Hair – Dust Bunnies and Dog Toys

As I mentioned a while back I’ve been pondering chopping my hair off again. Don’t get me wrong, I love long hair because it means I can create beautiful curls like this. But 90% of the time I style it straight or clip it up due to my busy, busy schedule. And here recently, it’s almost always down and straight because it’s just too long to pull up quickly.

I set an appointment with my stylist for a color (which I was in desperate need of) and a trim, planning to take an inch off to make it a little lighter and clean up the ends. But I hadn’t realized just how much it had grown out since my last trim until I started thinking about what I’d ask for at the appointment. I don’t think it has been this long since high school! This is it after blow-drying but before styling.

Then I saw this. I love this gal’s hair and her blog! I’ve always been a fan of a mid-length style and often come back to this length, so I was sold on this cut.

I pinned the post and took it to my appointment where I showed the fabulous Miss Bri what I wanted. Here’s what she created!

I LOVE IT! It’s so much easier to wash, blow dry and style in the mornings and I still have length to do some variations of up dos and curls. I usually make it a bit more sleek on workdays, but a quick blowdry with a round brush works just fine for a casual family outing on a breezy day. 🙂

The hubs says he loves my look no matter what length my hair is (ahhh, love that lug), but I know he truly likes it short, so this is a good compromise of what he prefers and what I wish I had time for. What’s your opinion? Is longer or shorter better?

My hair and I have a love-hate relationship. I love to hate it. I guess it’s that thing about you always want what you don’t have. I have thin, limp, straight hair. So I’m totally in love with any style best suited for full, thick, wavy/curly hair. I recently grew my hair out from the bob haircut I was sporting about a year ago just so that I could curl my hair and do the pretty up dos that abound on Pinterest.

Unfortunately, I’m not extremely proficient at hair styling, especially on myself. And the fact that I have to apply product, curl and then style each morning takes more time than I usually care to spend on my hair. So I searched for ideas on how I could comfortably curl my hair while sleeping and found this tutorial which I gave a try last night since it was the weekend and we planned to go trail riding in the morning, so it didn’t really matter what my hair looked like as it would be wind-blown by the time we were done. It’s a good thing because when I pulled out that headband in the morning, it looked like I’d been in a fight with a curling iron wielded by a beauty school drop-out! I was too frustrated to take pictures of what it did look like, and even if I had I probably still wouldn’t have posted them.

Let’s just say it wasn’t a style I plan to use again, but I figured I had some texture so why not try out an updo style I want to start using to hide the fact that they weren’t pretty curls. I’m in love with all of the tutorials Kate over at The Small Things Blog does, especially her messy buns like this one and this one. So I combined elements of each. And this is what I ended up with.

I was pleasantly surprised! It’s definitely better than the typical pony tail or twist & clip styles you typically see sported for casual outdoor activities. I think it needs some teasing for volume at the crown and the side twists should be done looser, but with a little practice and refining it might even be suitable to wear to work! And even better is that it’s comfortable and seems to hold fairly well. I had a few pieces come out while riding, which I just twirled and tucked back into the mess. I had the hubs take a typical side and back shot so you can get an idea of how the whole thing looked.

So maybe that headband curl idea wasn’t such an epic fail if it provides a base of texture to create something like this quickly. Perhaps I’ll give it another try next weekend when I have time to ‘play’ with the results. When I asked what the hubby thought of this new look he said, “It’s different.” *SIGH* He’s such a great friend who I want to share everything with that sometimes I forget he’s a GUY and not a girlfriend! I asked if it was a ‘good’ different or a ‘bad’ different. He said, “Well it smells good.” Um. Ok. I pointed out that it smells exactly the same as it does every day because I used the same hairspray I do every day! At least I know I smell good – according to him anyway! LOL