Pink, roze, rosa, rose..

So a couple of days ago I dyed my hair pink, finally right?
I'm very happy with it and it only took two bottles of stargazer baby pink, left on for about 25 minutes.
I decided to keep my fringe and a little bit at the side blonde to break up the whole pink extravaganza.
 It's already fading to a nice coral/baby pink. I wasn't expecting perfect results as my hair wasn't an even colour all over, it was platinum ontop, my natural colour (mousey) at the roots, and yellow blonde mid to tips. So I do have areas of bright pink and areas of lighter pink, which I think looks good anyway.

So guys and gals, mission complete. The force is strong with this one!

Here we have it sports fans..

After a grueling 4 hours at the hairdressers I am blonde. They put a silver toner on my hair for literally 2 minutes, and it must have been enough to pull the yellow out!
So after 3 washes, deep conditioning, 3 blow dries and a cut and style we have a decent look! 

The journey to pinksville continues

This morning I made the call, the call to the hairdressers! I've officially given in, and accept that if I want my hair to stay in any kind of condition, it needs to be looked after by a professional! 

I'm half way to blonde, which shouldn't be hard to fix. I just need a sure fire way to get it blonde so it can reach it's goal of baby pink at long last! The condition is slipping, which is scary as I do love my hair. I've already had to chop 5 inches off it so i'm not impressed. 

Tomorrow at 9am my hair will continue it's quest! 

In other news, I'm getting my gouache collection out tonight. 

Product.. lots of product

So I didn't go back to black. But I couldn't put up with the orange.. So I went to Sally's Beauty and was given lots of good advice and at least one good product! 

I was given a silver toner, which was a waste of £10 as it did nothing but tinge my roots silver.. not good. The second product was a ash blonde colour with developing creme, which (left on for an hour) has given pretty good results! I then conditioned the hell out of my hair and wrapped it in cling film for a couple of hours to soak in. Finally the finish line is in sight! Perhaps now I can take my Christmas photo with Ben and Dylan!  

Hello there blonde hair! 

Click on this photo to see the whole gallery!

I just couldn't leave it alone...

So my sister gave me some peroxide powder and cream. Somehow I believed it would turn my hair blonde, but how wrong I was. I mixed up 3 batches of the bleach and peroxide and lathered it on my hair. It began lightening instantly so I thought perhaps in a hour or so it'll lighten to blonde. Hell no.

An hour and a half later, a dissolving pickled head, and a bright orange barnet. Don't get me wrong I love ginger hair, but this is orange. Orange as a carrot. Carrot as an orange. 

So where from here? Well we'll see. All I know is, my hair cannot possibly stay this colour, and especially not for Dylan's first Christmas. Not only will photo opportunities be in abundance but he'll probably not recognize me. Watch this space, and if no news appears, I've gone back to black. 

Simply Red

Since my last application of 'Colour B4' my hair has been through trauma, on a big scale. Not only did I apply 'B4 U colour' but a second dose of  'Colour B4', then I decided (through some inspirational moment) to dye my hair peroxide blonde, with two bottles. You see, I'm a smart cookie and in haste to get results, accidentally left out the (very important) powder for the bottle. I had already applied all of the dye but I decided to cut my losses and mix it with a little water to form a paste. I then applied, and oh boy did it burn.

After blow drying I found that I was left with BRIGHT peroxide blonde (1 inch long) roots. Bright ginger hair for about 5 inches, and dark brown to the tips. Shocking..I wish I'd taken photos of the monstrosity.

After some thought I decided the best way to go would be to chop at my hair with scissors (hoping it'd make everything better). I then had a block fringe, and awful hair, resembling a squirrel that had gotten into the Tony and Guy factory. I finally bought some bright red hair dye and thought 'what could be worse than this'.

Once I'd finished the dying process I was impressed, It turned out to be a dark brown/red combo all mixed up. It blow dried to look even better.

Next time I'll be far more protective of my precious!

The hair continues

Today I applied my second dose of 'colour b4' and syrum 'b4u colour' which removes silicone and pollution from the hair. It's far lighter than yesterday and looks fairly nice, although not my natural colour!

It also seems to be in good condition still which is a bonus! It is slightly more 'ginger' than the photo likes to admit. Looking more of a mahogany deep brown.. which is a big old lie.

I am currently sat (with a burning head) dying my hair blonde, which I fully expect to turn sos sign orange. If it turns blonde straight away It'll be some kind of miracle.

In haste I forgot to add a powder to the dye, so I hope that adding it afterwards with a small amount of water won't have too dire consequences.

Good luck hair.. I hope we can make it out of this without too much trauma!

The hair blogs

 I shall begin at the beginning! My hair has been truly abused over the past 6 years. It's been dyed, stripped, bleached, straightened, crimped and curled. I have changed colour more times than I could mention. The most recent of which was in 2008-2009 when I was blonde. It was a pain to get there from jet black, taking 4 professional dying sessions.

So! Here I am back to black and desperately wanting change. I'd like my hair baby pink!

I discovered 'colour b4' while claims it shrinks the dye molecules in the hair so you can wash them out reveling your natural hair colour. I read mixed reviews but decided to cut my losses and give it a go. I emailed the director asking what his suggestions would be, he emailed back quickly with a lot of great information, and even better he sent me two boxes of 'colour b4 extra'! They retail at £11.99 each so I was very grateful. 

After leaving the product on for the allocated 60 minutes I rinsed for 10 minutes, lathered rinsed and repeated. I was left with a brown chestnut colour which is rather nice! I was hoping for a lighter colour but I am being advised by email on what to do to achieve what I want.

I was rather pleased with the lightening and emailed photos as promised to show how well the product worked and asked how I could achieve the blonde that I was after. He subsequently told me that the lighter colour looked great on me and that he'd send another box free of charge to try to lighten my hair some more, and also another product which will remove the silicone and pollution from years of dye. 

I am currently awaiting the arrival of the next lot of product which I will gladly smother on my hair and see what happens next! 

Watch this space.. things could get hairy! 

He arrived

Dylan Alexander Thomas was born on Thursday 13th October 2011 at 12.06am weighing 8lbs 13oz. Contractions began night of Tuesday the 11th. I honestly thought what I was feeling was a trapped nerve in my leg, but it turned out to be the real deal. I went into hospital where I was examined and told I was 4cm dilated and not dilating fast enough to keep me in. I arrived back home at 4am on Wednesday morning and growled through my contractions until I needed some pain relief. I sat in my beloved glider chair for hours timing contractions, and then decided to make the move to the hospital at 6pm as I couldn't get through them without screaming.  When I arrived at  LCH I was greeted with a welcome dose of gas and air.  I was 6cm dilated and very relaxed!

The night passed quickly and at 9pm I was given an epidural which worked fairly well up until the last hour of labour, at that point Dylan's head was pressing so hard to get out I was in agony again. After a lot of screaming I told the midwife I needed to push. She examined me and I was indeed 10cm and ready to give this a go! All it took was 10 minutes of insanely difficult pushing and Dylan was born.

He was the most wonderful little thing I had ever seen, like a wrinkled pink peach. I stared at him in awe for several minutes before realizing I was still in pain from labour. 

 

                                                                            5 Mins old

My boys

Today my little Dill pickle is 7 weeks old. That's 49 days.. I am still in shock. He get's more beautiful by the day, and recently learnt to smile at Ben and I. All in all, I'd go through hell and back for him, he's my entire world and I can't wait to spend the rest of my life adoring him.

32 weeks 5 days and a surprise!

So apart from looking and feeling well and truly like a planet, waddling and feeling minor pain in my hips and pelvis I'm actually alright! If the pain went, I'd hardly feel pregnant. Most women (and websites) say that 'after the second trimester it's downhill' but I disagree. I'm deep into the third trimester and feel fairly good!

Also - Big surprise! We have a house! We should be moving in within the next 10 days, and signing documents tomorrow evening. Very exciting!

28 weeks 5 days

So between the last 3 or so weeks I was diagnosed with SPD (Symphisis Pubis Dysfunction). This is where the two halves of your pelvis are connected at the front by a stiff joint called symphysis pubis (funnily enough). This joint is strengthened by a dense network of tough flexible tissues called ligaments! To help baby get out while giving birth a hormone called 'relaxin' is released which softens the ligaments. As a result the joints move around more, and cause lots and lots of pain! 


This all led to two trips to the doctors, lots of midnight phone calls to the emergency doctor, then finally going into hospital for 4 days! Which wasn't nice, lots of injections, painkillers and being tugged about by the physiotherapist! 


Anyway, about a day after the physiotherapist had her way with me I felt almost 100% better. I could do everything again without hurting! So i'm eternally grateful as I was told that SPD stays until after the baby is born. So i'm very happy about that, and back on track!


Anyway, back to how the pregnancy is getting on! Backache is getting considerably more painful, but it's nothing compared to the SPD! Then there's the not being comfortable anywhere, and taking 3 hours to get to sleep! But it'll all be worth it!


I spend most of my time pottering around the house these days as my hormones have gone a bit nuts and I will probably kill someone! 


11 weeks 2 days to go folks! Watch this space!

This is a couple of days ago, but the most recent picture of le bump. 

25 weeks 2 days

Well I've made it to 25 weeks, and time certainly has flown by, and hopefully the next 15 weeks will go by just as fast! My wardrobe is now a sporting maternity wear in all shapes and sizes, and my skinny jeans have gone on holiday (To the back of the wardrobe) as they are now far too uncomfortable.

I have an awful pain in my tail bone/ coccyx today, and have done on and off for a while. It sucks. Bending over, picking things up and sitting down are mountains to climb, ugh. It's worth it, besides Ben (the fiancé) seems to enjoying hoisting me up off the sofa when needs be.

Anyway, bump picture.

No complaints at the moment other than general aches and pains, and that damn coccyx thing.
I shall write again at 30 weeks, until then! Au reviour!

ITS A BOY! - 23 weeks

I'm leaning over the laptop like a vulture with really really bad lower back pain. But that's literally all I have to worry about for now! Although getting stitches when walking fast are happening more readily.

It's only three weeks since the last post but it feels like forever. It was kinda devastating that we didn't find out the gender at the last scan. As it was the last NHS scan us pregnant folk get :( But we got to go private instead (money grabbing...grr..) and we found out. There is a gentleman inside my womb. A GENTLEMAN! 

So it's a boy, and as soon as I got home, I sifted through a basket of clothes and put all the pretty pink things, dresses, shirts, skirts, etc into a bag and have put them in the cupboard. Although I can't dress him up as a doll, i'm sure I'll find other ways of being an embarrassment..

23 weeks and about 12 inches big, and about a pound in weight. The baby will double his weight in four weeks!

And there he is, all cute and all.. and 'NOT FOR DIAGNOSIS' 'well nurse your diagnosis, I do believe the girl is ...pregnant' silly goose.

For the past couple of weeks i've not felt very pregnant at all, no complaints. I should get out more and do yoga and swimming etc.. but pfft.. I'd rather watch horror movies and nibble on huge cheddars.

We've gotten all the real essentials figured out as far as baby 'stuff' goes.
Moses basket - check
3 in 1 pushchair, stroller, car seat - check
extra moses basket (dont ask) - check
Tons of baby-grows - check
Tons of other baby clothes - check
Baby monitor - check
Cot and changer - check
and lots of other goodies.

Perhaps I should wrap this post up? It's getting lengthy now! All I can say is, I'm excited, Ben is excited (and currently building a boat out of cardboard on the floor) and we can't wait to say hello to our little fella. 

20 week half way update!

IT BEGINS! The sickness and nausea has stopped! Now begins the backache, abdomen ache, and every other ache imaginable. But all very exciting.

I feel the baba moving now almost every day, and seems to love bouncing around when I'm eating or trying to sleep. When I need some peace!

We find out the sex next Tuesday and I can't wait! It'll be so exciting to know what Miss or Mr is hanging out in the womb room! Most people say it'll be a boy, but really.. it's 50/50 and I have no idea until next week!

Heres the bump :)

Be nice..

Today was a good day.

Life is no longer about the best angles to take pictures of yourself, how photoshop can do wonders for you, or how high contrast makes all your flaws disappear.

Forget about that. There isn't a photoshop or editing program in every day life, to make you look better in person.. or blogs to make your personality look utterly whimsical and carefree.

Prince William has a bald patch.

Good day

Still being 'cool'

So i'm one week past three months pregnant and feeling great! Thank god I've passed the first few months of sickness, nausea and generally feeling awful. 

As seen in the scan, my baby was lying back with their legs in the air and having a relaxing time of it all while I was being prodded and probed by the sonographer. 

I can't see myself slipping into motherhood, and suddenly becoming Betty Crocker.. I think the transition will be far more casual, although my cake baking won't cease. 

Having a baby is no excuse to become reclusive, and obsessive. There's nothing more repulsive than seeing a facebook profile full of 'darling' baby pictures. 

I may buy some big earphones soon and play them to the bump, with any luck the baby will develop a good taste in music.

Vivienne Westwood pimpin' your boots UK style

My new Vivienne Westwood booties complete me.. materialistically at least 

2.05am

It's 4:30 A.M. on a Tuesday.
It doesn't get much worse than this.
In beds in little rooms in buildings in the middle of these lives which are completely meaningless,
help me stay awake, I'm fallin'...

Bye bye baby

That job I held down for five months? Five whole months? It's gone. I've left, and never felt better. I've wiped the slate clean. I'm moving into a new home. Moving into a new life finally. Every year or so this happens. My expectations are far too high I know, yet it's nice to feel this way for a few minutes.. hours.. days.  Isn't it?

cherry cola 7.25

Got some needs yeah, I need to shake it

And I razamataz you honey, if you want me to

I can be your daddy, be your rock n' rolla'

You can be my sugar, be my cherry cola

Got some needs yeah, I need to skake it

End

Come home

How many times, for any reason have you wanted to say come home. Home is that place where everything is alright, where it always feels like Christmas. Home is the one place you feel wanted, grounded, unshakable. Like a womb made of bricks and board. Where all the furnishings have a story and a place.. The place you come back to at the end of the day. I don't have that place any more. But if I did, I'd tell you to come home.

Cutsie

Today I don't feel quite right. Yesterday was similar, as was the day before. I have my trinkets and toys surrounding me. My jewellery, porcelain and mirrors. I'm like the insecurity in the middle of the most secure beautiful things in the world. My little lamp makes everything look so much prettier, just that little glow that they need. My black hair, and white face must seem ghost like to these cutsie things.

Liquorice for veins and cherryade for blood

'If anything, it should have been a better thing. From underneath you staring at the ceiling, there’s another world of chocolate bars and baseball cards, that hides inside of all this tension that I’m feeling'

I'll never do that..

Remember when you made those rules, those lines you would not 'by any means' step over? Remember when you broke them? Well I've reached that point. Snobbery stops here.

I told myself I'd never work for 'the man' the 'fat cats' of the retail industry. I told myself I'd never be living at home again, and I told myself I wouldn't settle yet.

Having just gotten in from a 6.30am - 2pm work shift I felt inclined to rant.

Well, these things happened, and are now digging me deeper into a hole I can't see out of. Sure to many people these things aren't so bad, and hell, they're not. It's just something I said I'd never do.

The fact that I'm writing about it means I want change, and that change will happen. I'll be damned if I spend another year of my life telling people where the eggs are, or what the difference between a chicken leg and a chicken drumstick is. Read a god damn book, watch the discovery channel, and get off my case.

My artistic temperament is failing me. The most choice and rebellion I get at work is re-writing instructions and drawing faces on boxes of doughnuts.

End of rant.

Our quest..

For as long as we've been able to recognise happiness, we've wanted it. But what is it to be happy these days? Is it your party winning the election? Finding money down the side of your sofa? Being in good company?

To be trigger happy, is to be eager to point out the mistakes or shortcomings of others.

The search for happiness is like searching for a gun, searching to put your finger on the trigger, to give yourself complete control of the situation at hand.

Today my pistol was scrapped and made into a paperweight.

For me happiness is not having your finger on the trigger, it's knowing when to drop the gun.

Always going to be that wing span away

Today has not been too eventful, as most days these days.

I've been trying to think of my favourite place on earth, and it's a very difficult one!

In January I flew from Portland Maine to New York, I got off the plane and something just clicked and everything felt right. Although I had left behind a previous chapter of my life I felt quite content stood in the airport smoking area.

I think being on that plane. On my wing seat, with the table up, window in full view of New York city skyline. I think that is my favourite place.

Looking at something beautiful from somewhere restricted, I felt more free than ever.

I think in all my life I'll never find that 'favourite' place. The closest I got was to see what could have been. I find that with everywhere I've never really been, but seen.

What could have been if I had just taken my suitcase and gone? Who knows. One day I might find out.

The deceased..

Have you ever wondered why we put the deceased.. the gone off.. the out of date, corpses in the ground or scatter them on earth?

Perhaps it's so they can be at rest with the earth, the earth that gave them everything the needed in life.

In all honesty, being buried 6ft under soil and rocks, even when dead, would not be my idea of a picnic.

I think the way we like to keep all humans on earth is quite odd. It makes the ENTIRE world a grave yard. You cannot even walk out of your door without there being a body, a set of bones, underneath your feet, be it 10ft or 500. Imagine how many bodies are in the ground? How many more can we possibly fit in there!

But we have these 'attachment' things you see. We like to go to place, a bench, sometimes even the place where they died, to cry.. to weep. Which is entirely human. But in all honesty, that piece of ground you're praying to could be anyone.

Why not send these bodies off into space in capsules so they can orbit the earth, perhaps find other planets, other 'earth's.. Imagine that, we don't find other LIVING life until we're dead?

We can't see it, but we're circling it.

If only..

If I could tell what the my pity stricken face is saying right now, your glance would not be worthy. My Five thirty passes like a motionless train, yours in fact passes as a twelve thirty eloping divorce. Quick and not in the least bit subtle, thinking in ones own thoughts, imposing into possessions.

Perhaps you're at one with the crimson sofa, or the sterile walls which surround not the eyes, always the you's.

Hometowns shattered. You buildings there, you cross, you pressure stricken undignified children. Fall into this crack of these roots, this possessive mother. Claw your way from seam to seam, oh honey you've never looked so tragic.

This sickness plays again, like a classic you've heard a thousand times before ' Oh darling please believe me, I'll never do you no harm'. Today we
mix our 'o's and our 't's.. The 'l' always came too soon, the 't' not soon enough, oh, ay...

You are 'too late'.

I know I know I know I know I know nothing at all baby

Valium.. Valium.. Valium..

Even the word makes me feel like I have something very wrong with me for taking it.

It's been a month now since I was 'put on' this wonder drug, and yes, it's a wonder drug. It does things to the mind and body that could only be explained as beautifully fucked up.

Never before have I felt so safe while standing still alone in a field, never have I felt so upright when sat down, never before have I felt more loving, more appreciative of my own creations, others creations, creation in general.

Oh but boy am I hooked, and it scares me. It stops me from having these marvelous ideas of space and time, the universe and verse.

Valium is in the category of drugs that slow normal brain function. This is exactly what I think I needed. What a prayed for almost. That the racing thoughts, the overload of conciousness, the silence of juggernauts through steel would come to rest in the ground.

The beauty of the dark, is the beauty of no light.

AND SHE KNOWS

Mull this over, put it in your coffee, never so bitter this story of love and hate
A picture of eloquence, always the dainty girl, she always came to the line too late

The lover her heart possessed, tricked and tortured
Her vicious lure and over imaginative memory decide to take one last vow
That's all her heart can take, all it can see, even just for now.