How to Cheaply Dye Hair a Wacky Color

You can easily dye your hair with food coloring or powdered drink mixes, like Kool-aid, for a splash of wild color. Just pick your color, mix it up and apply it to your hair. You'll have brightly dyed hair for anywhere from a few days to a few weeks.

Difficulty: Moderately Easy

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• Drink Mix
• Hot water
• Bowl
• Latex gloves
• Shower cap
• Blow dryer

Using Food Coloring

1. Purchase a standard pack of food coloring from the baking section of the grocery store. Depending on the amount of hair that you want to dye, you may need more than one pack.

2. Mix the color and add a small amount of vinegar. A tablespoon should be more than enough. The vinegar will make the dye acidic and will help the coloring dye your hair.

3. Pull out the section of your hair that you want to dye. Pin the rest of your hair back so that the dye will not spread.

4. Pull on the latex gloves and use your finger to spread the dye from the roots of your hair to the tips. Don't apply the dye too closely to your scalp or too heavily at the roots, since this may dye your skin.

5. Put the shower cap on and let the dye set. You can also use a blow dryer to gently heat your hair.

6. Rinse your hair once the hair has almost dried. Some of the color may wash out and will continue to do so each time you wash your hair.

Using Drink Mixes

7. Purchase the color of drink mix that you want to dye your hair. Make sure that you buy a mix that has no sugar added. Any sugar in the mix will become a sticky mess in your hair.

8. Pour the drink mix into a bowl. Heat water until it is as warm as you can stand on your skin. Test the water before you use it so that you don't accidentally burn yourself.

9. Add the water to the drink mix in the bowl, a few tablespoons at a time. You want to create a thick paste with the mix to put on your hair.

10. Separate the sections of hair that you want to dye and pull the rest of your hair out of the way.

11. Put on the latex gloves and use your fingers to spread the paste over your hair.

12. Put on a shower cap or cover the section of hair with foil and use a blow dryer to apply heat to your hair for 5 to 10 minutes.

13. Rinse your hair with cold water. The cold water will help set the color and ensure that less dye rinses out.

Tips & Warnings

• Dye a test section of your hair first. These dyes react very different with different colors and types of hair, so the results will not be uniform.
• This technique shows up best with people with light colored hair. If you have dark hair, use a natural lightener like lemon juice before dyeing.
• This type of dyeing can cause an allergic reaction. Test the dye on your skin a few days before you dye your hair. Mix the dyes as you would for your hair, rub a little on a small area of skin, rinse and cover with a bandage. Observe 24 hours later.