Purple hair... trial and error.

So, I have purple hair. Over the last few weeks it's been everywhere from bright, in-yo-face purple, to pale violet, which I LOVED. Unfortunately, that faded to grey-white pretty quickly, so I pretty much started over with a new band of dye last week. In case you're interested in my journey (a woman too cheap to pay a pro), here's an outline:

First of all, here is my 'natural' hair color (your average highlights and such)

So, I had to bleach it out to get it as close to white as possible if I wanted to achieve my desired look, which was that of Ms. Kelly Osborne, as seen here

Isn't it gorgeous? I think so. Although, I've reevaluated my feelings about her. She has gone on and on about bullying, yet she made an ugly comment about how she has 3 years to do fun looks like purple hair, because only some sort of idiot would be 30 years old with purple hair. To that I say, YOLO. No, seriously, I shout it.

But I digress.

I decided to use a box 'non bleach' I found at the grocery store first... so, that was a mistake. It didn't do much, but at least it didn't force me into hiding

So, as you can see, it was lighter, but not NEARLY what I needed it to be. That's when I really started my research. See, my biggest DIY fault, is that I am a measure once, cut twice kinda gal. I know, I know... I just get so excited that I completely forget to do things right, ha!

Okay, so I went to Sallys and got a packet of bleach, and a little bottle of 20v developer. Mixed it up, and took my husband up on his offer to do it for me. Can anyone else spot the mistake here? Yeah, not only was it not enough bleach, but he sucks at hair. Why, oh WHY did I do that? So, enter patchy orange hair. I skipped the gym all week until I could get to Sallys again. 

This time, I got a TUB of Quick Blue, a liter or Wella 20v developer, and Wella toner in T18, to make it extra pale. I also picked up Special Effects 'Wildflower', planning to dilute it with conditioner to make it a pretty pale violet, like I wanted.

Everything went okay, except the color turned out much darker than planned...

But it grew on me, and my husband loved it, and YOLO.

Eventually it faded into this

which took maybe 2 weeks? Again, it was super uneven... some parts faded darker than others, so (here comes the part where you think my hair might actually pack up and move away from my head, or at least file a restraining order for abuse), I bleached it out again. Yes, two weeks after all that bleaching, I did it again. I was really hoping to get it even so I could finally get the color I wanted, using Pravana Violet and Silver together. 

The hairdresser friend I have that sent the Pravana to me told me to use a DOT of violet, and the whole tube of silver. I (not knowing how to measure a 'dot') used a 1/8 of the tube... this was again, WAY to much, and I'm back to bright purple... ugh. But, as I said, my husband likes it, and it's already beginning to fade (much more evenly this time), so maybe I'll keep it around for a while.

So, what do you think of the pastel hair trend? Would you ever do purple, pink or blue?

-C