Sweet Simple Living

My Ultimate List of Natural Health & Beauty Products


Hey y’all! As many of my readers know, this blog started out as a space to share a lot of my natural DIY health and beauty products! I’ve tried making just about EVERYTHING! I’ve shared my successes on the blog and I still actually do make some of my own products, but being a new busy mom, I usually just opt to BUY quality healthy non toxic health and beauty products now rather than to make my own because my time is more precious and I just ain’t got time for that! This post will be a guide to all my favorite products that I use myself and are tried and true and SAFE! If you’re not the DIY type or just don’t have time for that, check out these awesome products I love! I’m sure there are TONS of quality brands out there, but these are just the ones I personally use and love and can recommend! Note- The Amazon links are affiliate links that earn me a small commission if you make a purchase through them! None of the other product/website links are affiliate, I just really like em. 😉

 

Makeup-

I’ve dabbled in homemade makeup with some success but it really is so much easier to just buy it! I do still make my own face powder because it literally takes me one minute and I don’t really need/want a ton of coverage so the homemade stuff works perfect for me. I also really don’t wear much makeup- light powder, blush, eyeliner, and mascara are usually all I wear. There are two brands I use and highly recommend- One is a small shop run by my friend Alexis and her family called LuLu Beans Naturals. They physically make the products themselves in small batches and use simple all natural ingredients. They have great face powders, bronzers, blush, eyeshadows, lotions, toners, scrubs, soap, and lip balm! I am also a huge fan of 100% Pure makeup. Their products are pretty expensive but everything I’ve gotten from them has lasted me a LONGGG time since I don’t wear much, so it’s worth it to me to get their makeup. A few makeup staples I love from them are their mascara (I got this one that smells like blackberries!) and their cream blush is amazing! As for eyeliner, I usually go for this simple organic charcoal eyeliner pencil I found on Amazon!

 

Toothpaste

I’ve tried a couple natural toothpastes that I like. My favorite is Himalaya Whitening Toothpaste! It tastes, looks, and feels like “regular” toothpaste but with much safer ingredients and doesn’t contain carrageenan, fluoride, sodium lauryl sulfate, or harsh abrasives. It whitens using fruit enzymes! Another excellent option is Earthpaste! This stuff is even simpler but it does take some getting used to because it doesn’t foam up like normal toothpaste. The only ingredients are water, redmond clay, real salt, essential oils, and xylitol! Its very similar to my homemade toothpaste with the obvious convenience of being in a tube rather than a messy jar. 🙂

Deodorant

Natural deodorants are weird. And tricky. I’ve had a heck of a time finding deodorants I like. I actually have a theory about natural deodorants.. This might sound weird, but hear me out- In a natural living group I’m in on Facebook, there was a thread about natural deodorants. Reading what everyone used I saw a few people mention similar things- that they LOVED using such-and-such for a couple months and then it stopped working. Hmm. I saw several people mention this and I’ve had the exact same experience with both of my homemade natural deodorants- this spray, and this cream. They both worked wonderfully for a few months and gradually became less affective. So my theory is that maybe we just need to switch it up every few months to keep our body guessing!? I don’t know, it sounds weird but it’s my only conclusion. But with that being said, I do have a store bought deodorant that has been really effective for me, and that’s Schmidt’s deodorant, I love the bergamot lime scent! (it comes in a stick or in a jar- the jar worked way better than the stick for me for some reason so I recommend the jar only.) I’ve tried tons of natural deodorants on the market and this one is my favorite- it works and smells great..like a popsicle! But I also am a fan of my homemade deodorant options too for switching it up!

Shampoo/Conditioner

I’ve written a lot about my journey with “no-poo” but sadly I am no longer doing this! I did no-poo for over 2 years but recently stopped- I’ll explain more below. Right now I’m using actual shampoo but I would consider it “low-poo” because it is nothing like most stuff you buy at the store. The shampoo I use is from 100% Pure and every ingredient is plant based! I read the ingredients list and was familiar with every single ingredient except a couple which I researched thoroughly before deciding to use it. (They we’re plant based too.) This stuff is also a little expensive but I still only wash my hair once a week so it lasts forever. I stopped doing no-poo about a month after Gabe was born. Gabe is nearly 8 months old and I’m still on the SAME BOTTLE I originally bought to try. It has about an inch left at the bottom, so it looks like one bottle will last me 7-8 months. The soap nut wash routine I was doing just didn’t jive with my postpartum hormones or something… It wasn’t cutting it anymore. My hair was just icky with a soap nut wash ever since I gave birth (I’ve heard from lots of other women that they had a similar experience after giving birth and trying to stick with no-poo) so I knew it was time for me to switch to a low-poo product and I’ve been extremely happy with it! I also use the conditioner that goes along with that shampoo but I haven’t noticed a difference with it honestly. I just used the shampoo for a few months and then bought the conditioner thinking it might make my hair even better but my hair feels the same. I probably won’t buy the conditioner again cause it doesn’t make enough of a difference for me.

Essential Oils

People always ask me where I buy my essential oils! I’ve been using Eden’s Garden oils for a few years now and I love them. I truly believe there isn’t one brand that’s the only good one, I think there are lots of brands with great oils! I chose Eden’s Garden mostly because they’re a Christian company, and they sell directly to the consumer so there’s no middle man. This makes the oils so much more affordable than most competitors who sell through distributors. The quality is amazing – they’re 100% pure therapeutic grade oils, just like other brands, and they’re really transparent about all the third party testing and quality standards that they have so I’m really confident in what I’m buying. They also have an adorable kid-safe line of oil blends for various ailments that I love. I just bought a bunch of the pre-diluted roller blends so I can be sure it’s safe enough to start using with Gabe. So far I’ve gotten sleepy head, shoo fly, calm ’em down, sniffles and sneezes, healthy hero, head-a-sore-us, and tummy aid. I keep them all in a little zippy pouch that I throw in the diaper bag and have with me all the time. 🙂

That’s about it! I’m pretty minimal with products I use in general so that’s really it. I don’t use face wash, I use coconut oil for a lot of things, and still make some of my own creams and such. I don’t use any baby products with Gabe at this time. No baby wash or baby shampoo. Just water 95% of the time! I think I’ve used soap on him a total of 3-4 times since he was born.. (Crazy right?!) and when I do I just use diluted foamed castile soap (we like Dr. Bronners) that we use for washing our hands. I wash his hair with water only and it works great! I wish my hair was as easy as his. He has some crazy untamable hair but its beautiful and so soft and barely/rarely gets dirty! If I switch over to using any baby products with him I’ll definitely update with my recommendations but I don’t think babies really need all that stuff. 🙂

What are your favorite natural products?! Let me know in the comments!

5 Things That Happened When I Quit Shampoo

5 Things That Happened When I Quit Shampoo

Two of the most asked questions when people find out I don’t use shampoo is “why?” and “what’s happened since you started?” To find out the answer to “why” check out my first article on no-poo here! I did quite a bit of research prior to writing that article and its very informative about our hair and scalp needs, the types of chemicals and toxins that are found in commercial shampoos, the history of shampoo and why we, as a culture, started shampooing on a daily basis. This post is to answer question number two and give you a bit of insight into my life and my hair, and what has changed in the 7 months since I started. These are 5 things that happened when I quit shampoo!

1- My Hair (and Self) Got Healthier– Obviously, eliminating chemicals and toxins from your life is going to make you healthier! All you have to do is take a look at how my hair has changed to see a very visible difference in hair health! Before I quit shampoo I would need to shampoo everyday or every other day. My hair was course, damaged, frizzy, dry, just bad. I needed to wash my hair at night and sleep on it to help reduce my frizz. I would never dream of washing my hair in the morning unless I was going to be staying at home all day. My hair was especially damaged and bad on the underneath section. I had multiple little sections of underneath hair that would just break off constantly and were shorter than the rest of my hair. They were hidden by my top layers of hair that weren’t as bad, but it was really frustrating for me. I’m so thrilled with how soft the underside of my hair is now. I can actually wear my hair half-up and the underside is pretty! Its still a little damaged, but the short broken parts have grown out quite a bit and my hair doesn’t break off as easily and often as it did. I’m constantly trimming my ends to get rid of the damage while keeping my hair long. I’m thrilled with how my hair is coming and can’t wait to see how it gets even healthier as it grows out.

Okay- Backstory before I show you this photo: This day (in the before photo) I remember specifically because my hair was SO BAD. Why I wanted to have my photo taken is beyond me, but hey its still a cute shot of me and my mom. Haha, so remember how I said I always washed my hair at night so I could sleep on it and flatten some of the frizz down? This day I couldn’t do that. We were traveling at night and got to my aunt’s house late and had a family party the next morning so I didn’t get a shower till the morning before the party. I remember applying a bunch of crap to get my hair to behave but it just wouldn’t. I forgot to bring conditioner too, which made it even worse. In case you didn’t know, conditioner actually coats your hair with silicone (plastic!) to make it appear healthier and shinier and to hide the damage caused when the shampoo actually strips your hair down. So this is a photo of that…
The after picture is after being off shampoo and products for 7 months, and it was taken right after my wash day. No products or anything are applied in the bottom photo (or the above photo!). INSANE difference right?!?! I can’t even remember having my hair be that dry and frizzy, but it used to be my reality everyday. My hair still is far from perfect and clearly needs another trim (don’t judge), but it is worlds away from what it was before. After I had Ryan take the “hair photo” of me for this post (the photo at the top with the title of the post on it) I was just staring at my hair in the photo… I couldn’t believe my hair looked that good with absolutely nothing on it! It makes me so excited. 🙂

5 Things That Happened When I Quit Shampoo

2- My Hair Began Growing Faster– This goes along with the above point. About a month or two after I quit shampoo I started seeing little baby hairs pop up everywhere making my hair a little frizzy looking, but its always a great sign to see baby hairs growing! We naturally shed hair a lot and hairs get pulled, so when they start growing right back in that’s what’s supposed to happen. If I wasn’t constantly trimming my hair to get rid of the damaged parts I think my hair would actually be getting longer. I’ve always had long hair ranging from shoulder to chest length, but it would never really get any longer than chest length. It would grow to that length and just stay there. It’s exciting to see my hair growing out a little longer! I can tell that the top 4-5 inches of hair at my roots is totally natural virgin hair and has never touched any chemicals or products. It is shiner and much softer and my hair gets a little more damaged as it goes down from years of products and heat styling. Eventually when I get all the “old” hair grown out I hope to grow mine even longer. I love long hair, and Ryan especially loves long hair so I have all the more reason to grow it out. 🙂

 

3- My Hair Doesn’t Need Products– I used to need to use hair products to get my hair to do what I wanted it to do…Not anymore! My hair is much more likely to comply now. I don’t need anti frizz creams or serums. Right after a wash my hair will sometimes look slightly frizzy, but it doesn’t last. The natural oil from my scalp is the best anti frizz serum (and heat protectant) available and its free. When my ends are feeling a little dry I’ll put some coconut oil on them and they become soft and shiny like the top half of my hair, but that’s it. Its the best! And a major money saver too. Shampoo, conditioner, and hair products are quite expensive.


4- Extra time! This is one of my favorite perks of quitting shampoo. I only wash my hair once a week now, so shower time is so much faster. Washing and conditioning my hair took some time (I have a lot of hair) and styling it every day took forever. Throwing it up in a bun or ponytail didn’t take any time, but if I wanted my hair to look presentable at all I would have to straighten or curl it every day. If I wore it natural, I usually needed some type of product in it and lots of playing with it. Nowadays I curl my hair about once a week, which is so much better for my hair. I usually brush out the curl so its a smooth slightly curly wave and it stays all week, so it saves me a ton of time in the mornings. All I need to do is brush my hair and style it however I want and it looks great. I throw it up in a bun for daily showers so it doesn’t get wet and it works great for me.

5- Smell sensitivity– One weird side effect I’ve gotten since I’ve stopped using shampoo, conditioner, face wash, etc. is that I can’t stand anything with artificial fragrances now. I know that sounds really snobby, but I promise its not that! I used to LOVE the smell of certain fragrances like cologne, some perfumes, and fabric softener!! I loved smelling fabric softener. Cologne too. (Actually, a very select few colognes I still enjoy in extreme moderation. A little really goes a long way for my nose. The other day Ryan wore cologne that I used to love. As soon as he sprayed it I looked at him and wrinkled my nose up at him. Haha, I enjoy it a lot more if its been worn off for a few hours.) Gradually getting away from the artificial fragrances has made me strangely sensitive to it. If a customer comes in at work wearing any type of fragrance I’m immediately aware of it. If I have to be around someone wearing perfume for any period of time it will actually start to give me a headache. I can’t stand it. My nose seems to know anytime there are fake chemical smells in the air and it does not like it. Recently I purchased a new shirt on Poshmark. When I got it in the mail a terrible terrible smell emerged as soon as I opened the box and I realized she sprayed it with some type of perfume before mailing it.. I’m sure some other women would love the scent but I thought it was just awful. About an hour of sitting next to the package, I had a headache. I moved the shirt to the dirty laundry pile and the headache remained. I kept smelling it still! Then I realized the card that she added to the box was still sitting at my desk. Once I threw away the card I finally stopped smelling the perfume. Ugh! Natural scents I do really enjoy still, like fresh cut grass…campfires…flowers…essential oils…FOOD! Haha but I can’t stand almost all fake chemical fragrances. I suppose that’s a good thing though!

Do you have any other questions about no-poo? Let me know in the comments or check out some of my other No-Poo posts HERE!

10 Natural Hair Washes

10 Natural Hair Washes
So, I FINALLY wrote this post! I had so many people asking me what I use to wash my hair, what I recommend, etc. and I kept promising a post on this but procrastinated long enough. The truth is, I was busy trying different things since I kept running into different issues. The first issue I had was obviously the transition phase, where my hair was terrible no matter what I tried, then when that eased down I realized the issues I was still having were due to my hard water. So I started using distilled water, which may have been TOO soft for my hair type I later found out. It was still better than using my hard water, but using distilled water still made my hair feel a little weird which I’ll explain below. Finally, after being 7 months no-poo I found my wash! The one perfect thing that I had been searching for that would make my hair feel perfectly clean and shiny and soft, and the best part? I can use it with my hard water! Now that I feel like I’ve got a bit of a handle on this whole “no-poo” thing, I feel confident to tell you about some of the wash methods. These are arguably the most popular options that people use, although there are others. I’ll explain how to use each method, and my personal thoughts on it.

Please keep in mind that what works for me may not work for you. We all have different hair types, hair needs and different water that will all play a part in finding your favorite wash method! If it helps, I have long, thick, hair that tends to be dry/damaged on the bottom half (likely from a lifetime of using terrible hair products and heat styling) and smoother and more moisturized on the top half (that has grown out since stopping shampoo) that starts to get oily about 5-7 days after a wash. I wash my hair once a week and I have hard water.

Disclosure, this post contains affiliate links that may earn me a small commission if you purchase through them. They don’t cost you any extra, and I always only share items I use and love myself.

Alkaline Washes That Require an Acid Rinse:

Baking Soda
The most common (and controversial) method for no-poo-ers is diluted baking soda. Its controversial because many people say that it is far too damaging and causes breakage if used long term. Other people will tell you that its perfectly safe for certain hair types and that if you use it properly diluted with an acid rinse that its fine. I’ve read blogs of women who have used this for years and swore by it only to end up with their hair breaking off years later. Yikes! So I’ve personally decided its not worth the risk for me. My Experience: I tried this once or twice when I first started no poo and it didn’t really do anything for me. I was in transition though, so my experience with it isn’t really valid at all! Hair Types: It is recommended only for those with very oily hair, and not suitable for those with dry or damaged hair. How To: If you have the appropriate hair type and want to give it a try, dilute a tablespoon or less of baking soda into a cup of water, and wash your hair with it. Follow with any acid rinse (see below) to restore the pH of your scalp.

Clay
Clay is one method I used for a long time and liked for awhile. I’ve used bentonite clay as well as rhassoul clay, and sometimes I mixed the two. I used this post from Mommypotomus to learn how to wash my hair with clay and I encourage you to read it before washing with clay. Its really helpful and has lots of pictures. 🙂 Hair Types: You can use clay with any hair type, but keep in mind that it can be drying, so if you have dry hair, try to just use the clay on your roots where the oil is. How To: Dilute it with water, (I just poured the clay into a water bottle and shook it up really good to get rid of any clumps) and wash your hair with it, followed by an acid rinse. My Experience: I generally had a good experience with clay and used it for awhile, but it was a little difficult with my water issues. Here’s the story: With hard water, my hair would be really waxy afterward, but otherwise it was clean and didn’t feel oily. With distilled water, it looked clean and did not leave any wax at all on my hair, but my hair would get really stringy. Its hard to explain, but it was just a little odd. My hair would look gorgeous after brushing it, but within minutes it would look stringy again. Really weird! I think this was due to the water I was using being a bit TOO soft and over-moisturizing. I definitely had annoying water struggles!! But I don’t attribute any of my issues to using the clay.

Castile Soap
I love castile soap! I use Dr. Bronner’s lavender. It has so many uses around the house, and can even be used as shampoo. Keep in mind that using castile soap as shampoo is not recommended with hard water, but could be a good option if you have regular or soft water. Hair Types: As with the other alkaline washes, its best suited for hair that isn’t too dry or damaged, but anyone could potentially use it. I try to just wash my roots/top portion of hair anyway, so it would be fine for that. How To: Take a tablespoon, or just guesstimate, squirt it into a water bottle with at least a cup of water in it, put the cap on and shake it up. (Do NOT use it undiluted!) and wash hair and follow with an acid rinse.
My Experience: It definitely works! I used it with distilled water and I had the weird stringy hair issue as I did with the clay, in which I blame the softness of the water. (My hair is really picky with water apparently!) *Note: Some people might actually consider this option “low poo” because it is soap and it lathers, but since it is not marketed as shampoo, a lot of people just consider it a natural way to wash your hair. It doesn’t matter what you call it, but its a much healthier option for shampoo however you look at it. 🙂

PH Balanced Washes:

Soapnuts
My wash! Soapnuts were my lifesaver. They are a natural water softener and cleanser. I ordered these which I started using to wash laundry too! The other day I was telling a friend about soapnuts and she gave me the funniest look when I told her that’s how I wash my hair. Haha! Sometimes I feel like a total weirdo. Yes, it is an actual nut. They grow on trees in India. The shells surrounding the actual nut contain saponins which is like a natural soap. It actually lathers and looks soapy! (See the cover photo to this post- that’s a photo of my soapnut liquid.) Hair Types: All Hair Types! Especially good for those with hard water. How To: I take 5 nuts and boil them in 3 cups of water until the water is brown. Sometimes it helps to kind of mash the nuts as much as you can with a spoon to release the saponins from the shells. It usually takes me 15-20 minutes, so I do it when I’m bored, or the day before wash day so its ready to go. You can also make ahead and store in the refrigerator for up to a week. When the liquid is brown, strain the shells out of the liquid and pour it into a squeeze bottle. (Tip: Keep your eyes closed. I’ve heard horror stories of how bad this stuff hurts to get in your eyes. I haven’t experienced it luckily!) Wash and rinse as usual. An acid rinse isn’t needed for pH balancing, but my hair feels tangly after washing so I use an acid rinse on the length of my hair to detangle. *Note: You can re-use the shells more than once. Just dry the shells on a paper towel and boil them again to get all the soapy goodness out of them! My Experience: After so many issues with water and waxiness or stringy-ness, I was expecting to deal with the same thing. Amazingly I didn’t have either. My hair also looked so much shiner than normal. You can’t really tell in these photos at all, but when I look in a mirror I see my hair catching the light and looking shiny and I get really excited. 🙂 My hair has always been more matte and so un-shiny so I love love love the soapnut wash. This photo is after my first soapnut wash. I was so excited about my hair that I made Ryan take a photo.
10 Natural Hair Washes

10 Natural Hair Washes

^This is another photo of my hair after a wash day. It was SO SOFT! I know it looks totally frizzy in this photo from the light shining behind us, but it really wasn’t that frizzy! ..I think I just needed to brush it or something.

Egg
Okay, I know this is probably the weirdest sounding wash method yet. I know it sounds gross but it actually works and is great at clarifying and fighting grease. It also works as a protein treatment if your hair needs protein. Hair Types: Any! How to: Mix an equal part of egg and water and wash your hair with it in cold water. Hot water will make the egg cook on your hair (Hahaha! That would be such a mess..) so you don’t want that!! My Experience: This is a great method for maybe once a month to get some protein in your hair. Hair needs to have a balance of protein and moisture to be strong and healthy, and this does the trick. Washing with cold water sucks, but its the only negative I have from this method. Some people say their hair smells weird after washing with egg, but I haven’t noticed this personally. I also usually use an acid rinse with some lavender essential oils, so my hair smells like lavender which is lovely.

Water Only
Believe it or not, there are a lot of people who use absolutely nothing on their hair but water. Every time I see a post from one of these people in the “No-Poo” group I’m in, they’re the ones with the most gorgeous model worthy hair ever. I don’t know how they do it!! If I didn’t have so many water issues, I would definitely make this my ultimate goal. Since its just water it works with any hair type. How To: Check out this article to learn how to “scritch” and “preen” your hair/scalp. This step is necessary to remove any dead skin cell build up or dirt and sebum (oil) so your pores won’t get clogged. Then you brush your hair with a natural bristled brush to move oils away from your scalp. It also helps clean out your hair because the dead skin cells and any extra oil end up on the brush, so keeping your brush cleaned is really important. Other than these few things, all that “water only” people do with their hair is occasionally wash/rinse it with water after doing the above two steps! This method makes it so that your scalp just produces the amount of sebum necessary to keep your hair conditioned properly, so their hair doesn’t usually get overly oily anyway. People that use the water only method have usually been doing no-poo for years and years so they just don’t find that they need a regular “wash” anymore- just enough to keep their scalp clean. I can’t even imagine how nice this would be! I don’t have experience with it because its just not possible for me at this time. Maybe one day- way down the road I’ll be able to try it. 🙂

“Holy Grail” Wash (Recipe here)
This wash seems to be really popular! It contains clay, apple cider vinegar, water, and honey. So It really is basically a clay wash with some honey thrown in for moisturizing, as clay alone can be really drying on some hair types. Hair Types: Better for dry hair, but would probably be fine for any hair. How To: Mix up the recipe, wash your hair and leave on for 5 minutes. Rinse and you’re done! Most people don’t need an acid rinse after this one, but you always can. My Experience: I liked this recipe okay. It wasn’t a holy grail for me unfortunately because of the water issues. I would probably rather just wash with clay than this though because measuring and mixing this recipe takes a bit longer than just mixing some clay with some water. It worked about the same for me personally.

Acid Only
This is similar to the water only method, but you do occasional rinses with an acid to freshen your hair up. For some people it actually counts as a “wash” because it removes some excess sebum (oil), but for others its just more of a conditioner. Hair Types: This would definitely be better for dry hair types since it doesn’t remove much sebum. If you have dry hair it would be a good option to try for awhile. How To: Pick your favorite acid (see list below), dilute if you need to, and rinse your hair with it, followed by water. My Experience: Because I have/had such dry damaged hair, I did try this for awhile. Maybe a month or so. It didn’t really work for me. Although my hair is really dry on the bottom, the roots would still get too greasy for this to work for my hair. Plus, my obvious water issues. (My water really ruined most of these washes for me as you can see…Haha, thank the Lord for soapnuts!) When I tried Acid Only, I ended up using dry shampoo to get through the days wayyy too often, so I discovered that I needed to be using a wash that was more cleansing.

Aloe Vera + Honey Wash (Recipe here)
This is another wash that is very moisturizing and conditioning. Its popular among those with very dry or straw-like hair. It can also be used like a moisture treatment rather than a shampoo. Hair Types: Dry, course, or straw-like hair, or those with itchy scalps. How To: Follow the recipe I linked to..Or just use equal parts honey and aloe vera gel (natural actual real aloe vera though, not the fake green goo you might use for sunburn!) and wash your hair with it. My Experience: I just tried this once. It did make my hair really soft, but didn’t remove any grease, so I can’t really count it as a wash for me, but I would definitely do it again if my hair was feeling extra dry for some reason.

Bonus:

“Low Poo” Shampoos
“Low Poo” is actually not a real term…It was created by a No-Poo group I’m in on Facebook to basically mean, any shampoo that is commercially made but is healthier and more natural. For something to count as “low poo” it must not contain any sulfates, silicones, or parabens, and must have all or mostly all natural ingredients. If a product is commercially made and lathers, it is still technically shampoo, but it will be a much better option than most popular shampoo brands you get at the supermarket. A few popular brands of “low poo” are Moracco Method, Nature’s Gate, Shea Moisture, The Honest Company, Burt’s Bees, and 100% Pure. —>These are NOT affiliate links since I haven’t used these brands myself and can’t personally endorse them…They’re just there for your convenience if you want to check them out! I know a few people that use a few of these brands that love them. Also, I can’t promise that all the products from these companies would be considered “low poo.” A few of them may contain questionable ingredients. If you want to be sure, you’ll need to check the ingredient list and look up any ingredient that seems unfamiliar.
If you want to live a healthier lifestyle but going no-poo intimidates you, switching to a healthier brand of shampoo is a great alternative! It can also be a great place to start if you’d like to slowly transition your hair away from chemicals and silicones in preparation for going “no-poo” in the future!

Acid Rinses

Acid rinses are usually used as the “conditioner” after a wash, or in some cases, (Acid Only Method) can be used as a wash on their own.  For the alkaline washes they are absolutely mandatory to restore pH balance to your scalp. If you use a pH balanced wash they aren’t necessary but can still be used for extra conditioning, or to de-tangle your hair. They work SO well for detangling wet hair!
The most common acid rinses are: Apple cider vinegar or distilled white vinegar (Note: these need to be diluted 1 tbs to 1 cup of water!), coffee, tea, aloe vera juice, and even beer. I’ve used both types of vinegar, and coffee. The vinegar works great but does have a gross smell so I usually add some lavender essential oils to it! I smell the vinegar while my hair is wet, but once it dries, the scent of vinegar is gone, but the essential oil scent remains for a day or two. Coffee is probably my favorite acid rinse so far though! It seemed to make my hair super shiny! Plus, I love the smell of coffee. I only use coffee if we have leftover coffee sitting in the pot. I don’t like to brew coffee just for a hair rinse- Seems like a waste to me, so if we don’t have leftover coffee I’ll use diluted vinegar. I haven’t tried any of the others rinses to give my opinion on them!

Whew, that was a lot of information! I hope this is helpful for all those who have been asking!!

Let me know if you have any questions and I’ll do my best to answer them or find an answer for you! Its my goal to help anyone who wants to live more naturally and healthy lives find alternative options that work for your lifestyle. 🙂
Fellow No-Poo-People! Let me know if I left out a wash that you would like to recommend! I know there are TONS of other ones, but I tried to list the most common ones.

Failing at No-Poo? Check Your Water!

Failing at no-poo? check your water!

Failing at no-poo? The answer could be in your water!

After my first two “no-poo” (no shampoo) posts went up (here and here), there was so much interest from everyone about learning the different natural ways of washing your hair. I was so excited about that! I will still be writing that post, but it will probably be a few more weeks before I have all of the information ready. I want to make sure I have plenty of personal experience and enough research under my belt before writing this one so I can give y’all the very best information and my educated opinions. 😉 But today I wanted to explain a bit about one thing that has really hindered me in this experience so far because some of you may be dealing with it too and not even know it: Hard water!

In my second post, I explained how your hair and scalp must first go through the grueling “transition phase” if you wish to go the natural route with your hair care. This phase can take awhile, but after a few weeks, your hair usually sheds all the chemical/silicone build up and your scalp starts to get acclimated to the less frequent washing and has started to slow down oil production. After going through this, I experimented with several natural washing methods and found the one I’ve been sticking with. There was just one problem…The day after a wash my hair would look terrible. It would feel cleaner, but it looked awful.  My hair didn’t look greasy, but it also didn’t look clean; It would clump together at the roots as if it was greasy but it wasn’t greasy. It was waxy...like the texture of candle wax coating the top half of my hair. I read in a no-poo forum that waxy hair can either be a normal part of the transition phase, or a sign that you have hard water. I knew I had already gone through one transition phase and thought it couldn’t be that, but I still wasn’t too sure.  To remedy the waxiness, I would cover my hair with arrowroot powder dry shampoo, which would absorb into the waxy stuff, and then I’d use a fine comb to comb it out of my hair. This took awhile because I would have to clean the waxy build up from between every tooth of my comb after every few minutes of combing. After what seemed like an eternity of frustratingly combing my hair and cleaning my comb, my hair would finally look clean and pretty and free from wax. It would stay looking awesome for about a week before my next wash. Dealing with this issue was really frustrating for me. I felt like I was doing something wrong, or that my scalp still hadn’t adjusted completely, or that my wash method wasn’t working out. I hadn’t considered that my water could really make that much of a difference until we went to soft-watered Florida on a family vacation!

While in an awesome hotel on the shore of sunny Daytona Beach, Florida I realized something that really excited me. Our hotel water was soft!  Really soft! Now, I’m not an expert on water hardness, but I knew this water felt different. When I washed my hands, they still felt slippery after the soap was rinsed off which I knew was a sign of soft water. I was so excited to wash my hair and see if it made a difference! I used the same methods that I used back home, and impatiently waited for my hair to dry. You can’t really tell how a wash method worked until your hair is dry. The verdict? My hair was soft, moisturized, and completely wax-free! I couldn’t believe it. It almost seemed TOO moisturized, so its all about finding a balance of what your hair needs. After combing my hair, the comb was still perfectly clean. No build up of any kind. Could water really make that much difference!? It seemed unreal. I was so relieved to learn that it wasn’t me or anything I was doing wrong…it was just our water! The reason hard water makes such a difference with no-poo-ers, is because when you use commercial shampoo, its made with chemicals and detergents formulated to lather through any type of water, leaving your hair stripped and clean. (All while causing lots of damage and exposing you to a lot of really yucky stuff.)

When we got home from vacation, I knew I didn’t want to use our water to wash my hair anymore after seeing the results of the soft water wash, so I’ve been using distilled water in a jug to wash my hair with. Its a pain, but does save me a lot of headaches since I don’t have to clean waxy build up from my hair anymore! To test the hard water theory even further (as if I needed a reason) I did a plain ol’ rinse the other day with our normal water in the shower. No washing with anything; just plain ol water on my clean hair. The next day my hair looked horrible with wax. :/ The downsides of washing your hair with distilled water are its cold, it takes a little longer, and the hassle of buying jug water and taking it into the shower with me.  Even with all of those things, I’ve still decided its worth it, for now, to keep using distilled water over our hard water. *Update! After washing with distilled water for awhile, I’m kinda used to it and it doesn’t seem like a big deal anymore. I think washing the hair with cold water is actually better for it. I’m still trying to find that perfect balance with my wash and with my water. I think my hair might not like super soft water and might need some middle ground so I’m still conducting experiments and getting to know my hair needs!

If you’ve recently started no-poo, tried it unsuccessfully in the past, or have started having issues that aren’t going away with time, you just might have hard water! Try washing with only distilled water and see if it helps you!

I haven’t shampooed my hair in months…Part 2!


I haven't shampooed my hair in monthsI was totally blown away at the response my first “no-poo” blog post got. People are clearly very intrigued by this! So hopefully this information helps some people and explains it a little bit more. I’m going to share a bit about my hair-journey and how I went from shampooing everyday to ditching shampoo entirely.

Stretching my Washes with Shampoo..
Growing up I shampooed my hair everyday. It was just the normal thing to do. I explained in my previous post that shampoo strips your hair’s natural oils, telling your scalp it needs to produce more. This is why so many people get greasy looking hair every night and have to wash their hair everyday to get rid of it. This was the case for me. At one point I had “side bangs” and sometimes I had to wash my hair once and then later in the day wash my bangs because they would already look greasy. It was bad. Last year I kept hearing more and more about how you shouldn’t wash your hair everyday because its bad for your hair. As someone with dry damaged hair, I thought I should give this a shot, so I started stretching my washes. I started off washing my hair every night. Then I started drastically cutting down on the amount of shampoo I was using, so I would focus a smaller amount on my roots and around my scalp where it tended to get oily. After my hair adjusted to this I started skipping a day. I did that for about a month and my hair got used to it so I started skipping 2 days…and so on and so forth until I was fine washing my hair every 5 days. That’s as far as I got before I decided to try this no-poo thing out. I think all in all it was probably 5 or 6 months that it took to get my hair and scalp to the point of washing every 5 days, but it did adjust. And I did notice my hair seemed healthier than before when I started doing this.

Throwing out the shampoo and going through “the transition”…
If you switch from commercial shampoo to any natural/homemade wash your hair will go through what us no-pooers call “the transition”. This is a horrible, terrible, horrendous time where your hair and scalp are freaking out because they just don’t know what’s going on. Haha that’s the best way I know to describe it. This is a whole new adjustment period that is way worse than the minor oiliness you go through when you’re trying to stretch out your washes. This phase can last anywhere from 2 weeks to several months and its not fun. If you shampoo your hair everyday and use lots of products in your hair, it could take even longer. People who already don’t use product in their hair and already stretched their washes out tend to have an easier transition phase. The hair has years worth of silicone and chemical build up that it needs to shed out, as well as getting your scalp to slow down oil production. Many people that try no-poo end up quitting early on because they can’t handle this phase, or they say that no-poo doesn’t work for them because they never really got through this phase. No poo can work for everyone, its just a matter of getting through the grueling transition phase and finding a wash method that works for your hair type. It can be a long frustrating process and I completely understand it not being worth the hassle for most people. I seriously thought about quitting more times than I want to admit. Poor, sweet Ryan had to put up with me complaining about my horrible hair, but he was so supportive and told me I’d get through it. And I did! After my very last shampoo, my hair looked good for about 5 days, which was how long I was going between washes, and then after that, it started to get greasy. And worse and worse and worse. A few people commented on my last post that they would like to try this but they’re afraid that they’d look like a grease bucket. All I can say, is you will. There’s no way around it unfortunately.. There are ways to hide it and get through it, which I’ll get to in a minute, but if you do try this, know that your hair will look bad for at least a few weeks. :/ I’ve seen so many people say that this doesn’t work for them and their hair looked awful when they tried it. Its important to realize that that is a part of the process and that its totally normal. Your scalp has to adjust to producing just the amount of oil that your hair needs, and that takes some time. Its unpleasant but you can get through it if you are really determined. My hair only looked really bad for 2 weeks before it started to calm down a little. Then about 2 more months before I felt comfortable to wear it down completely. It felt like an eternity though. This brings me to my next topic..

Getting through transition without looking like it..
I had to get creative with ways to style my hair during my transition phase. I remember the first day I had to go to work after my hair started getting really bad. I had it up in a messy bun and wore a cloth headband. My mother-in-law told me my hair looked really cute that day, so I thought that was kind of funny.. I told her I had started this no-poo thing and that that was the only way I could wear my hair because it didn’t look good. I fell in love with wearing headbands and bandanas during this time..they’re a cute girly way to wear your hair and hide oiliness at the same time. I wore a lot of ponytails too, and on a good day I could pull off a cute fishtail braid. Pulling the side back in a french braid is another great way to hide oiliness. Another thing I started to depend on was dry shampoo powder. (Although, I kind of sabotaged my transition phase and slowed it down by using it too much..) For dry shampoo I use arrowroot powder. Some people also use cornstarch. Its a fine white powder than you dust over your roots with a makeup brush and kinda massage it into your roots like you’re shampooing. It absorbs the excess oil, and then you just brush it out. This works great for me because I’m blonde. My sister has slightly darker hair and when I told her to try it, she wasn’t thrilled with it, probably because it didn’t really match her hair. Brunettes usually mix some cacao powder in to darken the powder. If you use too much powder though, it removes a lot of oil, and it is actually considered a “wash” so its not recommended to use too much of it, as it can make your scalp keep producing more oil for longer. I didn’t pay any attention to this recommendation though because I hated having oily hair so much. In hindsight I wish I would’ve used less dry shampoo because I think it made my transition phase longer than it would have been had I just sucked it up and dealt with it. 🙂 One other thing that is absolutely essential, even if you have no interest in going no-poo, is a boar bristle brush! (BBB is the quick abbreviation a lot of people use.) The natural fibers slide through the hair, spreading the oil down towards the ends when you brush. Its really important to move that excess oil from the roots, down the shaft of the hair to condition the bottom half and the ends! I brush with my BBB in the morning and before bed. It really helps when you’re trying to stretch your washes too. Here are some of my getting-through-transition-phase selfies. I promise I really don’t take selfies very often at all, so I feel somewhat embarrassed posting all these at once.. 🙂 I talked/texted my sister a lot during this time to vent about my hair and just talking about hair in general so I would sometimes send her updates on what my hair looked like, or how I was wearing it so that you couldn’t tell it was oily. I think seeing them might give someone hope that you don’t have to LOOK like you’re going through transition, and that there are ways of hiding it.


I haven't shampooed my hair in monthsAs you can see I got by wearing lots of headbands/bandanas and pinning the front sections of my hair back, or wearing my hair up. (Plus dry shampoo around the roots!) These things helped keep my hair in place so you couldn’t tell that there were any issues underneath. That was the plan at least. I hope it worked. 😉 Now I’ve actually embraced these hairstyles and wear them even when I’m not trying to hide hair issues. If you’re a hat person, that would be the ultimate way of hiding it. Or if you are a stay at home mom, or any other type of work-from-home person, you probably wouldn’t even have to worry about looking presentable. I work with people everyday at my job, so while I don’t have to look super “professional” I do have to look nice and presentable. My hair never really looked perfect by any means, but it didn’t look extremely oily and gross either, and that’s what matters. 😉 I still have battles with my hair; Its not perfect now by any means, but its getting better and I have TONS of new growth. Little baby hairs started popping up everywhere about a month after I started this no-poo experience, so I know my hair must like what I’m doing! Also, I now only have to curl my hair once a week and the curls last me all week without any product. I just throw it up in a top knot when I take a shower so it doesn’t get wet, and the loose curls stay put. Its awesome. I’m pretty low-maintenance, so for me this is one of the best things about it. 🙂

In closing, I wanted to clarify a few things.. I still DO wash my hair. Right now I wash it every 5-7 days but hope to go longer as my hair continues to get used to this. I’ll write a part 3 in a few weeks or so explaining the different washes I’ve tried. I’ve experimented with tons of different natural wash methods and I think I’ve found my wash. I want to keep using it for a few more weeks to make sure its going to work out for me, and then I’ll share more on this! I’ve had a lot of people question me about this and express interest in trying it, so I feel its important to know what you’re getting into if you do decide to try it. I just wanted to stress that one more time. 🙂 I would give it at least 2 months before quitting. If you don’t have that kind of time to deal with it or have no interest in going fully no-poo, I’d recommend just stretching your washes out as much as you can and looking for a more natural shampoo with less of those harmful chemicals!  This is a great website that rates thousands of commercial beauty products and brands on their toxicity. The products rated 1-3 aren’t so bad for you, but the ratings go up to a 10 which are the worst of the worst. You can search your favorite products to see how many chemicals are actually in them, and choose better options when necessary!
Thanks for reading. 🙂 Let me know in the comments if you have any questions about my transition or no-poo!