire show just to be an amazing sing-along (it’s actually playing in my car rotation right now!). Unfortunately, I don’t think my neighbors like it too much, but I don’t care! My favorite ones to sing are “Santa Fe” and “Out Tonight” and “Take Me or Leave me”.
2. One of those stupid teenager magazines said a certain concoction would give me amazing volume, which I have always wanted for my fine hair! It involved mayonnaise, maple syrup, and EGGS! I’m pretty sure it messed up my entire shower’s drain, because every once in a while my bathroom will reek horribly of rotten eggs. This happened around six years ago, too. (as for the best stuff, I LOVE coconut oil!!!)
December 28th, 2007 at 1:20 am
1. Anything that gets stuck in my head, usually Celtic Music or JPOP - though I can’t sing and can barely pronounce most of the words right, but it makes for good practice with Japanese class
That’s what happens when you combine someone who is Irish (first generation) who is interested in Japanese culture I guess.
2. Weirdest thing I’ve ever put in my hair? Everything from honey (made it really soft but tangly) to mayonaise, egg, to olive oil (mixed with honey) to aloe and Apple Cider Vinegar or lemon rinses.
Weirdest thing I ever did at once was olive oil mixed with honey after an attempt with mayonnaise. Made my hair smell weird and spent two days and I don’t know how many gallons of water and shower attempts trying to get it out. Don’t even know what my hair smelled like but it was nasty. I blame the mayonnaise.
December 28th, 2007 at 2:05 am
1. i cannot believe i’m admitting this but i make up songs while i’m showering. most of them are inane, silly little jingles that pop into my head, but it’s funny to me and gets my brain started for the day ahead.
2. i’ve tried so many things in my hair: beer, avocados, mayo, olive oil, brewed coffee, lemon juice, honey, etc. (most of this before i became vegan) … but i think the strangest one was when i decided to try this homemade shampoo recipe i found online that had dried soapwort root and catnip mixed in distilled water! LOL … of all things … it dried my hair out and smelled funny, but it was an interesting experience.
December 28th, 2007 at 2:12 am
1.) What do you sing in the shower?
Actually… I tend not to sing, because then the song gets stuck in my head all day, and as I’m sure you might know, that can get annoying. Instead, I recited various quotes from movies and TV shows back and forth, complete with accents and even motions sometimes. (”You talkin’ to me? EH? YOU TALKIN’ TO ME?!)
2.) What is the weirdest concoction you ever put in your hair?
Honey, avacado, ketchup, and cornstarch. When I was 13, and completely fed-up with my curly, yet sometimes straight hair that can go from dry to oily in a matter of minutes. I have since resigned myself to that fact, because even after years of searching for holistic products that will work on my hair (I loathe purchasing things with ingredients I can’t pronounce), I have yet to find something that works well enough.
December 28th, 2007 at 2:14 am
1) Anything that gets stuck in my head. It varies really on what I sing. Language also varies. My favorite to sing in the shower is probably Part of Your World, yeah the Little Mermaid song. Fitting, isn’t it?
2) Practically everything has been in my hair. Beer, mayonnaise, olive oil, hone, corn oil, milk, eggs, tea, coffee. You name it I’ve probably had it in my hair.
December 28th, 2007 at 2:53 am
1. I sing girlie folk rock tunes (I’m partial to Sarah Mc Lachlan, Joni Mitchell, Tori Amos, and Susie Suh) or sometimes hymns from church. I often sing the dissident (soprano) refrain from “I Am A Child of God.” Which is really funny because I’m not really a soprano. I’m sure my husband gets a kick out of hearing me miss the high note every time
2. Hmmm. Well, I don’t think I have ever put anything weird in my hair. Although I have had some weird RESULTS from coloring my hair. I once tried to bleach my own hair, and the roots went bright blonde and the rest of it (I was trying to bleach out a dark brown so I could dye it red) turned only sort of the color I was going for. I ended up with like five different colors of hair. The stylist I went to in order to get it fixed called them “mystery colors.” I’ve dyed my hair pretty much every color of the rainbow, black, red, all the shades or brown. I just recently went from super long black hair to a short medium brown pixie cut.
December 28th, 2007 at 2:53 am
1. I sing girlie folk rock tunes (I’m partial to Sarah Mc Lachlan, Joni Mitchell, Tori Amos, and Susie Suh) or sometimes hymns from church. I often sing the dissident (soprano) refrain from “I Am A Child of God.” Which is really funny because I’m not really a soprano. I’m sure my husband gets a kick out of hearing me miss the high note every time
2. Hmmm. Well, I don’t think I have ever put anything weird in my hair. Although I have had some weird RESULTS from coloring my hair. I once tried to bleach my own hair, and the roots went bright blonde and the rest of it (I was trying to bleach out a dark brown so I could dye it red) turned only sort of the color I was going for. I ended up with like five different colors of hair. The stylist I went to in order to get it fixed called them “mystery colors.” I’ve dyed my hair pretty much every color of the rainbow, black, red, all the shades or brown. I just recently went from super long black hair to a short medium brown pixie cut.
December 28th, 2007 at 3:19 am
1) Anything. Everything. It doesn’t matter whether it’s supposed to have words or not, whether I can remember the proper words if it has them, whether I can hit anything close to the right notes, or even whether it’s supposed to be music or supposed to be something else and I’ve somehow managed to set it to music. Lately I’ve been singing a lot of Beatles songs, and I don’t know why because it’s been a few months since I’ve listened to any. When I’m at home my family doesn’t mind my singing (if I’m loud enough, sometimes they even sing along) but when I’m at school my landlady complains.
2) Like everyone else so far, I’ve tried mayonnaise. It worked okay (and after a bit of conditioner the vinegar smell was gone), but I didn’t think it was worth the price. I’ve also used chamomile tea. But the weirdest thing was probably some soap that a neighbour made. It had beer and I don’t know what kind of herbs, and it didn’t smell bad exactly but it was an odd thing to put on my hair.
December 28th, 2007 at 9:37 am
1. My kids (3 and 18 months) love it when I sing songs from Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Musical. Or Evanescence. Yeah . . . that’s a little embarrassing.
2. Beer on my hair gave me some nice highlights. Avocado is a great conditioner. And I’ve tried the “no ‘poo” routine of baking soda and cider vinegar rinses. But when I was a kid, river mud was where it was at. My parents would take us camping on this island in the middle of the Connecticut River and we would go into the cove, dive down, and smear big handfuls of river mud and seaweed on our hair. We were convinced that the spa days my mother talked about were just like this. Hey, it could be. I had really healthy hair as a kid. *lol*
December 28th, 2007 at 10:21 am
i sing HANSON in the shower and i have no shame in it. i also attempt to dance around a bit while i wait for my conditioner to sink in. my fiance walked in and caught me one day…that was just hilarious in it’s own right because i think i semi scared him.
i read this article once when i was in middle school that said if you SLEEP with mayo in your hair, it will be ultra shiny. so off i went with a huge spoon and a can of mayo just throwing the whole jar in my hair. i put a shower cap over it, a towel over my pillow, and attempted sleep. out of sheer stubbornness i made it through the whole night but i didn’t sleep. the smell was horrible, everytime i moved this squishing noise made me cringe, and then the unpleasant times when it would run down and land on my ear! but the next morning when i washed it out it was very shiny though the smell was horrid.
December 28th, 2007 at 11:07 am
1. I have to say, that my usual shower choices (honest to gods) are Phil Collins songs - In the Air Tonight especially, Rod Stewarts - Forever Young (and I CRY!) and Toto’s - Africa. I usually cry when I sing Forever Young because it makes me think of a diaper commercial YEARS ago that played that song and showed baby animals in Africa, etc. with their mothers. Its stupid, irrational and cheesy, but true! (all this and I’m 24 years old and listen to techno/reggae/classic rock usually
) I’ve also been known to throw in a little Loreena McKennitt, yipes!
2. Hmm . . . never really put anything too weird in my hair - I guess the usual beer, apple cider vinegar, jojoba oil. Oh! I remember when I was really young, I had this homemade concoction (self created) that I REALLY thought made my hair softer. It consisted of an enormous amount of shampoo, conditioner, and regular BAR SOAP (I’m talking the horrible, dime a dozen bath variety) that I would smear all over my hair, let sit for a minute or two, then wash out. I tried to teach my four year old sister this too, but I don’t think its stuck as well with her, and when my Mom found out, well that was the end of that
December 28th, 2007 at 11:10 am
Oh, I forgot to mention, I sang the song Teddy Bear Picnic in the shower the other day. That was thanks to my weirdo sister!
December 28th, 2007 at 11:37 am
1 - What do you sing in the shower?- Rainer Maria! They have a few songs that I can’t get enough of when I am getting ready to go out or start my day. My current favorites are “I’ll Make You Mine” and “Breakfast of Champions”
2 - What is the weirdest concoction you ever put in your hair? - Beer and olive oil…at the same time. The beer smell made me gag, but did take out the dullness of my much-colored hair, and the olive oil made it super soft.
December 28th, 2007 at 11:52 am
1. I sing whatever I feel like. Everything from the offspring to religious songs to weird parodies and inpromptu translations. People can easily tell my mood from my shower singing.
2. I made some kind of cure-for-split-ends from cheapo conditioner, corn oil and orange oil. It was actually decent, but I had a hard time answering when people asked what I used to make my hair look so shiney.
December 28th, 2007 at 1:25 pm
1. I sing a variety of songs—usually anything from Disturbed, Mark Schultz, MuteMath, or opera. I also make up my own songs, especially for my almost 5 year old daughter (Shampooing, it’s a shampooing, it’s a shampooing AND Conditioner, Conditioner, it’s a condition, it’s a condition, Conditioner, Conditioner. . .etc—you get the picture!)
2. My scalp is MAJORLY dry and I have a sensitive scalp, plus multiple skin allergies, so my best concoction as been olive oil with lavender essential oil mixed together—it actually works
December 28th, 2007 at 2:31 pm
1) I tend to sing scales while I’m showering, or little bits from songs that I’m convinced really exist..though they are probably just my own silly improvisations..I also make make up stories/songs about the previous day experience and sing them really loudly since the walls of our little apartment are so damn thin and my roommates end up feeling like I’m serenading them while they are hanging out in the kitchen, ahahaa
2) besides beer I can’t think of anything else besides shampoo that has gone into my hair, though after reading all these other replies I might look into some avocado conditioner : )
December 28th, 2007 at 2:46 pm
1) If I fell the day is off to a bad start I like to sing children’s songs about animals in the shower - my favourite is “Over in the Meadow,” but I’m relatively certain that I don’t know a single verse of the actual song… Making up verses about animal families is a great way to start the day!
2) The strangest thing I’ve ever put in my hair was an Oatmeal and Olive Oil concoction. Whole Oats and Olive Oil mashed together by hand and then worked into my hair down to the scalp. I put a healthy layer covering it all as well, so for a few hours while I waited for it to dry (it never did of course) I had a strange “oat helmet.” Good times - good times indeed…
December 28th, 2007 at 3:46 pm
1 - What do you sing in the shower?
I, too, sing things that get stuck in my head - things like commercials,etc.. I babysat fr an entire month for a friend who always watched the kids show “WonderPets”. I STILL sing the theme song for that show every once in awhile!
2 - What is the weirdest concoction you ever put in your hair?
Did you ever see the movie “Something about Mary?”. Ok, I’ll say no more on that one……
December 28th, 2007 at 6:51 pm
1. I always sing Beatles songs in the shower. I don’t know why that is.
2. The weirdest thing I ever put in my hair was a combination of hair oil, mayonnaise, beer and eggs. It smelled so awful.
December 28th, 2007 at 8:18 pm
Song:
“I like big butts and I cannot lie
You othah brothahs can’t deny
When a girl walks in with an itty bitty waist
and a round thing in your face
you get SPRUNG!” (wiggling butt and butt slaps included)
Weirdest concoction:
I twisted my hair in tiny sections to make it look like dreadlocks. Girlie’d it up a bit w/ bows. Also, gelatin to make rock hard buns (seems like a theme) a la Princess Leia circa Star Wars Episode IV.
December 29th, 2007 at 11:23 am
I usually sing Duran Duran songs, or if my 2 year old is running around the bathroom (sometimes thats the only way i CAN shower..give me a break) i sing “wheels on the bus” or “head, shoulders, knees and toes” etc etc. It keeps him from ripping back the shower curtain and saying “MOMMY UP!!!” Which means he wants me to get the hell out of the shower.
As far as concotions…I’m lucky if I have time to condition my hair, much less come up with various concotions. I’m entering this contest because I’m all about the vegan organic hair products (when I have time to use them!! HA!) THANKS!!
December 29th, 2007 at 11:36 am
Right now I’ve been singing Christmastime songs in the shower… for some reason Sleigh Ride has been a personal favorite… lots of BAH BAH DO DAH DAH BAH OH BAHs going on there!
Oh man, I remember being a silly preteen and doing all those things that you read about in Seventeen and all those other crazy magazines. I remember me and my girlfriends putting mayo and eggs in our hair to make it shiny (not even stopping to think that there are eggs IN mayo…), I think it involved oatmeal too. That was HORRIBLE. Just made my hair greasy… but if Seventeen says so…
And of course as a child of the 80’s, there were plenty of summers of drenching your hair in lemon juice to try to get highlights. That and that sun-in stuff was necessary during that era!
January 2nd, 2008 at 9:59 am
OMG OMG OMG!!! I know I missed the deadline but I have to share the story with you. I was working in a preschool and lice was going around. Well someone said that if a put vaseline in your hairy it will keep the buggers at bay and make your hair shinny… well I did not know that a dab would do ya, and put so much vaseline in my hair I think it took a week to come out. OMg I tried washing my hair with everything, dish soap, laundry soap, comet!!! omg it was hilarious and I was freaking.
March 19th, 2008 at 7:20 pm
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June 16th, 2008 at 6:53 am
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