Last week I talked about my summer project of replacing toxic cosmetic products in my home. I thought I’d give you an occasional update and review some of the products or ideas that we have been trying.

I know you are all dying to know how the baking soda hair wash went. I washed my hair using this method a week ago and kept track of my thoughts for you. My concerns were as follows:

1) Sticks
2) Ants
3) Brillo

To translate – I was concerned that my hair would be snarly and dry, that my scalp would itch and that my hair would look like #3. I have VERY strait hair, but it can also be pretty course.

I was surprised on all three counts. First of all, it was a pleasant sensation to scrub with the baking soda and water paste. When I rinsed with the vinegar (I just used regular old white vinegar) it was a bubbly party on my scalp. It felt so…gentle. I was expecting to feel more like I was scouring with Comet (it makes your mouth turn green…). When I got out of the shower the made-for-wet-hair brush literally slid through my hair. Once it dried, my hair looked like this:

I felt that the vinegar brought out lots of the reds in my hair.

Styling was simple and I used no products at all. My hair was very cooperative. And mostly it felt very, very clean. This was not a clean feeling I’ve had with my hair and scalp before. It was generally quite nice. My style (five minutes spent with a curling iron or strait iron, depending on my mood) held up great. My hair felt soft, but in a different way. It also felt much lighter. I was at two different functions the next day and two close friends of mine complimented my hair – I asked them to feel it and they were both shocked and all “NO WAY” when I told them I had crunchified it.

I thought I would have static or frizz issues, but that never happened either. I will say, however, that I live in Kansas and it’s super-windy here, so snarls can be a problem. I did find that my hair tangled easier and more often, so I was taking a brush to it more frequently.

This is certainly something I will be doing again. At this point I don’t think I will do it every time I wash my hair because I am trying out other products for the kids to use as well, but washing with baking soda and rinsing with vinegar is going to become a regular part of my routine. Did anybody else try this? What were your results? If you haven’t, do you think you might?

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