Why You Should Do Your DD's Hair

As I've fessed up before, I don't always comb the girls hair every single day.  Especially during the summer, there are days that we are 100% rag-a-muffin around here.

Well, here's a good reason why I should have done Goose's hair....

My husband recently hung tennis balls from the ceiling in our garage so we know how far to pull our cars in.  Our garage isn't overly big and so we have to be pretty exact where our cars park.  Anyway, these tennis balls hanging by a string have become a fun novelty for the girls and when we're doing stuff outside, they tend to gravitate towards them and play non-stop with them -- swatting them to & fro, hitting them with random items in the garage and so forth.

Recently, Goose was outside going at it with one of the balls, and I was going in and out unloading stuff from our SUV.  I heard her sort of hollering for me to come and help her -- and this is what I found (and yes,  it was rather funny so I stopped to take pictures - such a bad mom!):

Seems Goose had been hitting the ball around and it had gotten close enough to her face that a few of her wispy loose hairs got brought in to the spin of the ball and it continued to wrap her hair up around the string.  She then tried to free herself only compounding the problem.  This doesn't look overly bad - but I really thought we might have to cut a bit of her hair out up front, possibly leading to bangs or something we hadn't planned on doing!  But luckily I managed to get it untwisted only leaving a few hairs behind on the string!

At least Goose learned her lesson and stays away from the tennis balls when her hair isn't done!  But I  just wanted to share the news of this oh-so-hazardous-to-hair "toy"!! :-)

Oh, and I still haven't heard from the winner of this week's Just Wondering Wednesday - so please e-mail me asap (Scroll down to the next post to see if it was you)!

We Have a Winner

Finally found a minute to figure out who the winner is for this week.  It was rather interesting to see how many of you buy stuff from the store vs. the salon -- or like me, in years past, bought the fancy stuff from the salon, but to keep a little extra $$ in the wallet, go for regular stuff from the store now.  I guess in the end, it's what you feel works best for your hair, but I was just curious to hear from you!

So today's winner is #51 ....

And that means Juliet is our winner.  Juliet is a pretty regular commenter around here, so I'm glad to see lady luck shine on her today! :-)  Get me your mailing address & I'll get your gift card off as soon as I can!

Hope everyone has a great weekend.  Hard to believe August is just a few days away.  Man how time flies!

Just Wondering Wednesday #8

I hope everyone is having a great summer.  I realized today my girlies go back to school in about a month's time & that's just crazy!  Summer has been flying by too quickly if you ask me!

Here's my question for this week.  I'm wondering ....
Are you a "salon product only" kind of person?  

I mean -- will you only buy the products you use

in your hair (ie shampoo, pomade, etc.)

from a salon or beauty supply store?  

Or... are you of the opinion all hair products 

are pretty much created equal & 

to heck what those salon folks say & 

buy what ever is on sale at your local store?!

Up for grabs this week:

$5 gift card to Sally Beauty Supply

(You can put it towards fancy shampoo if you want! :-))

Remember - leave a comment here if you want to be included for this weeks gift card.  I'll do my best to get the winner announced on Friday.

And on a personal note .... can I just say .... I've had countless people tell me over the years that any more kids after you've had 3 kids is no big deal ... it's easy & not really any different than having three?  I'm sorry -- but I can't disagree more!  The new "babe" I mentioned a few posts back that I'm going to be watching temporarily isn't so much a "babe" I guess -- she's 3 1/2 like Bee -- but I am just worn out by the end of the day.  Maybe it's because it's like having twins.   I don't know.  But I don't agree with people who say more than 3 kids is no big deal! :-)    Anyone else been deceived by the whole more than 3 kids is no big deal thing?!  I guess I'm just not a wonder woman - so you lovely and amazing ladies out there with more than 3 kids - you are my heroes! :-)  Ok, I'm done with my soap box now!  Thanks for listening! LOL

Dressed Up Bun

As it's still hot and very much summer here at my house, the girls often want their hair up off their necks & I'm always trying new things despite their asking for "just a ponytail" a lot of the time!  Sorry for another "bun" style - but  here's a sure fire way to dress up a boring bun and add a bit of "art" to the style.

Sorry - no step-by-step pictures on this- but it's really not a hard thing to do.  Let your "inner hair-artist" shine through! ;-)

Start by making a ponytail and secure it with a rubber band.  I set Bug's off to the left side of her head a bit with a zig zag part on the right side.

Braid or do a twist/rope braid (which is what I did) and tie the end off with a rubber band - leaving a tail.

Basically start to make a bun as shown in THIS old post but don't tuck the tail.

Wrap the hair around as you would to make a bun - but don't tuck the "tail" underneath the bun to hide it.  Secure the bun in a few places with bobby pins - but leave the "tail" of the braid sticking out of the top.

This pic is from our old Turkey Bun that I posted ages ago - but basically the point that the "artsy" part starts!

With the "tail" sticking out of the top of the bun, divide it into several small sections.  Spray them a bit with water so you can work & form the hair around your finger.  I had 5 small different sections.  The 1st, 3rd & 5th sections I curled to the left down around my finger to almost make a full loop or circle.  

The 2nd and 4th sections I barely curled over so they almost formed a candy cane like shape.  Make sure the hair is quite wet so you can work with the hair & then spray well with hairspray to "freeze" the hair in place!  Or be sure to have some kind of pomade to sculpt the hair into the shape you desire.  Hope that makes sense. 

I basically used the same technique to get the curved/loopy hair for today's style as I did for this old one I posted back for New Years Eve.  A bit of product to sculpt & mold the hair can do wonders!  You really can do all kinds of pretty loops & curls to make just about any style a bit fancier!

Anyway, sorry to refer to so many old posts.  But often times I do a style & then after wards realize that it has multiple parts of other styles I've done in the past.

 

I hope what I did makes sense.  Let me know if you have any questions!

The Winners

Happy Friday everyone.  So glad the weekend is almost upon us.  This week we've got 2 winners -one from Just Wondering Wednesday #6 -- which asked "If you could meet someone from the past - who would it be?"  I've got to say there were so many comments that made me almost cry - especially where we've been dealing with the loss of a loved one.  You guys had a lot of great responses to this question!

Random.org says the winner is lucky #13!  And to me the #13 is lucky -- so I can't say I'm surprised!!

That means lucky #13 is Carly  -- so e-mail your mailing address a.s.a.p so I can get your cash off to you!

And for the winner of this week's question - "How long does it take you to get ready?":

It looks like Melanie is the lucky #27 this time!  So please contact me w/your info so I can send your prize off as well!

I'm glad to see that I'm not alone in it taking me a while to get ready in the morning!  I don't consider myself a very high maintenance kind of gal - and since I can't just pull my hair up in a ponytail I do have to do my hair each day or I look -- well -- less than presentable!  But some days it sure takes a long time to get ready when the girls are around!!

Also, thanks so much to everyone and their well wishes for us during this tough time.  It's been amazing to see God's hand in things and to see His tender mercies - so thank you all who have offered prayers & thoughts during all this. 

Have a great weekend & we'll see you back here soon!

"Futuristic" Bun Hairstyle

I got this hair request back a couple months ago from a little gal named Sara - clear across the world from me in the Middle East -- Kuwait to be exact.  She sent me the following picture & wanted to know how to do it.

She described it as a "futuristic" bun - and I'd have to agree.  A very interesting style indeed.  From the looks of things it seems like they've crimped the model's hair in the front & pulled the hair back across a bun in back.  So here is our attempt at it.  I did this on Bee the other day since she had the waves left from braids she'd worn up front.  It gave it a bit wavier appearance but I rather liked it.  I do have an old crimping iron but opted to go with the waves from braids rather than possibly frying her hair! 

Start by crimping or using left over waves from braids in the front section of the hair.  We had waves from ear to ear - the picture on top looks like they just had crimped hair starting at the temple.

Pull the wavy hair up and out of the way with a clip temporarily.

Take the remaining straight hair in back & make a ponytail.  Make it rather high on the back of the head.  (I should have made mine higher.)

To give her pony a bit of volume I ratted it just a bit.

Wrap the hair around to make a bun.  Don't make it too tight or it'll stick too far off the head.  The model picture at the beginning looked like they'd made a loopy like bun.  We just did a simple wrap of the hair for this bun.  Secure the bun with a few bobby pins.

Now take the wavy hair in front and pull it backwards towards the bun.

Secure the hair with a few bobby pins so that it doesn't spread out clear across the head - you need it just coming over the top of the bun.

I even used hair pins as well for this so I could just "stick" them in & have the hair hold in place.  Use a few of those as well to secure the hair on top of the bun.

Once you have the hair secured on top of the bun, bring the ends of the wavy hair completely over the bun to the underside of the bun.

 I gave it a little twist to help ensure it wasn't going to spread out all over the place and make it harder to secure.

Wrap the ends up with your finger if the hair you are working with is longer and reaches past the bottom of the bun.

Tuck the ends up underneath the bun & secure with hair pins or bobby pins. 

Mist with hairspray and that's it.

I need to invest in some blond colored hair pins!

Her darn cowlick is pretty evident on the right side (the left side in this pic)! 

I didn't have the picture with me when I did her hair so I probably should have gotten things a bit more "square" looking back around the bun, as well as a bit tighter - but as odd as this hair style is, I actually liked the end result.  If the ponytail had been a bit higher, the bun might have been more "square."  Anyway, the pictures don't do it justice! With the waves it made it look prettier & maybe not as "funky/futuristic!"  Granted, it was a bit mature for Bee - but it'd look great on someone older!  So there you go Sara -- hope that helps a bit. :-)

Just Wondering Wednesday #7

I realize I haven't posted a winner for last week's J.W.W #6 - but I plan on doing that together with this week's question on Friday.  So I'll post a winner for #6 & #7 this Friday.   On a more serious note, and without going into much detail, there has been a death in our family & there may be some changes happening in my life that I hadn't foreseen.  So I may not be posting quite as often - or on the flip side - you might possibly be seeing a new "babe" here at Babes in Hairland for a time.  Things are rather uncertain right now and my heart is very heavy from the events over the past week and a half, so I ask for your patience and understanding over the next while - how ever long that may be.

Anyway - on with the show!

I was chatting with my husband tonight about a possible hair related question to pose to ya'll this week.  He suggested something -- but due to his "neat" sense of humor I'll forgo his question and ask this one instead...

How long does it take you to get ready in the morning?  

This does not include the countless times your kiddos claim there is a dire emergency that they need you for right now and that it can't wait until you have clothes on, many interruptions from your children, phone calls you answer or anything else that tends to interrupt your "routine." I'm talking about from the time you step into the shower/bath until you are dressed, hair and make-up done & consider yourself "ready" for the day.  How long does it take?

Up for grabs this week?  

Another $5 cash!

If you didn't answer last week's question - you can still get in on that one - so go HERE for that.  Oh, and be sure to come back tomorrow for a new do!

Tween "Pocahontas" Braids

Although Goose loves regular Pocahontas braids, I saw this in some random magazine a while back that I thumbed through while waiting for my hair to be cut.  It described the style as a more "mature" look to those type of braids or pigtails.  It's quick & easy and I thought it was a fun spin off of regular ol' braids!

Part the hair from front to back - however you wish.  I did an off center part on the right side up front, and then a zig-zag down the back.

Make a basic braid - I started a bit higher so I actually did add in a section on each side like the beginning of a French braid - but that isn't necessary.  Plait just a few sections of braid until you reach the nape of the neck.  Tie it off with a rubber band.

Then take a section of hair from below the rubber band and make sure it's a bit wet - or mist it with hairspray to make it smooth.

Wrap that hair around the rubber band at the base of the braid once or twice so it covers the rubber band.

Then take a clear rubber band and secure the hair you were wrapping to the entire ponytail.  You can use a topsy tail and pull it through the hair as some bloggers do - but this works just fine for me.  I didn't wrap the hair very much because I wanted it to lay nicely into the remaining hair that hung down.

The end result will look like this:  (If the rubber band shows a bit - just cinch the ponytail a bit and the rubber band should disappear up into the wrapped hair.)

The first time we did this I did a half-french braid on the left side of the hair to add a bit more to the style.

Add the french braid into the rest of the hair and plait just a few sections of hair at the base of the neck and secure with a rubber band.

Repeat wrapping the hair around the rubber band as you did on the right side.

I did this a second time and we didn't do the French braid on the one side.  We just simply plaited a few sections of braid & tied it off.

Curl the ends of the hair that hangs down & it adds a nice touch to it as well.  I curled them with my flat iron both left & right directions so all the hair didn't curl into itself and make 1 big ringlet!

This too, is kind of a fun & playful style for any age - great for a day at the beach, or a morning when you don't want to take the time to braid all the way down the hair!