Thought I might post some things I've learned (many through experience, even) that are good 'natural' things to use on one's hair, most of which are pretty easy.

I did include one unnatural product that is very gentle for what it does.


Need to clarify? (or add softness/shine) These can also make your scalp 'happier', although I notice more effects on my hair.

- Vinegar rinse (apple cider if you have darker hair (can give slight red highlights), white if you have lighter hair). Anywhere from a teaspoon to a quart up to about 1/4 of a cup. Start with less! Rinse or don't rinse. (If you use a high concentration of vinegar, I'd suggest rinsing.)

- Citric acid rinse! Especially if your hair is like mine and dislikes vinegar. Dissolve 1/2 teaspoon to 2 teaspoons citric acid in at least a quart of water, use as a rinse. Even if you have dry hair, this words well. If your hair feels hairsprayed (btw, a bit of citric acid in water makes a pretty good hairspray!) you either need to rinse afterwards or use less citric acid in the rinse.

- Lemon juice rinse. Similar to the citric acid rinse, but can be drying and I wouldn't recommend doing this one on a regular basis. Citric acid works much better/safer for the hair.

How about getting your scalp clean?

- If you want to get your scalp nice 'n clean: Mix brown sugar (MUST be brown, not white!) with conditioner, apply to scalp, gently rub, rinse out--the more conditioner the better, as it makes it easier to rinse).

- Coconut oil applied to scalp (20 minutes or so), then washed out. Oil dissolves oil.

Shampoo/Conditioner additives:

- Aloe Vera! You can mix this 1:1 with both your shampoo and conditioner to make them more moisturising (also makes your hair shinier!)

- Oil (but be very very careful with this one, we're talking a couple of *small* drops).

- Honey. Mix with conditioner, or mix with aloe vera and conditioner. If you want to do this, read the 'caution' at the end.

- Tea Tree Oil, helps with itching, acne, and most scalp troubles. Couple drops in your shampoo.

Colour enhancing:

- Chamomile: As a rinse (have to keep doing it, both several rinses to get it started, then often after) can give blonde highlights to light brown/dark blonde hair. If your hair is closer to a true blonde/light blonde, this may actually *darken* your hair, so be careful. I know this as chamomile does nothing to the bulk of my hair (dark blonde) and darkens the lighter bits (whitish-light ash blonde. This did not do anything permanent to my hair. I don't know if adding sunlight would actually lighten, as I can't test it.

- For darkening, I believe a sage rinse is good, although haven't actually tried it.

- If for some reason you want lemon yellow hair, try Turmeric. Not natural looking, and if you have dark hair it'll only show up under sunlight! I did a test of this on dyed black hair.

- Lemon juice: Don't do it unless you have short hair and plan to keep short hair. Even then, it is very very drying. Seriously, just dye it or do a slight bleaching--much gentler.

- Honey. This can lighten hair. It is not 'instant', and any lightening can cause damage. If you want to try it and have med-dark blonde hair or brown hair: 1 part honey to 2-3 parts conditioner. Do NOT microwave this mix. Apply to damp hair if possible. Leave on 1-4 hours (cover with plastic bag/cap). Rinse really really well. Remember: Not instantaneous...you'll need to do this several times. I do not know what this will do on lighter blonde hair. From my experience, I'd say it might give a slightly more golden tone--but nothing compared to the chamomile.

Lightening/fading DYE (only darker dye):

- If the dye is very very fresh, slap a ton of extra virgin olive oil on your head and let it sit for 4+ hours (6+ or overnight even better), wash out, repeat. The fresher the dye, the more this will 'do'. And it's a treatment, too!

- Try the honey/conditioner from the previous section if EVOO doesn't do anything, remembering to NOT microwave the mix. This may also work a little on henna...or it may not. It is gradual and you may have to do this multiple times to notice a difference. This is actually fading my 2.5 year old dye on the ends of my hair. It's gradual and takes a while, but probably gentler than bleach (although, again, not instantaneous in that you'll have to repeat).

- NOT at all natural, but Colorfix will take out a lot of dye with very little damage (do not use the third bottle). If the dye you used was a direct dye (henna or, for example, Feria black...) it won't take it all out, but will 'help' with a few applications (I got to red with 3 applications of colorfix on old dyed black--I got about a level and a half lighter with 3 one-hour applications of bleach (stops lightening after 3)). Colorfix does stink though, and I mean really stinks (and I've only used it on *small* samples).

Dry/colour-treated ends/hair (mostly apply to longer hair):

- Oil the ends (EVOO (but it's heavy), jojoba, coconut, grapeseed (or rapeseed, depending on country), emu, sweet almond. If you have trouble with this (crunchy hair), try putting on damp hair if you tried dry (or dry if you tried damp), or maybe using a mister with a few drops of oil. If your hair still doesn't like it, don't worry, some people's hair dislikes all oils. And, even if your hair dislikes it as a leave it, you can soak your hair with it, let it sit for about 20 minutes pre-washing, then wash/condition!

- Mister solutions! Add a bit of aloe vera or conditioner to water, mist. Can also add various EOs.

- Mixing honey, aloe vera and conditioner (no-cone conditioner, Suave and VO5 are good to use for this) and leaving it on for 20 min to an hour. Microwave if you are concerned about lightening/fading, or use molasses instead of honey (only if you have darker hair, though!).

- This one is JUST for below shoulder length hair: Put conditioner on your ends FIRST, then wash just your scalp with your shampoo, rinse both out, reapply conditioner to the ends as usual. The first round of conditioner is there to prevent the ends from being overly cleaned/dried out/striped by the shampoo.

Cautions!!

- Be careful of allergies. Some people are allergic to coconut oil, aloe vera, etc. If you are allergic to something or react, don't use it! If you're prone to allergies, you might try a kind of patch test (particularly with herbs) to see how you react.

- Oils can fade dye! So, if you don't want your dye to fade a bit, you might want to avoid using oils....

- Tea Tree Oil is an essential oil. You don't need much of these! You can also use it on facial acne, but AVOID your eye area and lips. If you get a little too close to your lips, you can see how powerful EOs are (you'll taste it on the INSIDE of your mouth).

- Honey can be very very moisturising. It can also lighten hair/fade dye. Good news: Microwaving kills the lightening effects, so if you want the moisture but not the lightening, just zap it a few seconds. Not too long, though, as honey gets VERY hot. :)

And, I guess:

- Best 'natural' (as in detergent free) shampoo/conditioners I've used: Burt's Bees. They work in our very hard water without leaving a residue like many 'natural' shampoos.

Wow, that ended up a lot longer than intended.  Sorry about that!