Blonde Network

Throw away that over used hair gel that makes your locks crispy, crunchy, and terribly unnatural! Banish that mousse that gives your hair more body than a weight lifter! Today’s top trends in hair care products focus on the natural and allow your hair to be as healthy as it is beautiful. From sensible shampoos and hydrating conditioner to unique concoctions used to make your hair stay put every time, look to your local drugstore, department store, or upscale boutique to find the products that best suit your hair.

Beautiful, shining hair is a valuable asset. It can also be a versatile fashion accessory, to be colored, curled, dressed up or smoothed down. Your hair plays a big factor in determining how you look and perceive yourself. There are no secrets to beautiful hair! With a great cut and style, you’ll feel like a million bucks.

Avoid going in for perming, curling or straightening treatments during the summer months. Find out your favorite style and stick to it for 6 months.

If you are someone who religiously covers the head under the sun but still end up with dry and rough hair, then my guess is you are some one who neglects the importance of oiling. Many of us believe that shampooing and conditioning is all we need to look pretty and our best, but when we still get broken hairs on our shoulders we are left to wonder what went wrong? Answer is oil requirement.

Also, if you are one that does not like too much fuss and are not attached to using a whole array of styling products, natural products are definitely for you. Natural care does not include the use of tools like straighteners or curling irons. Actually if you were to do without these heat appliances you would not need many of the styling products being marketed today.

Blond hair was commonly ascribed to the heroes and heroines of European fairy tales. Naturally blonde hair is very fine and can be delicate. Individuals who want to add highlights to their naturally sunny locks should carefully condition their hair prior to chemical treatments, and leave-in conditioners help protect the strands during processing.

Taking care of hair is no big deal, but today it has become a major cause of concern to many. This is because they don’t watch what they eat, or do yoga or practice meditation, all of which will keep them calm, help their body and hair as well. Instead people would rather rely on instant solutions, namely the various hair products available on the counters of all leading malls and supermarkets. Eating plenty of green leafy vegetables, drinking plenty of fluids, including juices is what will keep our human body fit; our hair shining and healthy.

Preserve your hair color

Like any extra stress you put on your hair, coloring makes the hair weaker and can cause breakage, which is why it’s so important to deep-condition to lock in moisture. If you’re heat-styling your hair frequently, be sure to protect it with a gel or salve, which will ensure that the heat burns away the product and not your hair color. Also, be mindful of your shampoo and conditioner: Tailor them to your hair type and color to prevent fading and brassiness

I’ve just made another Photoshop video. This one is about colour tinting (or “colorizing”) an old photo. You may not know this, but back in the 1800′s – long before colour photography was invented – people used to hand-tint black and white photographs with coloured inks or water-colour paints, and I wanted to achieve that type of effect. Tinting monochrome prints using Photoshop is considerably less messy!

The photo I decided to use was a recently restored photo of my maternal great-grandmother (my mother’s, mother’s, mother). It was taken sometime in the late 1880′s when she probably in her late teens. It’s a typical Victorian studio portrait: Great-grandma is wearing her best dress, is standing against a painted background of a garden, and has one hand resting on a rustic looking chair.

The only thing I knew for certain was that Great-grandma had blue eyes, every other colour was a conjecture. Her dress was a dark colour, and after experimenting with a few different colours, I decided that navy blue looked best. I coloured in the background light green – although it could have been cyan. The bamboo chair was obviously a bamboo colour. That just left the colour of her hair to try and figure out.

My maternal grandmother had strawberry-blonde hair in her younger days (I’ve seen colour photos of her when she was young) but when I tried to colour her mother’s hair that colour, it just didn’t look right. Too light. Auburn? No, that didn’t look right either. I asked my mother, but she had no idea. Great-grandma was a white-haired old lady by the time my mother came along.

The only thing I could do was just to play about with the colour sliders until her hair looked “right”. That’s when I made a profound discovery: my great-grandmother’s hair was brown – like mine! It was the only colour that looked natural.

My great-grandmother and I never met, but thanks to Photoshop, I now have a better idea of what she looked like than would have been possible just from a black and white photo.

Returning Home
Born in Tucson, Ariz. into an Air Force family, Jeremy Stidham and his family moved to Cullman in 1993. Jeremy was in the fifth grade at the time.

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Tiger ‘hooked up’ with LeeAnn Rimes
AS if Tiger Woods did not need anymore bad publicity, but the golfer has been romatically linked to cheating singer LeeAnn Rimes.

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Laser hair removal has proven to be a very popular non-surgical cosmetic procedure and is a non-invasive, convenient way to permanently reduce unwanted facial and/or body hair. Short-term hair loss will occur in most patients with laser hair removal, but the degree of long-term hair reduction will vary among patients. Permanent hair loss occurs most often in dark hair, which has a high concentration of melanin whereas gray, white and blonde hair would need to be re-treated to maintain hair loss. This also will vary depending on the area being treated.

The Procedure

Laser hair removal is performed using a technology called Intense Pulsed Light or IPL. In this procedure, a handheld device is used that emits pulses of light that are able to effectively target hair follicles in their growth phase, damaging or destroying the follicles, thus preventing re-growth.

The process takes from several minutes to several hours, depending on the area of the body involved. The laser energy passes through the patient’s skin, being absorbed by the pigment in the hair follicle. A percentage of the follicles are instantaneously and permanently disabled with each treatment. In most cases, no anesthesia is necessary.

The Benefits

· A non-invasive, gentle technique that eliminates undesirable hair from all parts of the body

· Leaves skin looking smoother and silkier

· Treats larger areas effectively because it removes more than one hair at a time.

· Minimal discomfort

· Replaces waxing, electrolysis and razors

· Immediate return to normal activities

Other Considerations

· It could be ongoing process that requires multiple sessions

· Sometimes there is a temporary slight reddening of the skin or localized swelling

· May have to use specially formulated skin care products and/or a prescribed skin care regimen. Sunscreen is recommended for any treated areas exposed to the sun.

· Patients with darker pigmentation may not respond well

· Blonde, white or gray hairs are less responsive to laser treatments and sometimes cannot be treated
Laser hair removal works best when the hair is one to two millimeters in length. Patients cannot tan prior or during hair removal treatment. You may not wax but shaving in between is permitted if it’s necessary.

Water is not necessarily your hair’s best friend. It amplifies any weakness or damage that your hair may have. Combine these qualities with chlorine and you have a recipe for trouble. Swimming pools can have at least 3 effects on your hair – blonde hair can turn green, hair can become dull and dry, and hair can turn weak and brittle.

Blonde Hair Turning Green

I’m sure everyone has either seen or heard of blonde hair turning green after frequent swimming in chlorinated pools. I have had to buzz cut 2 of my boys’ hair after only 3 trips to the swimming pool. Depending on the concentration of chlorine, the green can set in quite quickly. Sometimes darker hair can even develop a slight tinge of green.

What this is caused by is high concentrations of copper dissolved in the water. This copper chemically interacts with the chlorine, resulting in a chemical compound (combination) that very easily attaches itself to the outside layer of your hair shafts. If you have high levels of copper in your tap water, it can also make your hair green even without the chlorine.

You can try to treat blonde-hair-turned-green with hot vegetable oil or hydrogen peroxide. I find it easier to buzz cut my boys’ hair and put a water proof swim cap on my little girl.

Dull and Dry Hair

Your hair naturally has an oil coating to give it a shiny look. This natural oil gets removed by the chlorine, giving it a dull look.

Your hair also has a hard outer layer, made up of overlapping scales to protect it. Chlorine can get between these scales, and push them up to give an otherwise smooth hair a very rough exterior. The combination of the oil being stripped off and the scales being roughed up results in hair that looks dull and dry and can feel rough to the touch.

Weak and Brittle Hair

As I’ve alsready mentioned, water is not your hair’s best friend. Hair is much weaker when it is wet than when it is dry. Hair actually absorbs water and when it has soaked up as much as it can, wet hair is 20% weaker than dry hair. Because of this, handle your hair very gently when it is wet, avoiding tightly pulled back styles or vigorous combing.

Another thing to think about is that chlorine is a salt solution. When you are in the pool, the chlorine can actually get inside your hair fibers because they have holes in them and water can get inside. When your hair dries after you swim, the salt from the chlorine will crystallize inside your hair fibers. You might think that if you shower immediately after you swim, you can wash out the chloine. Yes and no. You can wash the chlorine that is sitting on the surface of your hair, but not the chloine that has gotten inside your hair fibers. The only way you can get rid of that chlorine is to soak your hair in clean water for about 10 minutes.

As your hair dries and the chlorine crystallizes inside your hair fibers, the salt crystals get larger and change the structure of your hair – it weakens your hair by separating the scales that overlap to protect and strengthen it. As the scales stand out (instead of lying flat), your hair is weak and very prone to break.

After you’ve read this article, you’ll think twice about swimming in a chlorinated pool again! Do your hair a favour and cover it with a swim cap.

George Smith: Sitting out here moaning the blues . . .
The middle of my front yard looks like trench warfare. What happened is the wettest winter since Noah’s Great Flood settled in my front yard, rotting away my magnificent carpet of St. Augustine grass.

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Another successful Volleyball Fun Festival
Seventeen mixed volleyball teams took part in the third Volleyball Fun Festival organised lately by the Malta Volleyball Association at the Cottonera Sports Complex. This activity, which lasted around four hours, with over 100 players playing on the three courts set up for this event, was the third one organised this season to give [...]

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