Henna and the gospel

So on Saturday I dyed my hair red with henna....well I didn't do it, my amazing friend Chelsea Barrick did it.  Y'all she is amazing and the sweetest person.  I love her so much. 

I researched how to dye your hair red with henna on YouTube and watched videos and Saturday at about 1pm I mixed my henna to let it sit for about 5-6 hours before it would be used to dye my hair. 

This is what I started off with.  I took pure henna powder and put it in a bowl and then warmed up water to make rasberry zinger tea.  I mixed lemon juice and tea into the henna powder.

This is what it looked like at first. 

Then I added plastic wrap haha

Then I put the lid on just to make sure air wouldn't get in it haha

This is what it looked like after it had sat for a long time haha

This was after Chelsea put the henna in my hair and then wrapped my head with plastic wrap haha

I realized I didn't do my eyebrows so I did those...I looked like a crazy lady haha

 This is after I put a towel over my head haha.  It's supposed to help keep the heat in your head and activate the henna haha. 

Y'all here's what I've learned about Henna.  Henna is a plant.  It is natural and is not a chemical like you find in the box dyes.  That being said there are pros and cons to it.  One of them being you can't  necessarily predict the color (not like when you use the box dye).  The color you see on a box of dye is the color you are going to get (I guess, I've never used box dye haha).  The color you see on a box of henna though is not necessarily the color you are going to get.  Although you can try to be creative and change the recipe to try to get the results you want.  That part is fun to me.  I used pure henna powder and mixed it with Rasberry zinger tea and lemon juice.  I think if you want more of a brown color you can use things like Cocoa powder and coffee or black tea instead of water.  Or if you want more of a purple color you can use beet juice or something like that instead of water.  I wanted red so I didn't want to do this.  Henna color also depends on the color of your hair originally.  The lighter your hair is the more change you will see and the more it will be red.  If you have black hair or really dark brown hair the color of your hair won't turn out the same as that of somebody with light brown or dark blonde hair.  

The color of your hair the first couple of days is referred to as "orange panic" because when you first dye your hair with henna it is more orange and takes about 2-4 days to get to the color it is going to be.  

 This is what my hair looked like after I rinsed out the henna, dried it and took a picture of it in the sun haha.  Here's a picture of what my hair looked like before I dyed it haha.  This picture was taken in Hawaii though but it's still the same color haha. 

Once you dye your hair with henna it changes the structure of your hair completely.  Henna coats the top of your hair (that's why you should wash your hair with shampoo before you dye it and shouldn't use conditioner, because conditioner coats the top of your hair) and goes deep into your roots changing the structure of the color of your hair (not completely of course) but when your roots grow out they are supposed to be faded and not be as drastic of a change or difference as when you use boxed dye.  When we let Christ come into our lives He comes in and transforms us from the inside out.  He changes the structure of our life leaving us not the same.  He changes us completely (although the change He gives us is completely permanent, not like Henna).  Unlike Henna it doesn't take 2-4 days either haha.  Once Christ comes into our life He changes us right away.  Though we may struggle with dying to self and making decisions that please God more than please self, once we have become transformed by the blood of Jesus we have become a new person.  Daily we will have to pick up our cross and follow Christ, but the good news is that Christ has and is transforming our desires! We no longer want to live like the world, but we want to become more and more like Jesus.  We want to live more and more like Him.  I hope I haven't over-spiritualized this now but maybe this isn't about henna anymore.  Maybe it never was.  Sure now I have cute now, maybe not exactly how I imagined it haha, but the hair I wanted.  Maybe this was always to remind me and to remind you of the transforming power of Christ and how once He changes us we will never be and are never to be the same.  Let's run this race together and together let's press towards the prize.  Don't lose focus and don't set your focus off your goal which is Christ.  Let's always make sure to do what He has called us to do which is to glorify Him, to love God and to love others and to point them to Christ! Love y'all!!

This is what I look like now a few days after I dyed my hair with Henna.  It's not as red as I thought it would be but it's a cute auburn color.  And who knows I might dye it again so I can try to make it a little more red.  But for now I really like it....I might even love it XD

Mahalo Chelsea Barrick for helping me dye my hair.  Love you so much and am thankful for you and how God uses you!!!