I give up! I had been platinum for awhile and decided to go darker....gradually. Well, best laid plans.....

The first couple of attempts went well. After two months, I had ended up with a light ash. A couple of days ago, I decided to try a little darker to med golden blonde. That didn't work out so well. My new unbleached growth came out golden and my previously bleached hair (just past my shoulders) stayed ash. And THAT was with professional color bought at a beauty supply that stated a 'gold base'. I did it twice....same result. I said FORGET IT! I'll go back platinum, so I used a bleach and came out yellowish, but very light and all over even color. Cool, right? NOPE! I was prepared to use a toner, which I did. Same result only lighter.

I have just over 2 inches of very light golden blonde and the rest is light pinky ash with a tad darker pinky ash on the ends. I have a pretty fresh cut (about 2 weeks) in which I went from one length to layers.

Now.....I'm going to spend tomorrow at a professional colorist. It'll cost me a vacation day, but I don't know what else to do. Needless to say, I'm pissed and frustrated!

Platinum

Light Ash (taken just last Sunday....I should have left well enough alone)

Hair color is so tricky.  Would you consider working with a stylist from now on?  Your hair is so pretty, why take the chance of wrecking it?

Good luck with fixing it.  Let us know how it turns out!

I drove around and talked to a couple of colorists on Friday. I found a great gal and we discussed lowlights. I went back Friday afternoon and we talked about chesnut. We talked about it grabbing too much on the ends, but she said it was demi-permanent and would fade. She was afraid the light ash blonde wouldn't hold color.

OMG! It was horrible. It was way too dark. And the ends that were previously processed platinum ended up almost black. When mixed with the light blonde strands.....they looked grey. I know it would have faded, but my family hated it and we went out of town. When we got to East Texas, I put light gold bleach on most of it. I didn't spend as much time as I would have liked. Most of it turned golden strawberry blonde. Some of it's copper and I missed or barely got a few of the chesnut strands. There are patches of color where it looks like she put too much on the foil....hardly any light blonde. I've gotten LOTS of compliments on it, but I'd still like to lighten the copper and chesnut to the golden strawberry blonde. It might require test strands on each section and taking ALOT of time layer by layer. I'm much happier with it overall though.  (I deleted the camera phone pics)

I know I should have gone back to her to get her to 'adjust' it, but I wasn't in town and I'm too impatient. I thought my guys (BF, my son and BF's son) were going to leave me in the sticks!  I am still happy with her and will go back in a few weeks. I will definitely get lighter lowlights, though.

These are much better. I don't usually wear my hair completely straight, but I did so you can see the colors. (stupid flash!)

I love it! The streaks look great contasted to the light blonde. You should defantly keep this color. It is the best out of all the pics!

The ends are so much darker. I think I'm going to do the bleach again, but like I said.....only on selected strands. My bf says I should leave it alone. lol.....poor guy. I think he's just sick of me messing with it. 

You can really tell when it's up.

I agree with other posters that the ends will fade.  Just give it time.  By the way I love the GOLD!  Beautiful! 

Rebekah

HOLY HAIR COLOR BATMAN!!

LOL...Like I was saying Kelly, back at my post!!  Color correction at it's best.

First off, leave it to the ladies who color their own hair. Because this is where we professionals make our money! Let the professionals do it.  Kelly, really.  First off, when going any shade darker, your eyeballs will have a very difficult time adjusting.  All the bleached out hair was very poruos, and made any other color difficult to grab.  But, now that your hair is on the road to recovery, please stick with this hairstylist. She will get it to where you like it and your hair will too.  Remember what I said, back at my post....Color correction most always, will not come out the way expected the first time.  Usually, you always have to go back a few times.  Especially your time of correction.  And, it will take a few hours.   But, once you get it to where it needs to be, the touch ups will go faster, and you won't have to deal with all that again.

Unles you are the type of woman, who gets tired very quickly with the color and likes to change it often.  Can't make up your mind?  Yikes, that could be fun.  Tee hee.

Well, the color looks great from the photos!! 

Correction:'

I meant to say, "Especially your TYPE of correction"...not, your TIME of correction.

Yeah, Hairdoozie. I'm with ya. I'd had alot of bleach/color on my hair over the last 2 years. I hadn't had it professionally done in that time. There was alot of previously processed hair since I have been growing it out.

I would have gone to the girl who did it for 3 years before that, but she and I moved in two different directions. She was good.....but not worth a 3 hour drive.

Thanks, Tinkerbelle and everyone else. I'll leave it alone. Well, at least until the roots start to grow out.

Kelly,

what you should do, is make your appointment NOW.  Make it for the week you know your roots will be big enough.  This way, you know you have the appointment, and you won't wait till the last minute, and try getting a color appointment at the last minute, especially if you may want some foiling.  This way, if you can't get the appointment for when you want it, it will keep you from DOING IT YOURSELF.

KEEP YOUR HANDS OFF!!  I'M WATCHING......tee hee.

More like 5-6 weeks....but knowing that, make it for 6 weeks, and call and make the appointment.  take a look at how much root is showing by that time, and you will know for the next time how many weeks you won't mind waiting.  If you have dark hair, no longer than 4 weeks. 

do it, do it, do it....rah rah sis boom bah.

I took some more pics. It's not really that dark on top.....must be the overhead lighting.

Very, very pretty!  I just love it!

Thanks! The color variations are pretty subtle when it's 'styled'.

Now, I just have to figure out how to maintain it.

Well, you could try doing what you have been doing to get the plat...then adding lowlights.  As long as the lowlights aren't overlapped and put in about the same spots this might work. 

Another option is to find a base color, that's light enough but not plat, and then bleach highlights into that...Well, if you're having this done, the colorist should be able to do a base color and bleach highlights at the same time.  Base color and foil the highlights. 

Anyway, just some ideas about how to maintain your new color. 

That sounds like a plan Kelly and I won't be surprised if you change your mind.  

By the way, I just love your hair cut?  Is there a name for what has been done to your hair?  Also, can I copy a pic of your hair too?  I want to get my hair cut in that style eventually.  I'm seriously thinking of getting some bangs. 

Sure. No problem. They pretty much just called it long layers. It was framed around my face and the layers length began at about my ears.

I might add that it's a little more 'V' cut than I'm used to in the back. I usually went for straight across and rounded into the sides into the tapering in the front, but I like it.

Ack! My new growth is about 1/4 of an inch and it's almost a month since my fiasco with the lowlights. I'm scared to death to get my new growth messed with! I'm usually ready to bleach by now. I need to go 3 more weeks or so before I try to get lowlights matching the color I 'produced' after diddling with it........give me strength!

OK....I had thought my natural color was more ashy, but with the new growth being 'more' than I've ever let it go.....

It seems that it's a light/med NEUTRAL blonde. It has a tad ash and a tad gold. Since my ultimate goal is to get lowlights (closely matching my natural color) periodically until I have even color and THEN get highlights if I need to brighten it up, I'm trying to decide what color to try next/soon. My stylist that I will go back to uses Redken. She used a demi (Redken EQ) and used heat to make it more permanent.

I don't think she used the Chestnut last time, but I know she mentioned it in our conversation. I think she went darker. She HAD to have! It was so freakin' dark! I'm going to check that with her. I'm thinking the Irish Creme...

Here are all the shades.....

http://kellyholmes.net/Kelly/Redken_shades_eq.pdf - Redken EQ Shades pdf file

is HOT a shade?

We went with Irish Creme about 3 weeks ago. It was closer to my natural color, but still a little golden. It doesn't match. Also, she did 'narrower' strands so they're not very prevelant.

This is the best pic I have of it right now. Yes, I was cleaning my weapon.

I've decided with the holidays and a money crunch that I will do the next step myself. I know, I know....all I talked about in this thread was that only a pro was going to do it from now on, but I think I have the knowledge base now to get to my natural color myself. I will strand test and if the result is not what I want, I WILL STOP!  

I've ordered Redken EQ Cafe Au Lait off ebay and hope to level/even out my color to match about an inch and 1/4-1/2 of virgin hair. Hopefully (cross your fingers) I can get back to my natural color and the only thing I'll do from now on out is use Idora Toning Mousse to 'brighten up' the colored length now and then.

K~

You did an amazing job with the colour.  It turned out beautiful!