Life is crazy these days. With COVID, there is no wonder that some of us even get dressed each day, much less comb our hair. So it would be no surprise if…every now and then…a busy, tired mother just lets her daughter’s hair go.
Or maybe your daughter wants to wear her hair down. Everyone passes out before you’ve had the chance to twist it or braid it the night before. If either of these events happens, you may find yourself facing a head full of tangled, matted hair!
In those instances where we have to go out and I find myself in this situation where I need their hair to look decent…or maybe just need to style it for school, I tap into one of 3 quick styles that transforms their hair relatively quickly.
- Afro Puffs
My first go-to style is an afro puff. I will first spray Midnite Train liberally to moisten my daughter’s hair and then I section off her hair and apply Extra Butter to figure comb her hair and slowly separate it. Usually during this process, my daughters are complaining by saying “Mommy it hurts” and that’s when I explain to them that that’s why we don’t go to bed without putting our hair into some protective style.
I love to use Extra Butter because it slowly lets her curls loosen up the matted or tangled sections, and then I smooth her edges and brush off her hair into a cute afro puff. Sometimes, when we have some extra time, I like to roll out her afro puff into a smooth bun.
Using this style, her hair may not be completely detangled, but it’s not as bad as it was when we first started, and the Extra Butter and Midnite Train will give her some extra shine and smoothness. This is a quick fix and I know that I have to detangle all of her hair eventually, but this gets us going (to Church or out to dinner) and is the first step towards transforming her hair. This process usually takes 5 to 10 minutes, but it varies on hair texture, curl type, volume and length (and quite honestly, on how much effort I want to put in that day).
- Cornrows
My next go-to style is two cornrows on each side of her head. The reason I do that is because it requires me to detangle her hair a bit more. So, I will take down her afro puffs, keeping that middle part I have already created, and detangle it a bit more. I will still apply a little more Midnite Train and Extra Butter on her hair to help with the separation and detangling. Once I am done, I will then braid it working my fingers through her hair and braiding it out. There might be parts of her braid that are not completely detangled but from a distance it will look smooth (and that’s all I need!). I tend to like Extra Butter a bit more because of the moisture it adds to my daughter’s hair, but Supercurl is great at adding oiliness and slip.
- Pigtails or “Princess Leia Ball”
My third and final go to style for my daughter’s hair transformation process is pigtails or what I call “Princess Leia Balls”. At this stage, her hair has gotten softer because of all the products I’ve applied in the past two styles (mentioned above), which makes her hair easier to detangle and more manageable than it was on day one (when it was a big matted, tangled up afro). So I keep that part that I made, and I take those braids out and slowly finger comb her hair all while spraying liberally with Midnite Train. I then follow by a moisturizer (Extra Butter or Supercurl) and then go in with a wide tooth comb to get all her tangles out.
This style consists of pulling her hair up into 2 pigtails. Depending upon the daughter I’m working on and the length of her hair, I will either braid the pigtails in sections or create my “Princess Leia Balls”. For example, my daughter — Harris — has longer hair now, so afro puffs don’t work for her anymore. For her, I will take her 2 pigtails and divide each pigtail into 4 sections and create 4 twists in each pigtail. I then wind the twists around, creating “Princess Leia Balls” on each side. I’ll use bobby pins or a small rubber band to lock the balls into place. My other daughter Emma on the other hand has Type 4 hair, so I usually take her hair and create two braids in each pigtail, securing the ends with my favorite Gabby Bows.
There are additional styles that I like to do on my daughters when I have more time or when I’m feeling fancy, but those are Sunday styles that you see on Pinterest. 🙂 I hope you found my process of transforming my daughters’ hair informative and I look forward to hearing your stories about how you transform your childrens’ hair.
xoxo
Renee @LifeByRenee
