Salut! Je m'appelle Mahalia. I live in the fast paced city of New York. I am a college student studying the art of performance and drama. In my free time, I write with soul of an ol' time Bohemian looking out into the city of Paris. I also like to take photos of those miniature passing moments that fly by us without our eyes realizing it. But all in all, I'm a young woman finding her way in the world.

Sidebar Photo Credit

Banana Hair Mask 

My hair has been severely damaged due to negligence and stress. While prowling around the internet, I looked up some good homemade hair masks. Most of them were avocado/olive oil masks. Unfortunately, I don’t have these ingredients. (I’ve been craving avocado for weeks, too!) My eyes caught on to different hair masks using three ingredients I actually have at home: honey, milk, and bananas! Why not combine these ingredients to create my own hair mask? I’m sure I’m not the only who’s tried it.

Why these ingredients?

Bananas: Banana contains potassium and natural oils; which helps soften the hair, controls dandruff, improves elasticity, and promotes shine. Plus, the vitamin B in bananas prevents split ends. If you have chemically treated hair (like me) and you want to repair your damaged hair, bananas are definitely the way to go.

Honey: Honey is a natural humectant. It helps attract and retain moisture on your hair so that your hair won’t break. It also keeps the cuticles of the hair soft and shiny.

Milk: Milk has natural ingredients such as calcium that help strengthen hair cells. Milk gives the hair body, shine, and length. If possible, use organic whole milk. If you’re like me and you don’t have that, you can use regular milk. However, because regular milk has added hormones and chemicals, use it generously.

Let’s get started!

What you’ll need:

 1 tbl of Honey
1 Ripe Banana
1/2 cup milk 

Put the bananas in the microwave for 15 seconds to soften it, so it’s easier to mash.

Go ahead and mash that sucker until it looks like this

Start adding the milk, little by little. I didn’t have to use the whole 1/2 cup so I put the rest back in the gallon. 

It should look like

Now drizzle your honey and mix it in. I added a bit of cornstarch to thicken the paste.

It’s ok if you don’t have cornstarch. It’s not all that necessary.

The final product should like

 I left the mix in the fridge while I parted my hair into four equal sections. After that, I took it out of the fridge and completely saturated my hair with the mix.* This part will get messy!

*Just a caution: this mask cannot be stored because the bananas become hard and brown. Make sure you only make enough to put on your hair.

Let the mask penetrate your hair for 30-45 mins.

My hair before the mask:

As you can tell, the ends of my hair was very brittle and fragile. It was hard to run my fingers through my hair. 

Now my hair is shiny, soft and bouncy. Not to mention, my ends look great!

Best of luck to you and your hair!

Love,

M

Tuesday, February 21st 2012 (13:31pm)

36 notes
tagged: #banana hair mask #hair #hair care #bananas #honey #milk #hair masks #homemade hair masks #beauty