Everyday Shea is line of shea butter products brought to you from the fine folks at Alaffia. It’s an affordable line of natural shea butter products, combining great value with great quality. I loved the lotion, so I decided it was time to give the Moisturizing Shampoo a whirl.

The shampoo comes in large 32 oz. bottles with pump tops, in Lavender, Vanilla Mint, and Unscented. I chose Vanilla Mint, because I liked that fragrance best. It’s still a light fragrance, not super-strong at all. The shampoo contains liquid shea butter soap, two surfactants, shea leaf extract, vanilla extract and spearmint essential oil. It’s a very simple formula. It doesn’t contain any SLS or SLES, if you ware avoiding those ingredients.

It’s quite low-lather. If you like (or feel you need) a lot of lather, you will not like this shampoo. I’m pretty accustomed to low lathering shampoos, so it doesn’t bother me. It’s pretty effective at cleaning, but not drying at all. It’s also not too moisturizing. After lightly bleaching my hair, I still only used conditioner once or twice a week with this shampoo, because I didn’t feel my hair needed it more often.

Now, I just (as in, two days ago) pretty thoroughly bleached my hair and colored it blue, and haven’t tried this shampoo on that yet. My hair is a lot drier now, having been more heavily bleached, so I will probably want to use more conditioner. I’ll update this review if that’s the case!

Overall, I’m pretty happy with this shampoo. It’s a good value, it was around $10 for the 32 oz. bottle, and it’s gentle and effective. Two thumbs up!

In keeping with my money-saving efforts, and due to the fact that I liked the kids shampoo so much, I decided to pick up a bottle of Suave’s Rosemary Mint Shampoo. It’s a drugstore knockoff of Aveda’s Rosemary Mint Shampoo.

Suave’s Rosemary Mint Shampoo is part of their Professionals line, which are basically drugstore-priced knockoffs of salon brands. I say knockoffs, but it’s my opinion from comparing their ingredients lists that this Suave shampoo is at least as good a formula as the Aveda version. I have never purchased the Aveda Rosemary Mint Shampoo, but I have had it used on me at salons. The biggest thing I remember about it is the scent is quite powerful.

The Suave Rosemary Mint Shampoo is not as strongly fragranced as I recall from the Aveda version. It’s lightly minty and lightly rosemary-y, but the overall effect is more cleanly herbal smelling than specifically rosemary mint scented. I suspect the scent will be more of a crowd-pleaser, although I do like things to be just a bit more minty. But I really like peppermint in my shower. It has a lot of lather, rinses cleanly, and leaves my hair shiny but not dry. I only use conditioner once or twice a week, and mostly just because I like how my conditioner smells.

Overall, I’m totally pleased with this shampoo. I’m not going to make a judgment on whether or not it’s a perfect replacement for the salon version, since they are such different formulas that it’s pretty much apples and oranges. Taken on its own merits, however, I definitely give Suave Rosemary Mint Shampoo two thumbs up!

I really have a thing for stuff that smells like Jolly Ranchers. I was cruising through Target, and was sniffing shampoo and hit upon this one to sniff. “This one” is Suave Kids 3-in-1 Shampoo, in Wacky Melon, and it smells just like watermelon Jolly Ranchers. I love it!

The 3-in-1 part of the product refers to the fact that it’s a shampoo, conditioner, and body wash in one. On my normal, no longer color-treated hair, it’s perfect. It leaves my hair clean, but soft, and I don’t need to use conditioner regularly. I use a deep conditioner once or twice a week and that’s enough.

It works great as a body wash too, with a lot of lather. It’s also not drying on my skin, although it’s not the most moisturizing body wash I’ve used. The scent doesn’t linger long, so if you don’t want to smell like candy all day, you won’t.

I don’t have any children, so I can’t comment on how it actually works for kids, lol. But if you are a grown-up who likes fun smells once in a while (I find it really cheerful), this Suave shampoo is a perfect cheap thrill. I give it two thumbs up! Now I want to try the apple version.

Thanks to BlogHer, I recently got to try out one of Dove’s conditioners, the Nourishing Oil Care Conditioner. Overall, it does what it sets out to do, so I give it a thumb’s up.

The Nourishing Oil Care Conditioner contains natural almond and mineral oils, as well as coconut oil, to moisturize and soften your hair. It’s good for dry hair prone to frizz. It does have a perfume-y scent to it, which I find pleasant, but it could be too strong if you’re sensitive to scent. (Give it a sniff before you buy it, is my advice!) I really like the bottle, it has an easy-to-use flip cap.

When I started using this conditioner, I still had a good three inches or so of bleached, damaged hair. The conditioner worked a treat on keeping it soft and smooth and well behaved. I think if your hair is dry or damaged, this formula is going to do a great job for your hair. It certainly worked well on my damaged hair.

I then went and got a hair cut, and all the bleached, damaged hair is basically gone. I am back to a head of healthy, untreated hair. The conditioner is really too heavy/rich for normal hair. It didn’t leave my hair greasy or anything like that, but it definitely was limp and a bit lanky. This definitely falls into the category of “good product, just not the correct product for my needs.” If you don’t need a rich conditioner, probably one of Dove’s other options would be better. I personally am interested in the Cool Moisture or Volume Boost conditioners.

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I really meant to review this a few months ago, and just plain forgot. My bad! The product is Suave Professionals Keratin Infusion Heat Defense Leave-In Conditioner, a nifty and inexpensive styling product that really helped with my totally trashed bleached hair.

When I was bleaching my hair regularly, it started to take on a texture not unlike dry straw. It was really hard to style, since it just wanted to tangle up (even as short as it was!) and I couldn’t easily draw a comb or my fingers through it, wet or dry. I started using this product, and discovered it really helped!

The leave-in conditioner is a less-is-more type deal. The directions call for using a dime-sized amount. Since my hair is so short, I usually used more like a pea-sized amount. It’s called a leave-in conditioner, but it really is more like a styling product to me. What I particularly like about it is that it isn’t as heavy or greasy-seeming as a lot of similar products that contain a lot of silicones. This has silicones, but the formula seems lighter. Since “Heat Defense” is in the name, it makes sense that you’d want to apply a little heat. I did get the best results applying it, and then using a blow dryer for a few minutes. The result is smoother hair, ready to have a little styling paste/clay/wax/whatever applied to muss it up, and voila! Styled hair.

Now that I’m basically one haircut away from having all the damaged hair gone from my head, I’m not really using this much anymore. But if/when I go back to coloring/bleaching my hair, I’ll definitely be using it again! Two thumbs up.

I love good smelling shampoo. Because I wear my hair short, and now that I’m not bleaching the hell out of it regularly, I’m not too picky on what my shampoo DOES. I mostly just want it to smell good. Jason Restorative Biotin Shampoo definitely passes the smells good test! It also happens to be really good for my hair, so it’s basically a double win.

From the Jason website:

Natural biotin shampoo is formulated to gently cleanse hair and scalp and help alleviate dry, itchy scalp, repair damaged hair and split ends with “bio-active” natural biotin, vitamin B5, certified organic extracts or marigold, chamomile, and ginseng plus aloe vera, vitamins A, C, and E.

The formula doesn’t contain lauryl or laureth sulfates (which some folks are sensitive to) or parabens. It has a nice lather, but like most non-sulfate shampoos it isn’t super-lathery. It leaves my hair feeling clean, but not super-squeaky. I really like the formula!

The only thing I dislike is the lid to the bottle. I took a picture so you can see – it’s just kind of awkward to use.

Overall, I’m really pleased with this shampoo and will continue to use it! Two thumbs up!

Beautiful Curls is sub-company of Alaffia, the shea butter company I’ve raved about on occasion. Beautiful Curls is a line of haircare for, duh, curly hair! I don’t have curly hair, so I can’t speak to that particular niche. But I do have really dry hair from all the bleaching, so I wanted to try a super-rich deep conditioner to de-crunchify the dried out ends.

Beautiful Curls Shea Butter Deep Conditioning Treatment contains shea butter (lots!), arnica, comfrey, and panthenol. It has a raspberry and ylang ylang fragrance that is really awesome. It’s super-thick, and contains no silicones. The lack of slippery stuff in it means it does take a little bit of effort to smooth it through your hair. Warming it between your hands first definitely helps! It rinses out really well from my hair, with no greasy residue left behind – just softer hair.

Overall, I’m quite pleased with this deep conditioner. I don’t need to use a lot, since I’m just putting it on the ends of my hair, so the tube is lasting for a while. I use it twice a week in place of regular conditioner and my hair is quite happy.

You can find Beautiful Curls at Whole Foods Market (I’m not sure if they carry it nationwide, or just around here because Alaffia is based in Washington), as well as locally (to Portland) at New Seasons Market. Or shop online! I give it two thumbs up!

I’ve been looking for a deep conditioning treatment for my excessively bleached hair, but I didn’t want to spend a lot of money. I want a budget bargain! Freeman’s Papaya and Mango Moisture 3-Minute Conditioner fits the bill nicely.

It contains plant extracts like papaya extract, mango extract, aloe leaf extract, and chamomile extract, as well as Panthenol (Pro-vitamin B5), and nice oils like meadowfoam and jojoba. Unlike so many products that purportedly contain plant stuff, the ingredients in this product are high up on the ingredient list, so it contains more than just a little sprinkle to look good on the label. It has silicones in it, but they’re pretty far down on the list.

The conditioner smells really good. It’s not a cloying tropical smell, but rather light and fruity. The scent doesn’t linger for a long time in your hair afterwards, though.

It has a lighter texture than I was expecting – it’s thick but not greasy or heavy. I noticed smoother, less rough hair after one use, and my hair seems less dry after several uses. It’s not as intensive as more expensive products I’ve used (L’Occitane used to make an Olive Hair Mask that was AMAY-ZING but they discontinued it!) but for less than $3 a tube, I’ll take it. Overall, I’m quite pleased with the performance and will continue to purchase and use the product! Two thumbs up!