I have been getting a lot of questions about my pink hair and I figured that it was time for a tutorial on how to dye ones hair for maximum awesomeness and effectiveness. I have used a lot of different brands of dye and will make my recommendations based on what has worked best for me. If you have suggestions please leave a comment!

If you have dark hair you will have to bleach it a couple of times. You can use a bleaching kit (Special Effects makes a great bleach kit) or just a box of the lightest blonde hair color you can find. My hair is strawberry blonde so I use Revlon's Lightest Blonde and I only have to do it once. If you have to bleach your hair more than once to get it to really lighten don't do it in the same day. Give your hair time to rest. I recommend spacing bleaching sessions a week apart but if you don't want to do that? Fine. Whatever.

Follow the instructions included with your bleach kit. Do NOT leave the bleach in your hair for more than twenty minutes. It will NOT lighten your hair any more in an hour than it already has after twenty minutes. Your hair will get destroyed. Trust me. I've done it before on myself and others and have finally figured that out.

First things first: Take off all of your jewelry. Earrings, necklaces, rings, et al. Wear a crappy shirt (preferably white) and cover your work surface (like your bathroom counter) with a crappy towel or cellophane. This will make it easier to clean up when you're finished.

You need to wear gloves. Some kits include gloves. Make sure that yours does and if not? Buy some. Nothing fancy, just cheap latex or plastic gloves. The bleach will burn your skin so gloves are essential. Any bleach that gets on your skin will temporarily lighten the color of your skin. Speaking of which, if you get some on your face or neck use a baby wipe to get it off.

Mix the color (or bleach) and put it into a plastic bowl. Use a hair coloring brush and apply the bleach starting 1/8 inch from your scalp.Getting bleach onto your scalp will hurt (or at the very least itch) so do your best to keep it off of your scalp. Start at the top and work your way down. You may want to put your hair into sections and do one section at a time but that's up to you. When you are finished pull your hair up and secure it with a clip.

So you rinse out the bleach after twenty minutes (NO MORE!) in lukewarm water and put in a deep conditioner. Joico makes excellent deep conditioners. They aren't cheap but totally worth it. Leave that conditioner in for about 10 minutes and then rinse it out. Your hair will feel soft and not like straw because you followed my instructions.

Give your hair a day to rest. You get to be blonde for a day!

To keep your eager asses from doing it all in one day I'm going to post the actual applying color instructions tomorrow. You're welcome.

OH! And if you do color your hair please link up in tomorrow's post! I want to see it!