the layered approach

Many apologies for the delay in updating this blog! It has taken me longer than I thought it would to get my feet under me and to get used to this new life of being a cosmetology student. Hopefully this long lapse won't happen again but I make no promises...

When they said it was an accelerated program they really meant it! The fast pace, my personal drive to LEARN ALL THE THINGS and the horrible Metro-DC traffic have left me with little time for a social life and even less time for blogging and my beloved hobby of sewing and costuming. I comfort myself with the mantras "I can do anything for a year" & "Work now so I can play later". Sewing and playing dress-up with be there for me when school is done so for now I'm determined to focus on the task at hand and make the most of my investment at PMTS.

The time is really flying by and in the past 9 weeks I have progressed through the "Core" and "Protégé" phases. As of today I am officially an "Adaptive", meaning that I now spend half my time on the Salon-Clinic floor and half my time in the classroom. Overall I'm really loving school and am so glad I choose this Paul Mitchell School. My classes are interesting, many of my fellow classmates are great people and the more I learn, the more I'm confident that I'm meant to be a cosmetologist. Of course there are things that I don't like about school and things I struggle with but such is life. Overall it's been a good experience so far.

The curriculum's approach has been interesting and honestly not quite what I expected. While there is an emphasis on making the information accessible to many different learning styles there is no escaping that some of the teaching methods used are not the way I personally learn best. That was a little disappointing if fair. The curriculum's basic approach is one of a system of layered information. Basically every subject is on a rotation and as you go on you get more each rotation through. As a "Core Baby" I was basically exposed to all the basic elements of cosmetology, but only getting a basic foundation and taste of each. During the next phase, "Protégé, I learned a bit more about each subject (albeit very condensed since Protégée is only 2.5 weeks long). As an "Adaptive", which I will be for the next few months, I'll learn more as we cycle through and in the last phase "Creative", even more.

I'm the kind of student that likes to reach a certain level of comfort and mastery in one thing before moving on to the next so that has been a struggle. I have often felt a bit lost at sea without a life vest and it's been very uncomfortable at times. Still I've learned some valuable lessons and made some self discoveries through it. Being stretched and tested is never fun but it's a necessary part of life. Without it you can't grow and I certainly don't want to be stagnant - that is not a good way to live at all! So I have started down the path to let go of some of my ODC/perfectionist tendencies, swallow my pride, grow in my faith and be content to accept life as it comes. Oh yeah and I'm learning about cutting, coloring and all that jazz too. I can't say life as a Future Professional is dull, that is for sure!

day one down

I should be in bed right now but I wanted to say a quick thank you so much for all your well wishes this morning! *feels warm fuzzies* They really helped my nerves! I had a great first day including a welcome pancake breakfast with the whole school, getting to know my classmates who all seem lovely (I make twelve in my class), and getting my kit! Can I just say wow?! It's hard not to feel like a professional already wielding my fabulous new blow-dryer of doom. Now I just have to learn how to use it properly...

a new life begins

Up with the dawn this morning but I'm still excited - my new life starts today! Paul Mitchell The School here I come... :P

welcome to Stylin' à la Fleur

With Cosmetology school starting next week there will be all sorts of things I want to share that don't seem to fit on my Costuming Blog, Jennylafleur, so a new home was needed - welcome to my Beauty Blog!

School will eat up a lot of my time in the next 12 months but I'm committed to sharing some of the things I learn along the way, what the cosmetology school experience is like, fun links, product reviews and the historic hair and make-up tutorials I've been promising my costuming friends for years.

The posts behind this one have been re-blogged from my costuming blog. I kept the original posting dates for context, which is why they are so spread out and sporadic, even though this blog actually opens today. But enough of the housekeeping notes - on to some current and original content...

Let the games begin!

New Beginings

It's official so I can share my big news!

I will be attending The Paul Mitchell School in Woodbridge VA to become a licensed cosmetologist!

It's something I've thought about doing for YEARS but my fears and doubts always held me back. As I've been doing a lot of deep soul searching over the past few months, I finally found the faith and the courage I needed to follow this path. It's time to stop standing on the sidelines cheering on friends as they take risks and follow their dreams; it's time I followed their example. Things have fallen into place every step along the way so far and I feel an incredible peace and surety that this is what I'm supposed to do.

I start school on June 18th. It's an intense 11 month program, Tuesday-Saturday, so I'm not sure how much time I'll have for blogging but I'll try not to fall off the face of the earth and share some of what I'm learning along the way.

Wheee - have I mentioned I'm SO excited?!!!

From RED to Strawberry Blond

 

So what do you do when you want to leave the land of RED and go to a natural light strawberry blond hair color? Well lets say it's been an interesting journey. There was a lot more info online about how to get bright red hair, not so much on how to get rid of it. Apparently I'm the only one with bright red hair who can't afford a salon visit and doesn't want to go to black. Because most people with RED hair seem to color it black afterward. And now I can understand why.

Being an untrained colorist I am naturally leery of chemicals so I thought why not try some DYI solutions first. I found lots of them online and a few that scared me less than the chemicals. (There are some really crazy ideas out there!) There were lots of recommendations to wash color-treated hair with T-gel or Head and Shoulders for two weeks to strip the color. No way. I've tried those shampoos before for dandruff issues and they really reeked havoc on my fine hair.

So I went with a DYI that seemed fairly harmless - the vitamin C + dish soap method. I found some nicely priced Vitamin C powder at Trader Joes and combined it with Joy dish soap to create a gooey paste that I generously used to wash my hair with. It was HORRIBLE! It certainly stripped out some of the RED but it also dried out my hair badly and it took HOURS to rinse all the dish soap out. The suds just wouldn't leave! I will never do that again. I might consider shampoo with Vitamin C (another DIY recipe) but dish soap will never touch my head again. EVAR!

After that I went with one of the semi-professional strippers that Sally Beauty carries, Color Fix by One n' Only. The reviews I read online were mixed, it either worked wonderfully or was horrible. Not much in-between so it was a bit of a gamble on my part but I'd already started the process of de-RED-ing so I had to do something.

 

I enlisted my sister's help and after one application my hair resembled nothing so much as a My Little Pony Mane. Oy. In the end we ended up doing three applications, I basically used up the product. In the end the my hair still wasn't a completely even tone but I felt the product had done all it could so instead of buying more stripper I simply colored over it.

 

The results were livable but it took several more coloring sessions (over the next several months as I babied my hair with long breaks between color applications and lots of conditioning treatments) before my hair was even once again.

If I had to do it all over again I would have just gone to a salon. The amount of time, money and water I used with all those processes was close to what I would have spent having my hair stripped professionally, with vastly inferior results. The only way I would do it myself again is if I was going to a darker color - bright RED to strawberry blond was too much of a contrasting transition. Ah well you live and you learn and my hair hasn't fallen out so the experiments weren't total failures!

Redheads Have More Fun

I did it - I colored my hair bright red! I don't know how long I will keep it (that dreaded maintenance!) but for now I love it!

 

I used L'Oreal HiColor Highlights in Red with a 20 Volume Oreor Creme.
I'm really happy with the results - yay!