Wavy

My hair and I are having a moment. It's a good moment. That hasn't happened for a while.

You might remember that I can always think of something I'd rather do than fuss with my hair. Blow dryers are hot. Curling makes my arms tired. Professional styling services are expensive. My hair naturally bends in funny directions. I am going gray. I'm uncoordinated and generally don't care that much.

Good news, though. I have found a friend who does a lovely job on color. Right now we have a light-to-medium chestnut brown thing going on with some coppery highlights. Next month we go for bolder blond ombre highlights, which will be fun for summer, and low-maintenance which is very important for me. My friend does a nice job keeping my now-long layers in line and cutting long, sideswept bangs so at least I have something going on that points your attention away from my enormous cheeks. Bonus, I can bring Z along to her house to play with her kids while I get prettied up.

The length - now a good few inches below my shoulders - means my hair goes wavy instead of bending weird and flipping funny. That's good. Wavy is the Thing now, you know. So I have good color, a good cut, and the Thing.


I let my hair air dry without combing it. Then smooth on a little of this stuff - Sally Hershberger Wreck & Roll Texturizing Cream. Just a dot, maybe the size of a Cheerio or smaller. I rub it all over my hands and then just run my hands over my hair. It smells like roses, calms frizz and makes waves that look like I've spent the day at the beach. Good stuff.


If the waves need more help curling up - you know, if it's a dry day or whatever, which is almost always in Montana, I use a wave enhancing spray and then scrunch. Sometimes even with a blow dryer on low heat. KMS makes a nice spray, linked above. A cheaper alternative, still good, is this wave-enhancing spray from Garnier Fructis. I also have some Aussie Sprunch Spray for stubborn spots in my hair, but beware, it will take you right back to the days of spiral perms and the bangs style known as The Claw. Yes indeed, crunchy hair. Use sparingly, right.


For days when I do actually feel like doing my hair, I was lucky recently to get an InStyler as a gift from my friend Victoria. It's stinkin' cool. Sometimes I use it on my whole head for a really polished look (all right, that's almost never - when do I need to be polished these days?) but more often I just use it to straighten my bangs and make them go the way I want, to imitate an Emma Stone look with sleek bangs and waves in the rest of my hair. I love it that that's a really current look with absolutely minimal effort.

So, yay for me and my hair moment. It's all in the waves.