General Hair Talk - getting red hair--advice needed

I went to the same colorist for 6 years up until about 4 months ago. At that time I decided that I wanted to try out a little red in my hair and, then if I liked it, go a bolder red. When I showed her the color that I ultimately wanted, she told me she would not do my hair that red. It was like a friend of mines . She did not give any explanation. I felt I could not go back to her, so I went to someone new,and she did my base color a reddish brown and put in fine blond highlights. I loved it. The second time I went back to her I showed her a pic of what I wanted. The pic I showed her is in a magazine. I tried to scan the pic, but it did not show up well. The hair on this model is very close.
http://www.hairstyles-haircuts.net/wp-content/uploads/2008/10/winter-hair-colors-330x494.jpg - http://www.hairstyles-haircuts.net/wp-content/uploads/2008/10/winter-hair-colors-330x494.jpg

I am not sure how this is showing on your monitor, but it is somewhat auburn-y looking. She said she felt that it did not look natural and wanted "her redheads" to look natural. She fussed wtih me over it, so I just let her trim my split ends and did not go back. Eight weeks ago, I went to someone else and showed her a pic of what I wanted. This person came highly recommended to me. She thought it was beautiful, but she said she wanted to be sure that it was what I wanted. I told her I was absolutely sure, and she said she was excited and went on and on about how much she liked to do red hair color. She even took the pic to the mixing room with her. I was very impressed with that. When she got through with my hair and blowed it dry, it did not look like the pic. My hair had really no visible red in it. I asked her about it and she said that she was really afraid to go too intense the first time someone got their hair colored red. She didn't tell me that before she did my hair. I don't feel like I got what I paid for. I hate confrontation, so I said thank you and left. My hair was really pretty, and I am thankful it was not a disaster, but it was not what I paid for. I cried all the way home. It had blonde highlights, a few reddish highlights (they really didn't show up unless you looked for them), and some brown streaks. I was just so frustrated that I had shelled out about $250 over the past three or four months and still didn't have what I want.

Fast forward to today. I went back to my same colorist to give her another chance today. I told her she did not get my hair as red as I wanted it 8 weeks ago, so I showed her the same picture and she said she would do it. It was really hard to tell in the salon if it looked like the picture because of the low lighting. When I got home, I held the picture up to the mirror beside my face in the bright lights of my bathroom, and my hair looked brown upside the pic. I just took a deep breath and decided that I was going to have to go to someone else. I didn't really examine it closely. After getting out of the shower tonight, I looked at it very closely. Can you tell that I teach math and science? OH MY GOODNESS!!! There are some places where it this reddish burgundy at the roots, but brown below. It is a little splotchy. I am upset. When I calm down, I am going to go to her and ask her to fix it, but I don't think I can talk to her on the phone now without crying. However, part of me just doesn't even want to deal with this. Is a couple of shades of nice red in your hair with some highlights really that hard to achieve? I am beginning to think I can do my hair as well as the colorists I have been to.

I kind of want to start doing my hair myself, but I am so afraid. I have two friends who dye their own hair red and their natural hair color is like my natural. Their hair is beautiful. I am further afraid because I would be putting color on top of color.

Have any of you had similar experiences? Do you have any advice? Thanks for listening (er, reading) to me vent.