I Spoiled Myself This Week

Normally, all my free time is dedicated to my baby and my husband. Not a bad thing at all but I was feeling way outdated with my look. After all, it has been a year since my friend did a melt on my hair, when I was prego with my baby and when Lora Grady took these lovelies for me.

Lora is now located in Seattle and if you want her to do your pictures for anything, check out her website Lora Grady Photography. Also, great news for her, she is currently one of the 15 best photographers according to Le Magnifique Blog. I was so spoiled to have her take pictures for me! 

Oh, and the amazingly talented Lindsey Jacobson from Metropolitan salon did that wonderful melt. 

Anyway, that has been a year gone. Eventually, I took my melt to red on the ends and I loved that for a bit but I was still dark. Even though I have been doing hair for 7 years, I have never ventured to do anything drastic because I have loved my natural color. 

This last week, I asked Mallory Villagomez from Relik Salon in American Fork to do the Sam Brocato SuperSilk smoothing treatment on my hair. I thought if my hair wasn't so poofy and frizzy that I would like it more. Especially if that meant that my hair would be easier to do, and with kids, who doesn't want that? Lets be honest, even if you don't have kids, who doesn't want an easier hair do?

Also, I am not a very photogenic person really so don't look at the face. Just the hair :) 

Pretty amazing right? Keep in mind that for both pictures, I tipped my head upside down and blow dried my hair. I didn't use a flat iron in either picture either. That, my friends, is the magic of SuperSilk. And now you can see my red melt :)

After Mallory did this, I loved not having to flat iron my hair! I still had a wave but no frizz and no poofiness. Seriously, why did I wait so stinking long to do this? I feel every woman deserves to pamper themselves, me included. I loved it and I still love it. However, I wanted something more. I knew I needed a trim and then I was thinking about a color... I LOVE red hair. I wish it grew out of my head. So, I decided to go all red. My hairstylish Trish did it. She used to work with me at Metropolitan and at Relik but she is now a full time nurse. However, I rent her basement so while the kiddo was asleep, we had ourselves a great time!

I am not normally a "selfie" taker but I could name off a handful of people that would be pretty upset unless I posted a picture of my new hair for the world to see. I am so happy with the results and I plan on keeping it a good long time. I'm sure that I will miss the brown eventually, but for now, I am finally happy with my hair. And it has been a while since I have been happy with it!

Moral of the story? If you need a boost, do something completely different with your hair. A good hairstylist can recommend looks that will work for you. It can be dramatic, or it can be subtle but we can change how we see ourselves when we have new hair. 

Veteran's Day

I had the opportunity to work on a photo shoot with the amazingly talented Morgan Slade from http://www.morgansladephotography.com/.  She wanted to do a military based photo shoot to honor those that are serving our country, those who have served and those that will serve in the future.

Seriously, aren't they are gorgeous couple? I am so proud to be an American and I'm so eternally grateful for all the millions of service men and women for everything they do and the sacrifices that they make. 

I also need to express how grateful I am to their families as well. As a wife and a mother, I cannot imagine how hard it would be to send my husband away, not knowing for sure when he will come back or even if he will come back. I can't imagine sending away my child to somewhere I know that I cannot do anything, besides pray (and pray a lot) to protect them.

We are all in debt to all those wonderful people that protect our lives and our freedom. Veterans deserve so much more than what we give them but for most of them, a simple "Thank you for your wonderful sacrifice and service" would suffice. They gladly served and would do it again if they were able. 

What does the flag mean to you? I have fond memories of putting my hand over my heart and reciting the Pledge of Allegiance-I pledge allegiance to the Flag of the United States of America, and to the Republic for which it stands, one Nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. I so wish that this was still recited in every school, from every person. It is so important to remember what the Flag means and everything that has been given to protect it. 

This Veteran's Day, and everyday from here on out, thank those service men and women that have done so much for us. Show them how grateful you are. Show them how much it means to you. They will recognize your sincerity and remember that they fight for people like you and people like me. 

Photo Credits

Event Planning: Cake for Two http://www.cakefor2.com
Bouquet and hair piece: Jen's Bowdacious Bowshttp://www.etsy.com/shop/jensbowdaciousbows
Hair and Make-UP: Lisa Frehner lisafrehnerhair.blogspot.com
Wedding Dress: Danielle's Bridal danielles-bridal-slc.com
Jewelry: You Name it by Sarah: https://www.etsy.com/shop/YouNameItbySarah?ref=si_shop
Photography: Morgan Slade Morgan Slade Photographywww.morgansladephotograpy.com/wp
Videography: Amber Green www.agreendesign.com

Favor for a Friend

I have known many amazing women in my life, one of them being Kenna. I actually know her because she was one of my older sister's best friends through highschool. My sister and I are good friends now but it wasn't always that way. I was the annoying younger sister that tried to hang out with the older sister and all her friends. Now, I am her awesome younger sister that does a fabulous job on her hair (now that I'm thinking about it, maybe she is using me...? Kidding!). Anyway, Kenna was always amazingly kind and encouraged my sister to let me come and be a part of their group. She has a natural gift to be kind and loving to everyone around her. Now that we are all grown up, she has blossomed into an amazing photographer, wife and mother to a sweet little boy. We all face trials and challenges, but I can't imagine the pain that her and her husband go through along with tons of other couples. Sweet Kenna and her husband cannot have their own children. They have been blessed with one little boy and they are now looking forward to adding another bundle of Joy to their family. This post is meant to help them in their search and hopefully find a sweet girl that is looking for loving parents to fill her baby's needs. Please take the time to read and share her profile.
itsaboutlove.org/ial/profiles/28991941/ourMessage.jsf

Pixie Haircuts

As a stylist, I often hear people say that they think they don't have the right face shape for a Pixie haircut-it's too fat, too long, sharp features ect... I'm sure this thought has crossed your minds as well. I am here to tell you that anyone can pull off the pixie do! Not everyone has to have long, luscious hair :) I have done both and everything in between so I can attest that I had as much fun with my short Pixie as I have with my long locks. I put together some illustrations so that you can all see and I will explain each one. I have to say though, I am no artist in Paint so I hope everyone can see my vision here. A lot of people have a mix of shapes as well so just follow the basic rules I will explain here.

Oval:

       Hair- The ideal face shape. We all want it but not a lot of us have it. A Pixie haircut can be super short, longer, spiky, textured, relaxed... Pretty much, this person can do whatever they want to do and the haircut will flatter them. 

       Makeup- Pick a feature to play with. Bold eyes and nude lips with light pink cheeks or bold lip with simple eyes and pink cheeks. 

Round: 

          Hair- These people feel like they have full cheeks and for this reason they feel like a Pixie haircut will make them look fat. Not true!!!!! I wish I could pound this into everybody. We are way to hard on ourselves. If you want to try a Pixie haircut, you want a cut to avoid volume/anything too puffy on the sides. However, you want lots of volume on the top. I suggest taking the sides super short and keeping the top longer to get the right look.This will help create and illusion of a more slender face. I also suggest a cut that will frame the face to soften the roundness. 

         Makeup- Play with those beautiful cheeks of yours! Flaunt them and love them. You can't hide them, so embrace them. Pick a blush that will work well with your skin tone. I recommend Biofond Blush by Gerda Spillmann. 

Oblong:

        Hair- Go for less volume on the top, which will give you and even longer face, and more fullness on the sides. For your face shape, you want a fringe that will cover most of the forehead. You can choose a straight across, textured fringe or a swoop. Just make sure that you have it. 

        Makeup- Bold eyes look amazing with this kind of haircut. Keep the cheeks and lips soft.

Heart:

        Hair- Fringe is the key for this Pixie. I recommend a soft, short, textured fringe. This will help soften the widest part of your face. You could do it super short on top or longer with more volume. The goal here is to camouflage the widest part of your face, the forehead

       Makeup- Strong eyebrows are beautiful when you have a shorter fringe. It will help bring out your eyes, and with a soft, pink lip, you will be ready to tackle the day.

 Square:
        Hair- Your goal is to keep some hair around the face to soften the sharpness of your features. Asymmetrical is my favorite for this. Not to mention that it is super sexy! Volume is good for you because it will also help to soften your face. I like a heavy fringe going into the asymmetrical side as well. There is just something classy about it.
       Makeup- I love a dark smokey eye for this look. Play it up!

Rectangle:

        Hair- I recommend hair around the face again and less volume on top. A longer fringe that sweeps one way and then frames the face the opposite way is preferable. Hair should stay in front of the ears to help frame the face. 

        Makeup- Keep attention to your eyes again but don't do them too heavy. Accentuating your brows will help them stand out. 

Diamond:

        Hair- Also known as the inverted triangle, I suggest a longer pixie do for this face shape with a swoop fringe and lots of hair coming forward. This will help with the wide top and is very flattering for a pointy chin as well. You don't need too much volume but you want a happy medium. 

        Makeup-Highlighter around your eyes and cheeks will bring out their prominence and make your eyes pop. 

Triangle:

         Hair- Fringe across the forehead is highly recommended for this face shape to create a wider forehead to match the broad chin a little closer. Volume is recommended as well. I like a thicker fringe but it can also be more textured. 

        Makeup- Lips! Play them up and show them off.

Keep in mind that most of us have a mix of face shapes so this is meant to be more of a guide as to how your hair should look with different Pixie haircuts. I hope this helped you realize that anyone can pull it off and love it. However, if you have long hair right now, make sure you really want a short hairdo before really committing. It can be scary but it is a ton of fun! Here is a picture of me when I had a fun Pixie do. 

I will admit that I didn't think I could pull it off because of my nice, full cheeks but I ended up loving it. I still felt feminine and it took less time to get ready. I'm sure I'll go back to it one day, especially since all my hair is falling out after this cute baby of mine:)

Brocato Supersilk Treatment

I'm sure that most of us have heard about the Brazilian Blowouts and how straight your hair is once you get it done. I won't lie... I have never tried it! My main concern is that it contains Formaldehyde (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Formaldehyde) and that is considered to be a huge health risk. In my opinion, certain diseases are so prevalent these days that the last thing I want to do is mess around with something that is toxic or expose my clients and coworkers to said toxicity. 

I went to New York with Relik Salon (http://reliksalon.blogspot.com/) to an Academy presented by Sam Brocato (http://www.sambrocato.com/bio.html) where he introduced the Supersilk Treatment. A model came in that was bleach blonde and had super curly hair. They demonstrated the treatment on her hair and it was INCREDIBLE! Her hair blew out beautifully straight and without frizz. What can I say? I was convinced... it just took me until now to start offering it in the salon. Silly me. How does it work? According to Sam, "The supersilk Pure Indulgence  regimen consists of a Shampoo and Leave-In Treatment.  Both are Sulfate and Paraben- Free and contain Brocato’s exclusive NANO SILK COMPLEX.

The acidic nature of the protein compresses the hair while a nano particle (one billionth of a particle) delivers the Nano Silk Complex deep into the shaft to fill in areas of weakness and fortify compromised tresses"

Pretty fancy, right? The Supersilk Treatment will not straighten hair like a Brazilian Blowout but it will tame frizz, enhance shine and softness, smooth curls, improve control, condition and fortify the hair and lasts up to 12 weeks. Plus, it is 100% formaldehyde free. No poisons in this, baby!

So, I guess the question for you guys now is.... Does it really work? Take a look at this before and after and you tell me.

 The "before" picture is her hair after it has been washed and dried. I didn't use a brush to blow dry it so that we could see the real texture of her hair. The "after" picture is after the treatment and was blown dry the exact same way as before and the only product in there is the leave-in treatment that is part of Supersilk. So yes, it absolutely works and your styling time will go down like crazy! Not to mention that her hair felt incredible as well as looked incredible after it was all done. I sure can't wait to do this to my hair. I need some serious frizz control!

If you want this done to your hair, call and make an appointment! My contact info is under my "pricing" tab. Or you can call Relik Salon and ask for Lisa :) 801.216.4057

Experiment 2: Box Red VS. Professional Red

I had a request on my facebook page https://www.facebook.com/LisaF.Hair to do an experiment with red. Keep in mind that here in Texas, I can't get the brand of color that I am used to unless I wanna go on a really long drive. So this is kind of an experiment with new professional color as well as box color. This was our goal....

I am a huge fan of red hair and I always wish that I had naturally red hair. Anyway, I thought this color was beautiful (plus, I am a huge fan of the cut) and I thought that we would try it. This time, we are working on the back of Suzie-Kins head because the front has already been played with. The left side will be the side with box color and the right side is the one with my professional stuff.

So once again, I have a few things to consider.

-What is the condition of her hair? Dry and pretty damaged

-How many levels lighter will I need to go? I want to take her about two levels lighter

-Is there any gray hair? Just a couple

-Has she colored her hair before? Not yet

-If yes, how long has it been since she has colored her hair? This is so important to know if a client comes in with colored hair

-Is her hair resistant to color? Yes. Although it's real hair, mannequins are very resistant to color. 

And once again, the box color can't do any thinking for itself. It has been formulated to work on any kind of hair because there is no saying who will put it on their hair. However, I have not seen many good results from a box... something always goes wrong!

Here is Suzie-Kins with the color on her hair. Once again, the left side is the box color (bottle in the picture) and the right side is the professional color (the bowl). I was tempted to spice up the color and do a balayage but I decided to just let it be the one color (so the box color wouldn't feel so bad when it failed again :))

The instructions on the box said to leave the color on for 30 minutes and 10 extra minutes for gray coverage. I left it on the full 40 minutes just because I know that the hair is resistant and needed extra time with the color on. On the professional side, I left it on the same amount of time. Do you see the middle piece? That is the section of hair that I left the same so that it can be compared to the new colors. It is untouched by color. At the end of 40 minutes and a lot of rinsing (plus shampoo and condition), this is what I came out with...

I wish I was a better photographer! It's actually just a tad bit darker all around in real life but I had to have the flash on cause there was not enough light in my house today (storm clouds have it pretty dark here in Plano). That is the direct shot of the back of her head. You can see a tiny bit of a red lift on the left side, my piece that was not colored down the middle and then the dramatic difference of the red from my professional color. Looks like Ariel hair to me!

Just the professional side (the red looked really cool mixed in with the blonde).

This is the Box color side. Like I said, you can see just a hint of red but it's not much. In the end, I got much better results with the red than I did with the blonde! At least it did something:)

I hope these little experiments have helped everyone understand why it's so important not to color your hair from a box. Not only does it smell terrible but it is so unpredictable. I know that I feel so much better about myself when I love my hair and I know I'm not the only one, so please, please, PLEASE don't ruin your hair with box stuff.

Once again, Suzie-Kins is much happier with the red that I did with my professional color. 

If any of you readers would like to see something on my blog, leave comments here or tell me on my facebook page https://www.facebook.com/LisaF.Hair

Experiment 1: Box Blonde VS Professional Blonde

As a professional Hair stylist, people constantly ask me what the difference between box color and professional color is... and the answer? There is no ONE difference. There are several things that affect how hair color turns out when done with a box or when done professionally. Thus, I decided to do some experiments.

This is my friend Miss Suzie-Kins. She lets me do whatever I want to her hair. Including these crazy experiments. She came to me with a picture of how she wanted her hair.... (and I also talked her into a trim)

 Alright! Suzie-Kins is going for a big change! She wants to be blonde. So, here are some things that I, as a professional, consider before I even mix up color

-Has her hair been colored before? No
-Does she have any gray hair? I think I saw one...
-Is her hair resistant to color? Yes.... it's real hair but doesn't color quite as easily
-Will that shade of blonde work for her skin tone? Yes
-Does she want dimension or just one color? She wants subtle dimension
-What does she see when she looks at the picture? Everything is blonde
-What do I see when I look at the picture? I see a golden base color with a lot of beige highlights
-What is the texture of her hair? Thin, yet coarse and frizzy

From a box's point of view, here are some things that are considered


.......

....................

....................................Blonde.



Basically, the point that I want to get to is that there are so many factors to consider before changing the color of your hair and to put it bluntly, boxes just can't think for themselves. Now, on to the experiment...

Our left side is what I'm doing with my professional product and the right side is with the box color. The hair in between is to be left unchanged for comparison. Keep in mind that I put on the box color first to give it more time to develop. I followed the instructions and it gave me a max time of 35 minutes so I left it on the max time.

As I was doing this experiment, I thought, "how funny would this be if the box blonde actually turned out?" However, I didn't have to worry about that for long cause it didn't seem to be doing any changing as I let it sit. I took a close up picture so that you guys could actually see that I really did put on the color... and I drenched the hair in it. 

And my side :) You can see that it is already changing

And the results? Honestly, I was pretty shocked.... I labeled Suzie's forehead for your convenience:). P for professional and B for box

Say what!? Did the box color even do anything to the hair??? Ha! No surprise there, really. I tried to take some close up pictures because actually, the box side was tinted just a little bit. But even for my trained eye, it was hard to see.

Honestly though, it really doesn't look any different. If that was me, I would be kinda bugged that it didn't lighten my hair like it was supposed to. I even noticed on the box that it had pictures of how the hair would turn out, and it was supposed to be blonde but just a darker blonde than is indicated on the main picture.  Luckily though, it didn't turn out some funky green color.

Yay! Just what Miss Suzie-Kins wanted! I gave her a light golden base with even lighter beige highlights, but how natural does that look? Needless to say, I think she was much happier with the "P" side than she was the "B" side. And look how shiny it is. Plus, if you could touch her hair, it feels like a dream. I didn't put any product in her hair so that you could all see it with just the color.

And my baby was just a little fascinated with the head that I had sitting on the carpet so I had to take a picture. I just love that little chunk!

Next to come.... I'm thinking I'll play around with red cause I LOVE red hair. Will it work? Stay tuned!