hair care

When we first met our daughter, Sumaya, she had a very close-cropped hair cut. Her home kept all of the babies' hair short, and at first I chalked it up to it being a cultural thing. But after 4 months of caring for this little girl's hair, I discovered the real reason for their little, nearly-bald heads: it's so much easier!

What auntie could sit down with every child to wash their hair, detangle it, moisturize it, style it, etc? Even if they did it once a week, do you know how LONG it would take the poor aunties? Forever. That's how long. Not to mention how it would strain their voices (and their nerves) to tell these little babies not to rub their heads on the floor, the dirt, the couch...stop playing with the clips, and for heaven's sake, stop touching each other's hair.

Case in point: a precious 2.5 year old named Sumaya. 

I confess that for the first 2 months, I didn't do anything to her hair. Nothing. It was short, it was great, no big deal. But then her hair started to grow. And grow. And grow.

So now, we're 6 months into this raising a daughter thing, and I realize that if I want to avoid looks from other mamas about why my child looks so unkept, I better do something. Problem is, I have no idea what to do with curly hair - mine has never held curl for more than 4 hours tops (even when professionally done). So I hear that curly hair is so different, and I have a lot of questions: How often should I wash it? What do I put in it? How do I learn to fix it - without taking cosmetology classes at the junior college, please. Can I use rubber bands? No? Ok, then where can I find some of those soft cloth rubber bands? Oh, Target doesn't have them...um, where do I go?

Fortunately, I found a blog called Chocolate Hair / Vanilla Care that I sat down and read for several consecutive nap times one week. It's fabulous!

So, I'm starting to try some styles on Suma's hair, and I thought it would be fun to post them. They're not great, but they'll be fun to look at when (theoretically) I've gotten better at this in 6 or 12 years. :) 

Attempt #1
March 2012

This was the first attempt at her hair, and I think her face says it all (sorry, girl). The parts aren't remotely straight, the poofs (if you can see them) are different sizes, and the twists are too loose to stay for more than 20 minutes. Fail.

The second attempt at this style was much better - the parts were more defined, the poofs were closer to the same size, twists were tighter and held for a few days before they got frizzy. Yay!

Attempt #2
April 2012

I also tried out finger coils on her hair. They took exactly one viewing of "Robin Hood" to complete and needed touch-ups every day. But they were too cute, they were easy to do, and they didn't need any elastics.

Attempt #3
April 2012

We'll get there, yet!

Attempt #4, May 2012
Two-strand twists! They've gotten a little fuzzy, but they've lasted over a week!