Yesterday I was wondering if there was some sort of updo I can do, that for some reason slipped out of rotation. And there is: The sock bun.
I thought it had slipped out because it's not on a braid base and therefore needs more time in the morning. But as soon as I had put it up, I could feel the construction sliding. Even though it's based on a ponytail (Two elastics for added stability) it was quickly uncomfortable.
So I took two Ron Quattro pins and nailed the hair donut to the elastics inside. That solved the stability issue, but also felt kind of stupid: If I wanted to do an updo that was held up by pins or sticks, why not make some other, any other, updo?
Even though the pins are super discrete, it still annoyed me.
A sock bun does end up as a massive head-eating bun though!
Even hubby who is used to seeing my hair commented on the size of it.
"Can I ask you about somehting non hair related? I will go back to school this autumn and I really worry about how to balance school and part time work and a life and I worry about money too. I think maybe Igor is the right to ask about that because you seem to work a lot?"
Let me just start off with that I have no qualifications in time management or anything like that. I don't even think I've ever read one of those self help books or anything?
Anyways.
My tips on time management and efficiency on a short time budget:
Ask yourself what you can do for tomorrow's you
Tomorrow's you get tired and stressed too. What can you do to help?
If you're like me, any item on your mental to do-lists adds stress to your life. So even something simple like taking five minutes to tidy up your home (Focus on clearing up surfaces like tables and floors. Stacking things looks more organised than things spread out) will help you tomorrow.
Nice to do and must do
This is one I struggle with: Learn to separate your "have to do" from your "nice to do". Just because something is on your to do-list doesn't make it important. Yes, having a list full of "nice to do" is stressful, but learning to separate your "have to do" is necessary to remain sane.
Speculate in "open" and "closed" time
I don't know if there is a specific term for this, but this is what it's called in my head. For instance, coming home from work and having nothing else planned, so you have nothing to do until bedtime is an "open" time space. The time between putting laundry on and it finishing, is a "closed" time space.
"Open" time space is best for things like work, reading, blogging, hanging out with friends... Those things where you would like to do the thing until you get bored of it. "Closed" time space is perfect to get annoying little practical tasks done. They're especially good for doing those things that your future self will thank you for, like cleaning the kitchen, packing your work bag, taking out garbage, printing something you need in physical form, updating your calendar etc.
Have an in/out station
Create a space where you hang planners, calendars or notes so you can keep track of what you need to get done. This is also where you can put things that have to go out of your home, like letters and work stuff. Things that needs to be dealt with eventually, also goes here.
I keep my three bags here: A Kipling shoulder bag for "off duty". Two identical Samsonite shoulder bags that you can tell apart by the university ID and work ID card attached to the zipper in the front. There are hooks for hanging keys and umbrella and such. A magnetic whiteboard week planner.
However, it's on my to nice to do list to put up some better boards: We could use a month planner, a better week planner and maybe a blank one too.
Money
I guess my only advice here is to clean up your monthly expenses as much as possible. But this is all things we all know already: You don't need that daily calories-and-coffee-bomb, you don't need a Netflix account. If you want to buy something non-essential like a box subscription or a gym membership, maybe you can find it as an option where you pay for it now for so-and-so long instead of a continuous expense. That way it's more like a gift to yourself instead of a monthly expense.
Huh. Funny how "normal" messes with your perception of things.
After a few days messing around with five and seven stranded braids, my bun looks kind of weird with a three stranded braid base. Like... Bulky? Puffy? Undelicate in structure?
Mr Igor and I are going to Högevallsbadet this weekend. It's a small and mildly unimpressive water park in Lund, but it's nearby and it's a good way to spend some hours with hubby for a date day.
It has "relaxing evenings" during the winter months, which I think sounded so interesting I have booked our tickets for a date in October already. It sounds like a good way to take advantage of the dark winter months: Being warm and cozy indoors in a water park where they dim the lights and have lots of candles out. There are also different "events" during the evening, something with essential oils and sauna stuff. They have it every month in the winter half of the year, and it if turns out we enjoy it in October, we will probably want to go again.
But this left me with the question: Wasn't there something about hair and chlorine?
I can only think back to going in a pool one single time the last decade or so, which was on Tenerife last year. I do however have the memory of how much the chlorine in the pool wrecked my skin when I had swim classes as a child. Which I did in this classy swim hall from 1926 right here:
I grew up near some pretty good beaches and my parents own a boat, so I'm a total, unapologetic snob when it comes to where I swim. I only went to said pool because that was where the classes were, and I will forever scoff at Mr Igors bizarre idea that it's fine to swim in a lake. This is something I have only degraded myself to in landlocked Switzerland on really hot days.
No, swimming takes place at a proper saltwater beach with warm and fine sand between your toes. Preferably in the archipelago south of the island where I grew up, so you can just anchor the boat up by one of the little uninhibited islets and have the entire beach to yourself: No screaming children, no broken glass in the sand, no dog shit. Just the entire little islet to yourself.
This is the only proper way to spend a day at the beach. Fight me. I will die on this hill.
Anyways. Hair and chlorine.
If you can’t
get to a decent beach and you have to swim in a pool, chlorine in the water is actually a good
thing. Chlorine is a disinfectant that kills bacteria in water, such as E. Coli. and Cryptosporidium which can make you very, very sick with diarrhea, Pseudomonas which causes rashes and swimmer's ear, and Legionella, which causes Legionnaire’s disease and Pontiac fever. Basically, chlorine kills all the nasty you get when a bunch of people of unknown hygiene splashes around in pleasantly warm water.
But chlorine comes with a price for your hair and skin.
Just as chlorine is good for killing bad bacteria, it indiscriminately kills the good as well. That means killing the benign bacteria that keeps malign bacteria from colonizing the acid mantle. The skin has something like a thousand different bacteria strains living peacefully on it, and even with names like Staphylococcus epidermidis and Streptococcus pyogenes, those are the good guys. You want to nurture and protect them so they don't die and leave living room for the bad guys.
Chlorine also does a good job of breaking down dirt and oil, which means it will destroy the sebum and the polyunsaturated fatty acids that the good bacteria need for maintaining the right pH for them to thrive. Stripping oils from scalp, skin and hair causes dryness to the skin and hair, which increases the risk of damage. It can also provoke dandruff. Removing the oils from your hair will cause a loss of flexibility in the strands and increase hairs natural porosity. Increased porosity in chlorine water is a bad circle, where the hair can absorb more chlorinated water which again cause more porosity. If your hair is already dry or damaged from perms or dyes, it can increase the damage from chlorine even more.
Bleached or highlighted hair is also more at risk for turning green. The infamous greenish tint is actually caused by oxidized copper in the poolwater which binds to the proteins in hair. Just like that pretty, turquoise tone on copper we see on some buildings and statues. If you wear contact lenses like me, chlorinated water absorbs into your contact lenses which can irritate the surface of your corneas. I'm going to bring extra lenses so I can discard mine after swimming. Maybe I will even invest in a pair of swim goggles if the water park becomes a place we will visit more frequently.
How to
prevent chlorine damage?
Since the
problem with chlorine comes from absorbing it into hair, the first step is to
make sure your hair is completely soaked through with unchlorinated water
before getting in the pool. Rinse, rinse and rinse. Give your hair time to
absorb it. You can also take breaks during swimming to take a quick rinse in
tapwater.
To further
block the absorption of the chlorinated water, a swim cap is the way to go. It
will keep your hair nice and compressed and decrease the flow of chlorinated
water into the tapwater soaked hair. Silicone swim caps are the way to go
because they are flexible, hair friendly and bacteria can’t grow on clean
silicone.
A quick
google search found a ton of specialised, chlorine-combating products. Often
expensive. And often without a listed ingredient list. I’m deeply skeptic of
any product like that, especially if they don’t list the ingredients. I'll save my money.
Even though
leave in products will eventually be broken down by the chlorine and washed
away by the flow of water, they can slow down the process of chlorine absorbing.
Amodimethicone is not water soluble and is known for causing build up, but in
this case it’s a good thing and might prevent silicone absorption. Quaterniums bind
to microscopic damaged areas of the hair to protect them and some of them are
known for building up: Polyquaternium 10 and 11 especially. Again, this is
normally something to avoid in large doses, but before swimming in a pool it
could be a good idea to load up on amodimethicone and quaterniums.
And of course
there are oils. Oils will naturally repel water and keep water from
absorbing into the hair.
“Repairing”
chlorine damage
Yes, I
know. You can’t repair damaged hair. But still…
First step
out of the pool is to rinse. Rinse, rinse and rinse. Get as much of the
chlorine out before anything else.
Just as the
chlorine damage-preventing the products mentioned before, I found lots and lots
of specialised, chlorine-damage repairing products. Again: Often expensive. And
often without a listed ingredient list. I would not spend money on those.
If
anything, I would go for a weak apple cider vinegar rinse to remove build up
from chlorine and poolwater residue. Or go for a shampoo I know and trust.
Basically not Head and shoulders and not something that promises too much, doesn't want to show the ingredient list and is too expensive.
A deep
conditioner would be a good idea afterwards too. Get something with protein in
it to replace the broken protein molecules in your hair. Look for cetearyl
alcohol, glycerin, hyaluronic acid, panthenol, propylene
glycol, sodium PCA, sodium lactate and sorbitol for moisturizing
ingredients. Niacinamide aka vitamin B3 is a very effective skin-restoring
ingredient against ageing and environmental stress.
Five stranded braid without trying anything fancy with "layers". I could still need some practice at keeping the extra strands separated! And I actually bothered to braid the five strands all the way down, yay.
First of all: The five stranded double buns got massive. The five stranded braid has a way to flatten a bun a lot more than a normal three stranded braid, so these got big and flat. I like!
Second: The five stranded braid that was started as a three stranded braid and then added another two strands into for the next layer, worked perfectly fine as a bun base. It's not pretty when you can see the three-to-five transition, but as a base it worked perfectly.
Weird that the seven stranded braid from the other day got so messed up? Do the last two strands make that big a difference? Or is it because I'm not used to braiding seven and that messed it up?
Played around with starting a five stranded braid by first making three strands and then adding in another two in the next layer. I liked the result, but tomorrow will show how it works for a bun-base.
Don't that today is the last day for 10 % off on all orders (Both physical book and E-book and all hair products) at Nightblooming's Etsy store. Either follow this direct link or apply the code BELLTOWER when you check out.
I spotted this ad for a recruitment agency at a bus stop. Even though the guy's beard-braid looks very much photoshopped on, I still thought it was mildly interesting.
Also, is the guy supposed to look like Kristofer Hivju (Tormund Giantsbane) or is it just a coincidence? Especially since he seems to be doing that "staring in awe" thing at the woman.
