New on the website - Victorian Valentines Cards.

I have been offering these in my shop for a year and now they are on the website as a Mail-A-Card item. IE: For 2.95 you can have a lovely Victorian greeting card mailed to any recipient in the U.S. or Canada - or for 3.95 anywhere in the world !

How cool is that ?

Most of the time if you order by noon central U.S. standard time your card will be mailed THAT day.

Right now there are only the Valentine's Cards but soon there will be Easter as well as Birthday, Wedding, Get Well and Sympathy cards. Just let us know if you want a message inside.

Check them out and let me know what you think.

PS - These are scanned images of actual Victorian cards and emephera.

Angela

www.thesycamoreboutique.com

http://www.thesycamoreboutique.com/Catalog/VintageGreetingCards/VintageGreetingCards.htm

Henna update:

Well, it has been a year since my first henna and I am still going strong.

I would never, ever go back to commercial color.

What I have learned is that I don't need to henna the length at ALL, it

never fades. It is nice to do a "henna gloss" every now and then to keep it nice and bright - but I have only done that maybe 3x.

A "gloss" is simply a blend of equal parts prepared henna and hair conditioner.

You glop it on, press into the hair and put on a shower cap or plastic wrap for an hour or two (I did 3 hours last time). I did this in tandem with my regular root touch up (which is easy because you don't need to be precise with henna, just squish it into your roots and "moosh" around and you are done).

The photo was taken in November - my daughter and I are having a kind of growing contest to see who can get the longest. Considering I am now past 55 I think it is kind of fun to have long hair - and the henna keeps it in optimum condition so it looks great.

Angela

October-November Discount Coupon

The October - November discount coupon is going out to all Mailing List Members Thursday morning. We are offering 3 different discount levels this time $3, $5 and $10 discounts.

Get your coupon by signing up for the Newsletter. Signup box is on the front page of the website, left hand column.

www.thesycamoreboutique.com

Angela

Vintage Halloween & Thanksgiving cards are here

Our new line of Victorian / Vintage cards are now available in Halloween and Thanksgiving themes.

Christmas will be available in about 2 weeks.

www.thesycamoreboutique.com/Catalog/Cards/VintageGreetingCards/Halloween-Thanksgiving.html

These are available on the website as a Mail-A-Card service where we mail it for you to anywhere in the world - or we have them available in the shop.

Henna Chapter 2

Still LOVING Henna !

I have never had such great red color from a commercial tint, rich and realistic to boot.

Repeat applications (3 months now) have deepened the red tones. I think this will be the permanent color from now on.

Henna, like natural color looks a bit different in various lighting.

Outdoors it is vibrant and nearly electric. Indoors it is more subtle - richer looking under regular bulbs - toned down under florescent lighting.

The first photo is how it looks directly under an incandescent lamp, warm and golden red. It really brings out the gloss too.

This one is near direct sunlight - here you see the more intense, coppery red effect.

This last photo is inside the shop where there is only fluorescent and halogen lighting. Here the color is muted by the blue hued lighting.

One of the benefits of henna is that it really works as a stain - adding color to your natural color - so where you had highlights before, you still do.

It makes the effect so much more natural and the outgrowth is barely noticable if you are a medium range color to start with ( I hennaed over auburn tinted hair of about the same depth).

Starting with light hair will result in very, vibrant red and darker hair will have less of a noticable color change but the effects will be evident in sunlight.

Henna is tricky to use on completely grey/white hair as it will be very bright. I do have some grey in the front, the henna did cover it but it was quite a bit brighter than the other sections. I did touch up that one spot with a permanent color.

It will work for scattered grey as each henna application will add more color to the grey strands making them a brighter auburn highlight amongst the deeper base. It really is a nice effect, so I think I will only occasionally touch up the grey so I keep that highlight going.

If you like auburn/red and you don't mind a bit of extra time and effort to get away from chemical haircolor (or like me, you are having bad reactions to it) henna is worth a try.

Angela

If you like Victoriana you should love our new card line.

We just launched it at Valentines with a few designs and now have an entire assortment for Easter and Everday occasions.

We even added a Mail A Vintage Card service to the website - for 3.95 we mail the card for you and even add a special note.

Here was the selection for St. Patricks Day - the Easter selection will be up on the site this week.
PS - With a little notice we can even print personalized messages inside or on the front.

Chapter One - Using Natural Henna for Hair Color

My experience with Natural Henna For Hair Coloring

I decided to switch to all natural Henna this year after a bad reaction to my traditional hair color made me want to scream. The itching, and irritation were getting worse, sometimes lasting weeks after the coloring (and red needs to be done every 4 weeks ... ugh).

Since I wanted a nice rich, red shade Henna was the natural choice.

Real henna - ie: Body Art quality henna is the only way to go for a deep natural red hair color with incredible shine. The photo is 20 hours after my first time using it and the results were quite good. The color is a bit more coppery-orange the first day, but will "oxidize" and become a deeper auburn in 3-5 days and the richness and depth will increase with each repeated use.

For those who want browns or less red, mixing with natural Indigo is the way to go. More on that in the next issue.

Angela

Now a "natural" ... redhead