Our hair routine
Oct 6, 2006 Parenting
Just ‘cuz.
We rarely wash her hair — only when it’s obviously dirty like last night because she has a cold and kept wiping the snot into her hair (when she wasn’t wiping it on me). Most of the time we just rinse it and maybe do a scrub on her scalp with baking soda. She hates to have her hair washed and I’m afraid of drying it out so that’s that. When we do wash it, we use a baby shampoo with conditioner. Some kind of Suave, I think. When we bought the last bottle she and I spent a long time in that aisle sniffing all the bottles before she settled on strawberry. I hoped that would cut down on the screaming during hair washing but it didn’t. Much.
Every day I spray her hair with Soft & Precious Detangling Moisturizer. I’ve tried others but this one seems to work best on her. It doesn’t weigh down her hair like some other African American hair products and it makes her hair softer than the Pantene conditioner we were using. Also it’s inexpensive and readily available at our regular grocery store, which is a good thing for both our money and time budgets. And Madison really likes the smell. (Yes, she’s into smells. So was Noah at this age, come to think of it.)
Ok, so I spray her hair down and comb it through with a wide-toothed comb. Then I ask her how many ponies she wants. (Ponytails.) If she wants one, I just pull it back. Since using the Soft & Precious, a single ponytail no longer looks like, “Oh my god, what the hell should I do with her hair?” (This is a look I see on a lots of little brown-skinned girls with pink-skinned mamas and I want to avoid it.) The conditioner leaves every curl defined and shiny and the little curls that are coming out around her face don’t look dried out. (Madison’s hair is getting thicker and curlier — around her face are one inch curls replacing the wispies. I don’t know what her grown-up texture will be.)
I have tried twists on her hair just to see what they look like and they look cute but not like twists. I’m not great at frenchbraiding but I do that, too. Sometimes she just has curly ponytails that used to be close to her head and now are getting longer. If I haven’t wet down her hair (sometimes necessary to bring her curls back), they are poofier but the pic I’m going to upload after this shows them looking sleekier ‘cuz her hair was just done before the picture and was still pretty damp.
Today she has four braids (parted with a rat-tail comb) and she yanked out the little dragonfly clippies at the end of the two in front. (sigh) Because her hair isn’t all that textured, the braids in front are slowly, sadly coming undone. (sigh again) I’m looking forward to the stage when she will maybe perhaps hopefully like having little doodads in her hair.
Madison is not tender-headed. While I’m doing her hair she will yank her head around and not mutter a word. (I wish she were just a tad tender-headed so maybe she’d keep her head still.) She does hate the rat-tail comb and calls it the “ouchie” comb even though we just use it for parting. (I think she’s afraid it might hurt because it looks pointy and also because we won’t let her run around with it — why, you could lose an eye that way!)
We started doing Madison’s hair when she was about fifteen months old and started to have enough to comb. I hoped that this would get her used to it but she can still be really annoyed at the bother. If the weather tolerates, we do her hair outside after breakfast while we’re sitting on the front porch. I use brother to keep her occupied — he’ll sing to her or read or just be silly and keep her looking at him. Or she’ll sort her rubberbands. It takes me ten or fifteen minutes to comb it out and do a style, depending on the style. I always sit her between my knees and start by saying, “So, how’s your day going?” Then we chat. Then she gets wriggly. Then I call for reenforcements from brother.
She likes to do my hair after (she asks, “So, how’s your day going?”) and she instructs me to complain (”Say ‘no no no’, Mommy” and then she’ll say, “I almost done. Just hold still!” or “It won’t be much longer!”)
October 6th, 2006 at 4:30 pm
You know, some things are the same no matter what the race of the child. This is what I go through everyday with my older daughter. Except she has that superfine anglo-saxan blonde hair from her father. You can’t curl it, it won’t keep a barrette, it won’t hold a head band, everything just falls out. It seems the only thing that works are the Goody braided elastic ponytail holders. Non-braided doesn’t seem to hold. And does madison sometimes change her mind mid-styling?
I will offer my big girl two choices - let’s say one pony or two? and she’ll say NO I WANT A HEADBAND. So I go to put in the headband and when I’ve just gotten it on her right, she’ll turn her head, some hair will fall in her face and then she wants a pony. AAARGH.
I am in fear of the day my younger daughter finally grows hair long enough to do something with. Looks like she will have very curly thick hair like me, but for some reason, at 2.5 it’s still just wavy fuzz around her head. When I put ponies in her hair it looks like Jim Carrey’s Venus DiMilo…
October 6th, 2006 at 5:58 pm
The pictures above look great to me. Excellent parts and neat braids. You sell yourself short when you say you aren’t good at it!
I can’t wait until Nat’s hair is just a titch longer. Today I made twists and knots. The twists are too short to stay knotted by themselves, so I use rubberbands and tuck under the ends. Knots are my all-time favorite. Nat won’t leave cute clips in either, though. I have to settle for colored rubber bands.
October 6th, 2006 at 6:06 pm
Somehow I lost the password for photos. Any chance you could resend it to me?
October 6th, 2006 at 6:40 pm
man oh man … why do you have to start such interesting conversation when I have no time to read and write?!?!?
THe movers are coming in 19 hours and we are so not ready. And then I will be without internet access for –oh — who knows????
I’d love to share what I do with BlueJ — just cause… Hopefully I’ll think to do it later…
October 7th, 2006 at 11:38 am
Type your comment here.
Probably of no use to you whatsoever but the African women who use my mother’s childcare centre do their incredibly amazing braids while their children are asleep. These are refugee families who are following their own traditions.