Pull Through's & Cascading Curls

First off, you should know that I had no idea where I was going with this when I did this months ago, and secondly, I seriously think Bee had ants in her pants, because I took countless pictures, and had to delete the majority of them because they were all a total blur.  So please pardon the quality of some of the pictures!  Oh, and thirdly, I had no idea what to call this, so work with me here! :)  (And yes, I realize the flowers look like eyes or something on the back of her head.  She seriously wouldn't hold still to let me anchor them where I'd really wanted.  Ah, the joys of an almost 3 year old!)

Part the hair off center on the top of the head.  Then part from ear to ear.  On the right side of the head make a corkscrew/twist braid/rope braid and secure with a clip temporarily.

 

 Repeat on the left side, and temporarily secure it with a clippy or rubber band.  Let the twists hang out of the way for now.

  

With the rest of the hair hanging down in back, part it about half way down the head - again from ear to ear - but this time horizontally.  Secure each part of hair with a clip to keep the sections of hair apart.

  

 Leave the bottom section secured with a clip.  With the top section of hair, divide it into 3 smaller sections and temporarily hold them with clips.

  

With the far right section make a ponytail, and then do a partial pull-through (coming from underneath the ponytail.)  Don't pull it all the way through.  Leave a loop, and have the "tail" coming out on top of the ponytail.

  

 Repeat on the left side - forming a bit of a loop.  Cinch the hair tight at the base of the rubber band (as you would if it were just a pony tail & you wanted to cinch the ponytail tighter) to help secure your semi-pulled through hair.

  

Now, take your twists/corkscrews that have been hanging down in front and pull them back towards the middle back section you have parted out.  If you need to, twist them a bit again to ensure they are tightly twisted, as they sort of relax when not totally secured to anything.  Secure the 2 twists with the middle back section of hair with a rubber band, making a ponytail.

 

Take the ponytail and make another pull through - coming from the bottom up through the top of the hair.

This is where we encountered major "ants in pants syndrome" and pictures had to be deleted because they were total blurs!  So sorry there's a few pictures missing! Once you've finished the pull throughs up top, take the bottom section of hair that's been held separate with a clip and divide it into 2 sections.  Make 2 more ponytails, and flip them with pull throughs - again leaving loops and not pulling the hair completely through.

And again, after this, I just have "finished hairdo" pictures.  But with all the loose tails that are flipped over the top of the ponytails, curl them all nicely and arrange the curls to cover the parts, etc.  You can secure them with a few bobby pins, here & there if you need to. I was hoping this would make Bee look like she had more hair than she did, and had she been less wiggly on this day, it might have seemed like it, but I'm afraid, this style didn't do that for us!  I still liked it though, just didn't do what I was hoping for!

So nice that she finally held still for me to take pictures ... of the top of her head!

  

  

   

"It always feels like ... somebody's watchin' me ... and I have no privacy!!"  Stinkin' flowers! :)  Sorry - my husband made me do this!  Ok, so I had fun doing it - but I was so frustrated when I did this hairdo that she wouldn't hold still for me, and that the flowers looked like eyes!

And a mischievous -evil grin for the finishing touch!

 

Toddler Version of an Old 'Do

I guess when you get down to it, you might think that this is just "glorified puffy braids," but after I got done, it really reminded me of one of my favorite hairdo's I did forever ago when I'd first started my blog.  If you've been around from the beginning, or have gone back through my archives, you might remember THIS 'do.  It wasn't puffy ponies - or whatever you call them, but for the toddler version - that's what I had to do.

Sorry - I forgot to take a picture of the left side of her head first.  But being by parting the hair off center.  I switched things up a bit, and did the side part on her left side.  Then part down to the left ear and make a little ponytail.  Secure with a rubber band.  Then with the hair on the right side, make a diagonal part so that you make a triangular section of hair on the top of the head.  Secure with a rubber band.

With the remaining hair that is on the right side, part it off to make another ponytail, and include the one you just made on the top of the head in it as well.  Secure it with a rubber band.  (Sorry if it looks like she's picking her nose in a couple of these pictures!  She had a little cup of water and was dipping her finger in it and "painting" her face!)

Here's how it'll look on the right side of the head.  At this point, you'll have 1 single pony on the left side, and 2 on the right side (forming 1 pony tail.)

 

Take the ends of each ponytail and bring towards the back of the head.  Secure them with a rubber band off center - on the left side of the head.  Make sure the hair is slightly damp for this - it works much better.

 

Then part the hair from around the back of the head from ear to ear.  Smooth the hair and include the ponytail from above.  Use a rubber band and form another pony tail.

 

 This is what it'll look like form the right side at this point.

 

Depending on how much hair you're working with, or the size of your dd's head, you can make more ponytails, and make the sections smaller.  We were in a hurry, so I just made 1 more ponytail with the remaining hair at the bottom and secured it with a rubber band.  I then curled her ponytail with my small barreled curing iron.

 

 

Add a fun accessory of your choosing and your done.  This fun cute flower is from Every Little Detail. 

 

So am I off my rocker, thinking Bee's hairdo resembled this old hairdo I did on Bug forever ago?  Just a simpler and quicker way of doing it.  In the below hairdo, I didn't include that top ponytail in any of the other sections.  I did include it in the toddler version.

Anyway - Bee was being extra silly the day I did this, so we got silly & major cheezy smiles this day!

 

Tuesday Tip - Braid Leftovers

Don't know if you remember my post on Toddler French Braids.  I did it mid-November.  I totally spaced posting this next bit - as it kind of was the 2nd day hair from the French braids.  So here we are, almost 2 months later & as I was going through my pictures, looking for something totally un-hair related, I found these.

So - here's my tip for you today.  It sort of has 2 parts.  Maybe this is nothing new to most of you - but maybe for a few of you to try.

K - so your dd has had her hair in braids - regardless of what kind (this works on twists and the like too) and the next day you want to take advantage of her beautiful curly/wavy hair that the braids have created.  So in this case it was our "Toddler French Braids."

The next day ... you go to take out the braids - and from where the rubber band stops and below - it's straight.  That's problem #1 (at least that's my opinion!)

Because I'm -- O.C.D., uh - really into hair - that totally bugs!  So this is what I do. Remove the rubber band, and before doing anything with the braids using a small barrel curling iron, curl the ends - clear up into the braid.

When you're done curling, you should have something like this.  You can do each section (meaning 3 separate pieces of the braid) if you want .... or you can wait until you've totally taken the braids out and curl the ends -- but this way is soooo much faster I think, and works pretty much the same.  You may have a few misc. ends to curl here or there, but for the most part this takes care of those "straight ends" that are left over after braids.

Here's Problem #2 (in my opinion!)  You've got all these lovely waves from the left over braids - but on the back of the head it's - you guessed it - straight.  So after I've put to little pony tails on each side of the head up front -- I do THIS great easy hairdo to pull the 2 ponies to the back (that are so nice & fluffy and curly).

By pulling them towards the back, it covers up most of that straight middle section in the back of the head, and instead makes it all look pretty and wavy.  So you have nice waves in the middle section, and the ends are nice and curled under too - not all straight and jig-jaggy (that's probably not a word - but you kwim!?)

Sorry - her light hair against her white little jacket - with a hood - wasn't the best thing to show the end result of this on - at least to see the curled under ends.  Maybe a b&w pic you can see it better.  Either way - I'm sure you get the idea.  I just think curling the ends while they are still all grouped together is so much easier than curling along the whole bottom of her hair. Oh, and this fabulous turquoise clip is from Gimme Clips.  If you haven't known where you could get their amazing clips - they now have listed on their website a bunch of the major retailers where you can purchase them. 

Toddler French Braids

First off, I've got to pat myself on the back, as I feel like I've finally got a hang of French braiding.  Gasp - yes, I have a hair blog and I've stunk at French braiding (at least in my opinion!) I mean, I could do it, but I never really like how things turned out.  But with practice, I've gotten better.  And as the old adage says - practice makes perfect!  I still am not the queen of braiding, but I'll actually let the girls go out of the house sporting one of my braids now! :)  For this one, you'll need to know how to French braid.  I'll eventually put my video on here, but I don't have time for that yet!

Anyway, back to the hairdo.  This is nothing earth shattering, just something I thought I'd share because chances are some of you out there deal with this problem too (and who knows- w/all the many, many hair blogs out there, this possibly has been done elsewhere!)  Bee finally has enough hair to braid, or French braid.  BUT - she still has a lot of the little short hairs/baby hairs up front around her face.  So trying to French braid towards the front of her hair is a joke for 2 reasons.  One being those baby hairs, and secondly, trying to get her to tip her head the way I need her to so I can get a grip on the hair and braid it is just rediculous.  She's pretty good at holding still for short periods of time, but I still am usually working on a moving target.  So the other day I decided to try something else.

I made a side part, and then parted from ear to ear - making 2 little ponytails up front and secured them with rubber bands.  Then I did a zig-zag part down the back of the head to divide the rest of the hair in half. 

Starting on the left side ponytail I made 4-5 plaits of a regular braid in the little pony tail working towards the back of the head.

Then once I had braided far enough down the ponytail and I was over the hair hanging down in back - that's when I started adding hair into the regular braid, to start making a French braid.

Continue adding hair, as you would to French braid, and braid until you run out of hair.  You could stop at the nape of the neck and leave the rest in ponytails, or I could have flipped the braids up to cute-sify it some more, but I left it as is - 2 basic French braids, just started from a ponytail, into a regular braid, and then into a French braid.

 

And because she was in a silly mood & her sister wouldn't let her have her Halloween vampire teeth, she opted for putting a claw clip in her mouth for "scary teeth!"

Anyway, by doing the ponies up front, it helps all those little hairs stay put, she doesn't have to crank her neck to some weird angle for me, and we still get cute French braids out of the deal!

Lost a Bow?

So, this hair style isn't necessarily one to write home about - it was more one of necessity -- for a couple reasons. I'm hoping I'm not the only one out there that either -

A - Has a favorite bow or flower - but only has ONE;

B - Had a set of bows or flowers, and now 1 is lost or gone who knows where- in the mounds of Barbies, dress-up and toy boxes (please say I'm not alone in this!);

So the above reasons are one reason for this hair style. The 2nd reason is due to the length of Bee's hair. You may wonder what I mean, because most people say she has fairly long hair for a 2 year old. Well, that's mainly in the back - but her sides are shorter than the back and she still has fine whispy baby hair by her ears and up around her temples.

So to simply pull her hair back into a half pony (parted from ear to ear & pulled into a ponytail up on top) still isn't much of an option for us because once nap time is over both sides of her hair are basically no longer where they should be and it's a huge mess -- leaving just a bit of hair left in the rubberband on top. I really try not to plaster her too much with hair spray, etc. so hair coming out is a problem at this point.

So this hairdo was my solution for the 3 problems - either only have 1 bow cuz that's all I got, one is lost, and because her hair is too short to just pull it up into a half pony or full ponytail. This was also a great one when her hair was just barely long enough for the 2 ponytails to touch in back. I would make a 3rd little pony in back so it seemed like she had "more" hair! So here is your simple do for the day:

Part the hair from ear to ear - like you are going to make a 1/2 pony. But then also part it in the middle - or off to the side. As always, I prefer a part set off to the side. She wouldn't let me take a pic from behind at this point! Then make 2 ponytails. Now, see - this is the simple do anyone can do - 2 ponytails - cute and done, right? WRONG! I don't always have 2 bows or flowers that I want to use - and it would be ghastly for me to NOT put in a hair accessory right?! Ha! Well, for this exercise - yes! (And on a side note - I've just got to say how much I love this picture! I can't believe how big she's getting!)
So once you have 2 ponytails secured w/rubber bands, part of another section of hair in a triangular fashion. I start from behind each rubberband and go backwards at an angle until my parts meet up.
Once you've got the hair divided out - add the 2 pony tails from the front, comb it smooth, then secure with a rubber band.

Then just add your 1 lonely accessory & you're done. This one happens to be a fav of ours & it comes from Every Little Detail. All my girls love this one because of the soft fuzziness of it! You can also make that pony in the back further back on the head if you feel like the bow/flower is sitting too far on top of her head.
I know, it looks off center - it's because of the part - and I actually like the non-symmetry of the whole thing! So you do what suits you best! You can also do pull-through's in the front instead of plain old piggys if you want too. Change it up & have fun w/it.
And her "I'm ready to be done" smile! (notice the difference in her smile here than her first front smiling shot!!!)
Anyway - that's it. Simple, but serves a double purpose for us -- keeps her hair looking tidy and in order and solves the problem of the 1 bow/flower issue!! Hope it helps a few of you!