Asymmetry & Pancakes

Shorts and cardigan are thrifted | Top is random singlet, possibly a hand-me-down | Ring is DIY I had attempted to cut myself an asymmetrical fringe, as you can see in these photos, however I was later forced to abandon that idea and just cut one that goes straight across; unfortunately, when you have such thin hair like me, an asymmetrical haircut requires constant fixing to ensure it's sitting in the right place. I guess I'll have to give up all ideas of becoming Emily Fitch (so 2009 - though I have always been a fan of her fashion sense). Also, I wasn't content with merely buying food jewelry (as mentioned in this post) - I had to learn how to make the stuff for myself. Luckily, this amazing vlogger called Toni Ellison exists, who has tutorials for basically any sweet western food that you'd ever care to make tiny clay versions of. I just made up these pancakes myself by squashing some clay into round flat shapes, but I also followed her tutorial on how to make miniature polymer clay pies and it worked out SO well. Now I just need this fabric to turn into a circle skirt dress and this bag, and I'll own the most perfect outfit ever: pancake lady! Also, I'm working on two new DIY videos (oh my gosh, I'm actually putting stuff on my youtube! This is so exciting haha). So if you haven't subscribed to my youtube channel yet, you totally should. Lots of love, Bloglovin' | Facebook | Twitter |  Instagram | Chictopia | Lookbook | Tumblr

Twin Buns & Bionic Legs

Dress - c/o Sheinside (sold out) | Socks - c/o Oasap (sold out) | shoes - c/o Yeswalker (sold out) Needing opinions on these twin buns - yay or nay? I really need a cute, easy hairstyle that I am happy with while my hair is growing out, otherwise I'm going to just cut it short again (it's often too hard to stop myself when it's going through this awkward growth phase). I suppose this is also a "Halloween" kind of outfit, though I must try to remind myself to wear black lipstick more often, anyway! I think that black lipstick goes really well with red hair. What do you think? I thought I should do a more uplifting science piece today after my horrible Halloween facts, hehe. So don't worry - if you were scared by my last post, you don't need to skim through this one today. Last month, the first thought-controlled bionic leg was attached to Zac Vawter, after his left leg needed to be amputated following a motorbike accident. I've talked about mind control and bionic devices before in June, but what happened here was a real advance on that story. When Zac Vawter thinks "I want to move my leg", his brain, doing its normal thing, sends an electric signal from the motor cortex, down the spine, and to the peripheral nerves in his right knee, which are picked up by electrodes in the bionic leg. And he walks. The fake leg is so clever that Zac is even able to control certain parts of it. Say, if he wants to move his ankle, the "hamstring" mechanics on his fake leg contract, but not the rest of his leg. This allows his to walk basically seamlessly, which hasn't yet been possible in prosthetic limbs. Read more here. I hope that you're all having a gorgeous day so far, Bloglovin' | Facebook | Twitter |  Instagram | Chictopia | Lookbook | Tumblr

My new hairdo!

If you're a new or not-so-regular reader of this blog, you may not be aware that I had given up on my real hair and taken to wearing wigs all the time. Unfortunately, my real hair is not so super long and curly and luscious as this. In fact, my real-life-hair had become very brittle, thin and damaged due to a combination of medications and trying to maintain a near-white colour so that it could be bright pink and blue (and green and lilac) all through the first half of last year. It was getting to the point where if I wasn't wearing a wig, I'd feel really awful about my appearance all day. And that's no good. I haven't been to a hairdresser in such a loooong time, but yesterday I thought I'd finally go and get them to try and replicate, if at all possible, this particular hair cut from a magazine I picked up in Japan. (By the way, if you follow me on facebook, this hair cut is your doing because you all told me to go for it! And I thank you for that.) Trying to do the same pose as the girl in the magazine.. haha. I took myself along to Japanese hairdresser Allure Hair in Sydney and they did an awesome job! I love my new haircut, and even better, I finally like my real hair. I have noticed, however, that having shorter hair does require a slightly different way of dressing - so I'm going to start trying to wear my wigs less in outfit posts (after the few I've got already lined up), and attempt to suit my clothes more to a short hair style. So, another reason for this post is that I'm embarrassingly bad (for a fashion blogger) at hair styling, and I was actually hoping for some tips... my hair is super thin and just getting it to look this "full" required about half a can of hairspray, half-an-hour with a hairdryer and a whole lot of curling with a curling iron (edit: my fringe didn't need this, but the rest of my hair did) - which I want to avoid having to do every day or I'll be back at damaged hair again. Mousse doesn't give it enough lift either. And I wasn't really able to style it like it looks in the photo, which I would like to be able to do as well. If anyone has any tips for me on styling my hair like the photo, without too much heat damage, I'd be super happy to hear them :)

How to dye your hair pastel pink - Adventures in Bleaching and Hairdye #2

Although in the last couple of weeks I've gone lilac (and now blue again), I've been dying/maintaining a pastel pink colour in my hair for about 3 months. This post is a kind of sister post to this one I did a while back about dying your hair pastel blue. It seems to have helped a lot of people, so I want to do the same kind of thing but this time with pink! DISCLAIMER DISCLAIMER DISCLAIMER While I am not a hairdresser, and have never bleached anyone's hair but my own, I am well experienced in home hair dying and bleaching (I'm pretty sure I haven't seen my natural hair colour since I was 12 years old) and have had black, brown, pink, purple, red, very bright red, blue, green, bright blonde, orange hair. I never go to the hairdresser. That said, don't use this DIY as absolute gospel, and if you think if I've got things wrong or it sounds silly, you can ignore it or go to your hairdresser for advice instead. However, by all means use this as a guide to help or inspire you if you're trying to achieve pastel (particularly pink) hair. Okay, disclaimer over! I have to say, pastel pink hair is a lot of fun. You will definitely be noticed with a head full of pretty pink locks, and it's so much fun to brush, curl, straighten and style especially when you pretend it's cotton candy! Pink hair is awesome because you can wear all black for an interesting-yet-sophisticated look, look ridiculously sweet by pairing it with more pastel pink, or you can go all out and wear a bunch of different colours, because it basically goes with everything. How to dye your hair pastel pink Step 1: The bleaching. This is the step that probably claims the most victims. While bleaching, you need to be patient, and expect it to take upwards of a month to get your hair light enough to become pastel if you're starting off with darker hair. You also need to be very careful to not burn all your hair off. If you are scared of this happening, then go to your hairdresser. However, if you're stupid like me and still want to do it all yourself, then read on! My hair started off a dark brown (hair dyed), but naturally my hair is quite dark anyway. For this first step, I used a bleaching kit, Schwarzkopf Nordic Blonde "Ultimate Lightener L1++". This is some pretty serious bleach, designed to lift your hair colour from 6 - 8 shades. It also has a blonde toner in it, so your hair doesn't go as yellow as you would otherwise if you were just using developer and powder bleach. I highly recommend it, it did a fantastic job for the first bleach! Before bleaching, make sure you DON'T shampoo your hair for at least a day, and let it get nice and greasy, or your scalp is going to HURT a LOT. The chemicals in your greasy hair will protect the skin on your scalp :) Start bleaching on the ends of your hair, working your way up. DO NOT apply any to the roots until the last 10 - 15 minutes of the bleaching process (I did this, and look how blonde the roots still went!) The bleach will work on your roots really quickly because of the heat raditating from your scalp at this level. The bleach should not be on your hair for any longer than 45 minutes. Really. Your hair will melt off. Now, don't expect your hair to suddenly be ready to dye after the first bleach. If you have started off with very light hair, then you're probably alright to dye it now. However, this is the process my hair went through: You should NOT consider trying to dye your hair pink until your hair is at least as light as my hair in bleach no. 3 there. If you still have dark yellow bits, even if its just on the ends, your hair will not look good if you try to dye it. Between each bleach Do not bleach hair twice within a time frame of about 2 weeks (unless you want to ruin your hair). Between each bleach, you will need to do a lot of deep-conditioning treatments, which can be done by covering dry hair with conditioner, whacking it up in a shower cap, leaving it for a few hours then rinsing it out. Do this a few times between each bleach. If you bleach it in excess of five times and it's still not getting to the level of blonde that is needed, then here might unfortunately be a good place to give up :( you can, however, try to get rid of the yellow bits using a Silver toner (I used Schwarzkopf's LIVE Colour Silver Toner) and then see how it looks. If you can't get it light/yellow-less enough, then you can always go a darker colour, like a pretty midnight blue! Step 2: Dying your hair pink Okay! So your hair is now finally light enough to go pastel. If it's still a little bit yellow-toned, that's okay for pink. It would only not be okay if you were trying to go blue or lilac.  So which dye should you use? Don't buy an already-pastel  hair dye. These wash out far too quickly. Instead, buy a really vibrant colour and then dilute it with conditioner. This way, the colour will last a lot longer. For my hair, Directions Carnation Pink has been really good. I use a diluted Carnation Pink. This consists of a mix of 1 part Carnation Pink to every 6 parts conditioner. To dye, I wet my hair, towel dry it (so it is still damp), and spread the mixture through my hair, starting at the roots. I then throw my hair up into a shower cap, and leave it for about 6 hours (the dye doesn't hurt your hair, so you can leave it in as long as you want). Then rinse it out thoroughly (I've been told that if you do this part with cold water it'll last longer, but I refuse to suffer that much for my hair so doing it with warm water is okay too). Hooray! You should have pretty pastel hair! If it's a bit too bright at first for your liking, don't worry - it should fade to a nice pastel colour with a couple of shampoos. If it's too pastel for your liking, then you'll just have to dye it again - just use a little bit less conditioner this time. Step 3: Maintaining the pink You will have to dye your hair once every 3-4 weeks. If you don't want to do this, then don't go pastel pink. Tips which can help (which I totally ignore out of laziness/wanting to stay warm, but you should follow) are to wash your hair with cold water only, and also to put a tiny amount of your hair colour into your conditioner bottle. Also, it will obviously help if you don't shampoo your hair every time you have a shower - I have pretty naturally greasy hair so I use shampoo once every second day, and on the days I don't shampoo I use dry shampoo (you can probably just find this at your grocery store or chemist), which I spray on just before styling my hair - that stuff is magical. You will also have to re-bleach your roots often (I do this once every 2 months but I have very slow-growing hair, and am not that bothered by my roots showing, either). Once your hair is very light, you don't need to leave the bleach on for long. I usually put it straight onto my dark roots (not on the ends, which are already super light), put it in a hair cap, and leave for about 20 minutes before washing it out. I use powder bleach mixed with 30 vol developer for re-bleaching my roots. But times and the strength will vary depending on if you have dark or light roots (you may need a stronger developer if you have dark roots, and weaker if you have relatively lighter roots). I hope this helps somebody out there. If you have any questions, please comment below! Also, if you'd rather go a pastel blue, read this post here. xxx Annika Bloglovin' | Facebook | Twitter |  Instagram | Chictopia | Lookbook | Tumblr

Pastel Green Garden

 Okay. So with all my bragging about how easy it was to get pastel blue hair.... well HAHAHA on me: it's gone green. Still, I don't hate it, and it's gone quite a nice pastel green at least, not seaweed green or oscar the grouch green or baby-poo green. At the very least. Anyway, this week I'm going to try bleaching it again and then mixing Turquoise hairdye with Blue hairdye and see what happens.

I paired my green hair with an amazing pleated pastel skirt that I bought in Tokyo. Isn't it pretty? Also, I got this lovely bag vintage as well, for $5 in Salvos, just yesterday! And it fits my camera - no more ugly red (and practical) camera bag for me! Hooray!

 Wearing:

Blouse - Wholesale-dress.net

Skirt - Vintage

Belt - Vintage

Bag - Vintage

Hat - Wholesale-dress.net

Shoes - Forever 21

Tights - Forever 21

Necklace/Pocketwatch - Wholesale-dress.net

And a lovely collage of this outfit, of course:

All my love!

Annika xxx

How to Dye Your Hair Pastel Blue - DIY Adventures in Bleaching and Hairdye

(Click here to find the DIY for pastel PINK hair.)

Hello, everyone! I wanted to share with you all my DIY pastel hair experience. While I am not a hairdresser, and have never bleached anyone's hair but my own, I am well experienced in home hair dying and bleaching (I'm pretty sure I haven't seen my natural hair colour since I was 12 years old) and have had black, brown, purple, red, very bright red, bright blonde, orange (and a particularly intriguing combination of red, black and blonde when i was experimenting with terrible hair in my 15 year old scene kid days) hair. I never go to the hairdresser. I have never had pastel hair before, so I am also by no means an expert, or even really very experienced on this either. So don't use this DIY as absolute gospel, and you think if I've got things wrong or it sounds silly, you can ignore it or go to your hairdresser for advice instead, but by all means use this as a guide to help or inspire you if you're trying to achieve pastel (particularly blue or turquoise) hair.

OKAY, disclaimer over, this is how it's done.

Phase 1: The bleaching phase. This is the scary part. Bleach has to potential to melt and fry and burn off your lovely locks. If you're hesitant, get it done at the hairdressers. Or if you're silly like me, do it at home! But do it carefully. You need to do this right so that you don't kill your hair, and if you have hair that is any darker than medium blonde, expect it to take a few weeks and at least 2 bleaches. Hide yourself away from everyone you know, like I did, by conducting the first phase of bleaching on holidays, where I wasn't going to see anyone important (or anyone who would laugh at me) for a week.

Hello, canary yellow!

For this first step, I used a bleaching kit, Schwarzkopf Nordic Blonde "Ultimate Lightener L1++".

This is some pretty serious bleach, designed to lift your hair colour from 6 - 8 shades. It also has a blonde toner in it, so you don't go as yellow as you would otherwise if you were just using developer and powder bleach. I highly recommend it, it did a fantastic job! I went way blonder than I had expected, as I was starting on a pretty dark dyed brown. Before bleaching, make sure you DON'T shampoo your hair for at least a day, and let it get nice and greasy, or your scalp is going to HURT a LOT. The chemicals in your greasy hair will protect the skin on your scalp :)

START BLEACHING on the ends of your hair, working your way up. DO NOT apply any to the roots until the last 10 - 15 minutes of the bleaching process (I did this, and look how blonde the roots still went!) The bleach will work on your roots really quickly because of the heat raditating from your scalp at this level. The bleach should not be on your hair for any longer than 45 minutes. Really. Your hair will melt off.

Wait a week or two, and bleach again!

**NOT BLONDE ENOUGH**

(If you still have dark yellow bits, or it looks like this, you'll need to wait a week or two, then bleach AGAIN. You probably won't get a nice pastel blue if you dye over this.)

**BLONDE ENOUGH, BUT COULD GO EVEN BLONDER**

You need to wait for at least a week before redoing the whole bleaching process. In this time, you need to be looking after your hair (no straightening or blowdrying) and doing some serious deep conditioning treatments. You can deep condition your hair using regular conditioner, by applying it to dry and hair and whacking it up in a shower cap for 20 or so minutes, then washing it out. Do this a few times between bleaches. And don't bleach again until your hair feels soft and healthy.

For the second bleach I used Schwarzkopf Nordic Blonde "Extreme Lightener L1+".

I figured that I didn't want to go a whole another 8 shades lighter (and less damage to my hair, hopefully), so this bleach kit, while still extremely strong, is only designed to lighten your hair 5 - 7 shades. It's also got a blonde toner, so you avoid the yellowness just a little (but be warned, it WILL still go yellow).

Same again for the bleaching process: start at the ends and work up, leave it for 30 minutes, THEN apply the rest to your roots, leave it on for ten more minutes, and then wash off.

 Use a silver/blue toner to get rid of the yellowness. I used Schwarzkopf's LIVE Colour Silver Toner. I did this so that my hair would be less yellow when I put the blue in, because blue + yellow = green, and I didn't want entirely green hair.

When can you do this? Immediately after bleaching! Or you can wait however long you would like. This step will not hurt your hair.

Now.. to go turquoise...?

or pastel blue?

After bleaching, you can then begin dying immediately!

Final product #1 - PASTEL TURQUOISE - To achieve this turquoise pastel colour, I used 1/4 Manic Panic Atomic Turqouise with 3/4 conditioner (I think I ended up using 150ml of Conditioner mixed with 50ml of Hairdye) and then left it on my hair for 6 hours in a shower cap after making sure it was throughly worked through. Manic Panic dye will not hurt your hair, and with all the conditioner you're probably doing more good than bad to your hair in this step. You can leave it on as long as you like. Leave it on for AT LEAST an hour if you're in a rush, but if you only leave it for this long, it won't end up as vibrant.

**UPDATE** So, Manic Panic's Atomic Turquoise will eventually (like, after 2 washes) go more like pastel green. At least it did on my hair. If you don't want this, try a less greeny-blue colour, like Directions Atlantic Blue or Lagoon Blue.

Final Product #2 - PASTEL BLUE - To achieve this blue pastel colour, I used 2% (a small spoonful) Manic Panic's Atomic Turquoise mixed with 8% La Riche Directions Atlantic Blue, and 90% conditioner. I can't even comprehend how ridiculously vibrantly blue your hair would be if you used Atlantic blue undiluted, because my hair ended up pretty vibrant, even though the mixture I used was so diluted! Make sure you make at least 200mls of mixture, perhaps more if you have long/thick hair. Work the colour throughly through your hair, and put in a shower cap. Leave it on for a few hours, at least 2 or 3, or for up to 6 like I did. Then rinse and enjoy!

More on maintaining your pastel colour to come...

And to see my new pastel pink hair colour, check out my more recent blog posts. I will try and post a DIY on obtaining pastel pink hair real soon, but it does basically follow these steps, concluding with using a pink rather than a blue dye (obviously).

I hope this post has helped someone out there :)

Have a super lovely day, everyone!

Annika xxxx

Black Dress, Blue 'Do

The final product of my adventures into the world of home bleaching and hair dye - pastel turquoise!

Also, another outfit for you to view. I completely didn't know what colour to match with the new turquoise hair today, so I stuck to a very neutral palette; the only colour I could think to match with blue was blue (so very inventive) so I stole my brother's blue socks. Now I'm going to have to do some experimenting with what clothes go with blue hair. I think all reds, yellows and oranges can be ruled out. Although perhaps I'll find a way to clash those colours which will still be pleasing on the eye. I think it'll force me to combine items in my wardrobe in a way I never have before, at the very least.

What do you think of the turquoise hairdo, anyway?

I'm sorry that I only ever wear these shoes now. Once I get hooked on a pair of shoes, I wear them every day until they're ruined and broken. The heel has already begun to wear off (grrrrr), but I have worn them a LOT, so they are lasting quite a while for cheap shoes.

Wearing:

Dress - wholesale-dress.net
Lace Blouse - wholesale-dress.net
Bag - oasap.com
Belt - vintage
Shoes - yesstyle.com
Socks - stole them from my brother, I think they're about a billion years old
Pocketwatch/necklace - wholesale-dress.net
Velvet Bowtie - DIY

Keep an eye out for my next post all about bleaching and home hairdying adventures.

Much Love,

Annika xxx

Baking Soda

I'm blonde today! But I'll only be blonde for this post, because this gorgeous canary yellow is NOT going to be the final product of hair dying. It may look good on some people (in rare instances), but for me, canary yellow is not the way to go. I had enough of experimenting with bad yellow hair when I was 15. No, you'll all see the final product of this home bleaching and dying tomorrow ;) Today though, I'm wearing an incredible vintage dress that I got in Tokyo (the label is "Baking Soda" - it's just too cute!), and an amazing new 60s style leather bag c/o oasap.com! Wearing: Dress - "Baking Soda" - Vintage store in Tokyo Bag - OASAP Necklace/Pocketwatch - wholesale-dress Belt - Vintage Tights - wholesale-dress Shoes - wholesale-dress Hat - markets in Osaka Have an amazing day all! Annika xxx