First Haircuts

Neither of our kids have ever had their hair cut before.  For Mitch only being 16 months, that's not terribly unusual, but Chloe is 4 years old and still never had a haircut (unless you count the time she took scissors to her own hair and trimmed the long pieces in front this past December, not noticeable to anyone, not even me, until I saw the cut off hair on the table).

We decided they both needed one and decided to do it ourselves!  It would have been really fun to go get their hair cut at a cute little kiddie shop where they can sit in airplanes, but I didn't think Mitch would be very happy and I can't justify paying a lot for Chloe to get her hair cut when it is just straight across cutting (her hair is easy because it's curly and you can't really tell if it's uneven).  We started with Mitchell.

His hair has just recently gotten thick-ish and is starting to form a curly mullet in the back.

It is very long over the ears and it was starting to look like a little old man's hair.

The baby curls in back were cute, but when they started to look like THIS (see above), I said enough was enough!

And his hair was so long on top that we could spike our own mohawk.  I called him "Spike Lee" one day after I spiked his hair and now Chloe calls him that every time his hair is spiked or sticking up.  She especially enjoys sneaking into his room with him, getting his baby lotion and putting globs and globs of it into his hair and spiking it herself.

Ben used his beard and mustache trimmer to get the job done.

The way Mitch was whining, you'd think hair really does have feeling in it.  I had to pull out treats to keep him still and quiet.

Here is our brand new man after the haircut!

Bye bye baby mullet, hello handsome!

I can't tell if his short hair makes him look older or younger..... at any rate, he is still our beautiful baby.

Now onto Chloe.  She hasn't had a haircut in all her 4 years because we had to work so hard to get hair in the first place!  I have been putting off cutting it because we FINALLY have hair to style and we've been enjoying it.  It just didn't seem right to cut hair that took 4 years to grow.

Here's a little flashback to illustrate my point:

Here's Chloe at 1.  She had less hair than Mitchell does AND a receding hair line (not a great styling combo).

I worked very hard at one year old to put her hair into tiny little pony tails on top of her head.  I was desperate for ANY hair to style.

At 2 years, we had a little bit more hair- it was definitely thicker, but not a ton longer.  At this point, it was very curly and I loved that.

But I still didn't have much hair to style.  She had the same hair do everyday.

Finally, by 3 years old, she had hair to her shoulders!  It was still very, very curly (and gorgeous) and we could do long pigtails, braids, pony tails, etc. 

Finally some length to play with!

And now, at age 4, it has doubled in length in just one year and we are having a blast styling it.

Chloe's curls are great because they are easy to style (we don't have to fight them like some kids with curly hair) and it makes for easy hair styling days if we don't have much time- just wet it down, put a little gel or mousse in, and put a bow in it.  It dries quickly and cute all by itself.

But just in the last month or two, her hair has been not so great.  It gets very tangly and snarly and she screams bloody murder when I try to run a comb through it.  The longer it gets now, the less curly it is and her hair looks flat, thin and unkept.  It took me a few months to finally do it, but I decided she needed it cut to give it some volume and bounce (and to reduce the tears each time we tried to style it- a bonus for Mom and child).  It was hard to do, after all the work it took to grow it.

Here's our little Rapunzel before her FIRST haircut.  Notice the scraggly ends at the bottom...

I gave it a whirl at cutting her hair.  How hard is it to cut a straight line? (Not terribly hard, but kind of tricky, to be honest).  Ben had to help me even it out at the end.

And here is the finished product.  I should have measured how much we cut off, but I'm guessing 4 or 5 inches or so.  It made her hair look so much thicker and has added a little more curl back to it.  (I'm sad that her hair doesn't get as curly as it did when she was 2 and 3......)

Maybe we'll cut it again in another 4 years!