Why? WHY would I stop shampooing my hair?

Just for kicks, really!

This past winter, I washed my hair about once a week. I have REALLY long hair. So washing it requires time to dry it, and air circulation, and since my default hairstyle is a quick bun I would often find it still very damp at the end of the day. I found myself washing on the weekend and letting it dry around the house or while driving for weekend plans, then tying it up again come Monday.

I started thinking about why I keep it so long if I hardly ever wear it down or visible in any way. My hair is pretty, a dark blonde/light brown, wavy, and startlingly long to most people, including myself. It's also annoying, getting stuck on velcro, wool, fleece, and outside the car when I shut the door on a windy day.

But I LIKE it long. I just don't like having to mess with it much. So I figured I had nothing to lose by trying out the No 'Poo system. And here's what I've found:
Day 1: The baking soda rinse feels slippery, which is good since it's pH is basic (alkaline) and should be slippery (soap is basic too.) I wonder if I'm wasting too much of the rinse trying to get it on my hairline. Using a half pint mason jar- it's the right size, but I have visions of broken glass in my shower! The vinegar rinse made my wet hair feel so smooth!
Dry, it's soft. And thick feeling. And it didn't get as knotty as usual!
Many others online have reported that this is common the first time, but the next time felt really dry. We'll see.

Day 2, 3: Ponytail, ponytail! And it looks nice! There's wave that's holding together, not getting frizzy or wild even against fleece, not as many loose strands falling all over the place, and the best part is I can brush it really easily at the end of the day. It's definitely smoother and less knotty.

What a vista.

Far off in the distance, up a hill, I see evergreens and the skeletons of trees still to leaf out. There’s a trio of high powered tension lines out there, too, so I’ll just scootch my chair over a bit to hide them.

In the mid-distance, a pond with a fountain, and an old stone pump house, and just a couple Canadian Geese (grrr). And nearer still, a curving flagstone path with a gazebo, lined with under-trimmed shrubbery and a sadly over-trimmed weeping tree of some kind.

Those same flagstones create a few stairs to double glass doors, and probably are the same ones under my feet in this porch that has two sets of large windows on either side of the door, another set of windows at either end of the room, and extra exterior doors at either end too. More doors lead into the kitchen, my workshop room (there’s a window in the wall here), and my bedroom (another window!)

Lovely, no? Oh, I forgot to mention the path that zooms between the gazebo and the pond, the golf carts, the lawn mowers, the groundhogs and squirrels, and all the people out practicing their swings on this breezy spring day. Not to detract from the beauty I see from my rented house, but to buffer it for sure! I love looking out my windows and seeing grass and trees, and not a road in sight, but I have to keep reminding myself that I’m not really ever alone here so put some pants on!

I have only been here since last fall, so my "garden" really looks like this:




Those are some seedlings, including San Marzano Tomatoes, Alpine Strawberries and Tulsi, and a calendula plant that made it through the winter.

More seedlings, on the table. I stood up for this one, but still this is what I see from my chair. Greens, aloe and a paperwhite that hasn’t opened yet.

On the inside wall, there are a couple convenient big nails in the mortar. This is lemon grass (r), swiss chard (sort of) (center), and stevia (l), all from last year!

Flowers I haven’t started yet. The lights are in a plastic bin of sand behind this chair, that I used to keep the other seedlings warm until they sprouted. Also behind the chair is a leafless Plumeria- it’s too sad to show right now!

That’s Rosemary in the green pot, Rose Geranium and Lemon Verbena in the strawberry pot, a little Clary Sage to the left of the Rosemary, and some Bird of Paradise leaves waving hello. Behind the Rosemary and strawberry pot is another scented geranium, I think maybe Nutmeg, but I don't remember and I'm not quite sure when I sniff!

There’s also a pot on the opposite side of the house with over-wintered St John’s Wort, and it looks like some Chamomile and French Sorrel coming back. There’s also a basket with Christmas Cactus and Heliotrope sunning on a flagstone.
I don’t know yet what I can do outside, what with wild men on lawnmowers and oversized rodents that are used to eating whatever they want. I guess I’ll find out soon!

 A Dream Garden. Oh dear.

I see, out front, a ‘cottage garden,’ a riot of plants that looks charming from the drive and is the source of the herbal medicines I use as I become an herbalist in my own right. Perennials, self seeding annuals, shrubs, they have to be reined in and divided and multiplied with cuttings and allowed to creep as ground covers. This is organized chaos, or at least inventoried.

Along side, and in back of the house are the more ordered, organized food beds. These have to be planned, rotated, fostered. Greens and root vegetables and Butternut Squashes and Paste Tomatoes and even a little plot of Quinoa, to try. Beans and Cabbages and Rhubarb, Strawberries and Blueberries, and unusual things like Gooseberries and Horseradish. Food for me, my family, for bartering and offering. And I want to Plant a Row for the Hungry, and for my local food bank too.

And the garden shed! With its built in potting bench with Running Water! And windows! And racks for holding tools in convenient spots, and canvas bags for harvesting, and racks for lamps that I’ll start seeds under, and best of all, the Worm Bin. Every fall I’ll compost the leaves, the prunings, all that, make a pile and leave it to cook. But those little wormies will eat every day, since there will be extra Carrot tops and Pea shells from dinner, and bits pinched off the Tomatoes, and in general just scraps. Scraps of food I’ve nurtured onto my plate and into my health, that I can give back to that same dirt from whence the scraps came.

And the bird’s-eye view- this garden is convenient, extremely convenient to my Dream House. It’s out front, on the sides, and in the back. Lawn? Yeah, maybe a little, if someone else is mowing.

(I grew up with a ‘yard’ that was about 5 acres, and bordered by trees that were the beginning of the rest of our almost 80 acres total. “Convenient” to me means that I can see it, every day, from the doors and