Monday, August 8, 2011

Torture at the hair salon

With the sounds of screams and wails still echoing in my mind, I am sitting down to write about the horrific experience of Charlotte's first hair cut. Or, if she were telling the story: the day my parents tied me down and tortured me while they took pictures and ignored my screams for help.

I've been pondering Charlotte's first hair cut for a while. I know you shouldn't compare siblings, but some things are just obvious. Molly has curls. My curls. They started showing up before she was 1, and we were able to delay her first hair cut until she was about 3 and a half. With curls, you can't see the unevenness of hair growth. It just looks cute and curly. Charlotte has more of the Lafferty hair, because, with the exception of a couple of cow-licks, it is stick straight.

Now, being a curly girl myself, this straight hair business baffles me. When Charlotte's hair appeared to be headed in the straight direction, I started thinking what we should do with it. (I say "we," but really it was me. Cory, I don't think, put one iota of thought into Charlotte's hair style, unless it was me asking him what he thought of my idea.) My mind immediately went to the adorable little girls with their cute, straight bobs. (Think Suri Cruise when she was younger.) It was settled. That's what we were going to do. But, I didn't know at what age to do it. I didn't want to make her grow up too fast, after all, she's still my baby. However, her mullet in the back was starting to drive me absolutely crazy. I waffled back and forth for quite a while.


I had to make the decision to do it and go through with it before I could change my mind. So, I decided, enough of the mullet. Let's do this today. Luckily, the kids' salon where we take Molly had an opening for 6:30. Not luckily, Charlotte skipped one nap today and only took a short second one. I was hoping if we stuffed her with enough food beforehand, she'd still do ok. I even brought dolls, ponies and snacks to distract her. Oh, Amy-from-two-hours-ago, you were so foolish and naive!

We got to the salon, and they weren't ready for her, so we were forced to start out torturing her by showing her the cool cars where she got to sit, but not letting her sit in them. Full-on tantrum before the appointment even began. She did ok when we sat her in the seat ... until she saw the bucket of suckers. More screams. So, we gave her one. She calmed down. Then, the hairdresser started spraying her hair with water. You'd think she was actually being sprayed with a skin-burning chemical weapon. Oh, the torture. And, yes, I'm talking about my eardrums.

She clung to my neck the ENTIRE hair cut. Finally, I just sat down and had her in my lap. I'm a little scared to see how even the hair turns out tomorrow. But, I'm so grateful to Kris at Shear Madness. She was incredibly patient and kept telling me that the screaming didn't bother her at all. I think I apologized for the crying about 952 times. Meanwhile, Molly was content as could be, sitting in a different car, watching Scooby Doo on TV. The advantage of age, I guess. And naps.

So, to further torture my child, I will now show to all of you, photographic evidence of her devilish behavior at the hair salon. Enjoy.

Give me a SUCKER!!!
Molly, happy as a clam.
Got my sucker. The calm before the storm.
And, so it began. How dare she spray me with water?!?
Charlotte got an arm workout with how hard she was clinging to me.
That is a look of pure and absolute terror. I feel a little bad putting this out there for you all to see.
"Help me, Daddy!!!!"
My God, please let this be over.
Finally, another sucker, and a little peace.
Molly, still happily (and quietly) watching Scooby Doo.
The only time we got a smile was when we got home (far away from that evil hairdresser).
So, lessons learned from this experience? 1. My whole life, I'd wished I'd had straight hair, but I guess having curly hair helps when you are younger. At least it can delay your first hair cut until you are old enough to understand what is going on. And, 2. If your kid skips a nap, just cancel the appointment and reschedule. Your eardrums will thank you. Trust me on this.

3 comments:

  1. For us, the end result was worth it.....love the story and the pictures....although, if I were there I probably would have left the place in tears myself!

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  2. Oh my gosh! This is horrible but I laughed so hard at the photo you didn't want to post. The poor thing!! I hope she doesn't have nightmares about it. Maybe by next time she'll have forgotten this...hopefully her hair doesn't grow too fast and you can wait 6 months or so.

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  3. Sorry about the "fun" had by all, but 1) great post & 2) SUPER cute hair at the end of it all! :)

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