Off with her head!

 I got a call from Leon's mom Tuesday that Leon said he was ready for a haircut!!!!

I suggested to get him to Great Clips right away before he changed his mind!

again.

She got him there and here is the before.  He hates brushing his hair but insisted on long hair.  I think he was envisioning his hair to be like an anime hero.

And here is my gorgeous grandson with his new doo!

He's going to be so happy with that!

I canned 12 jars of pickles yesterday morning and am SICK of it!! I looked into other options.  Found where you can make cucumber chips by slicing them thin (I've learned... it's supposed to be thicker than this), tossing them with oil (1 tsp), apple cider vinegar (2 tsp) and salt (1 tsp) and putting them in the food dehydrator for 4-8 hours.

Let them cool (or not) and they taste good on their own or dipped.  I used ranch.

REALLY good!  I actually bought more racks so I can make more at a single time.

And THEN for "the dumb thing I did" award.

I went out to mow the yard over my lunch yesterday and as I started out under the deck, I accidentally raised my head too soon and smacked the top of my head onto the edge of the deck. YIKES!

I stopped right away and headed inside.  I've seen enough 9-1-1 episodes to know that this means a concussion or a brain bleed or Typhoid. 

After he quizzed me on all the major birth dates of everyone in the family 

and seeing if I cooked my "9"s,

 

Ryan helped me find the ice pack and after taking the obligatory photo, I spent the rest of the afternoon and evening on the couch.

I rented "The Deep" with Jacqueline Bisset and Nick Nolte for $.75 and held Aggie for over an hour while she napped.

Being a grandma is the best!  When she started fussing, I handed her off to her parents and went to bed.

About to "head" out now and finish mowing.  Wish me luck!

Eye Gouging

SIGH...  my hairdresser is going to kill me... 

I did confess on FB to her.  

My appointment was sometime around now but I can't find the reminder card.  My bangs hanging in my eyes is usually a good sign that it's coming up.

And she's not considered essential so she'll be closed for about 2 more weeks, last told.  Like HECK is she not essential!  Robb is starting to worry that his hair is getting too poofy and he's starting to look like Side Show Bob from the Simpsons.  He's not...  

So after my shower this morning, I trimmed my own bangs.

Not QUITE like Joan Jett and not QUITE like Jim Carrey...

But just like me.  

At least the hair ends aren't poking my eye balls anymore.

Party Like A Meme

So Meri & Shub's potluck dinner party was great last night!  Meri, of course, had all her Pfalzgraff out and ten place settings filling up her table.  We brought some folding chairs so we'd have a seat too.  Our nephew and his girlfriend joined us as well as a couple from church.  Then Grandma, Robb and Leon.

The "kids" played hide and seek all over the house while the meal finished up.

Meri had cooked up the Penne Noodle lasagna, from yesterday's post.  Since she hadn't anticipated how long it would take to bake from frozen, dinner was a little delayed, but it tasted great.  She also had a salad made up.

The friends from church brought cheesy potatoes with bacon on it. YUM.

Josh brought some brownie bits and rice krispy treats made with fruity pebbles from Caseys.

Robb brought a pepperoni pizza from Caseys, where he met up with Josh.  This way Leon could definitely have something he'd like.  And it's Josh's favorite pizza.

PLUS pizza prices were half priced at ALL the pizza joints around our area in honor of National Pizza Day!

I brought some ice cream for dessert, some boiled cod to ensure my MIL had something she'd like and then I cooked up the Cube steaks with gravy in the Instant Pot.  It took almost 30 minutes to come to pressure as it was frozen solid.  

I pulled out the steaks at that point and mixed in the water and cornstarch to thicken the gravy, but it was taking FOR EV AH!  We didn't want to be late to Meri's, so I kept adding poultry gravy mix until it finally thickened up sufficiently.

At the same time, I made some instant mashed potatoes and pushed it all to one side of a heated up crockpot.  

The steaks got cut up into bite sized pieces and then mixed back in the thickened gravy. I left that until the VERY last minute and then poured it into the open side of the crockpot to keep warm.

After dinner, several people had to clear out due to work and sleep requirements, but after Robb took his mom and Leon back to the house, he came back and joined in a game of What do you Meme?

Hilarious! Especially because Meri had an adult version and I think Josh just picked the REALLY bad ones to hear how Robb or myself would read them out loud.

Yeah... I'm not reading this one and NO it doesn't win! LOL

We finally got home about an hour after our usual bedtime and I was asleep within 5 minutes of touching my pillow and after getting the weather update for the next week.

I went over there this morning and helped her clean up her kitchen a bit more.  

And because I have NO pics of the dinner, here are some of Leon.  He got his hair cut recently.  Here is what it looks like with the expensive product in it that he talked me into buying and the portions that got cut off.  He COULD have donated it to locks of love, it was so long!  Well, I exaggerate a little...

And here is him demonstrating how to use the product...  I had to hide it from him.

I'm just glad he never saw THIS comic!

Fun times... here's the recipe.  I hope you had a fun weekend!

CUBE STEAKS WITH GRAVY
serves 4  I put this one together.  The original recipe called for 6 cube steaks but we only had 8 so we did 4 per bag.

INGREDIENTS
4 cube steaks
2 cups water
1 cup pureed yellow or white onion
1/2 cup soy sauce
2 tbsp Worcestershire sauce
2 tsp minced garlic
2 tbsp beef bouillon - I used chicken because I didn't have beef.
1 tsp salt
dash pepper

1. Add all ingredients to a gallon sized freezer bag or container for instant pot.

MAKE IT NOW: Add to either the instant pot or crockpot and cook as directed below.

MAKE IT A FREEZER MEAL: Seal bag or container, removing as much air as possible and freeze.

COOK IN INSTANT POT
From frozen, add contents into an instant pot.  Add 1/4 cup water. Cook for 23 minutes at high pressure, then do quick release. Place on saute. Remove steaks. Whisk in a small bowl  1/4 cup cornstarch with 1/2 cup water until smooth. Pour mixture into the liquids left in the Instant Pot. Whisk continually until gravy starts to thicken. Add cubed steaks back into the pot, heat until warmed through then serve.

From thawed or freshly made, transfer into an instant pot. Cook for 20 minutes at high pressure, then do quick release. Place on saute. Remove steaks. Whisk in a small bowl  1/4 cup cornstarch with 1/2 cup water until smooth. Pour mixture into the liquids left in the Instant Pot. Whisk continually until gravy starts to thicken. Add cubed steaks back into the pot, heat until warmed through then serve.

COOK IN CROCK POT
From thawed or freshly made, transfer into slow cooker. Cook on low for 6 hours. Remove steaks. Transfer remaining liquid to medium saucepan. Whisk in a small bowl 1/4 cup cornstarch with 1/2 cup water until smooth. Bring saucepan liquids to simmer over medium-high heat. Slowly add while whisking the cornstarch mixture into the sauce.  Whisk continually until gravy starts to thicken. Add cubed steaks into the pot, and heat until warmed through, then serve.

SERVE WITH: So delicious served over buttery mashed potatoes and a side of green vegetables.

Stripes tell no lies

Leon's haircut was NOT popular with his dad and Jen, so he's getting a redo tonight from a hairdresser friend of Ryan's.  

Granted... this pic was a few minutes ago with bed head and his (my) favorite blanket, watching "my Youtube."  Kind of like me saying I'm going to watch my news channel. LOL!  He cracks me up.

As far as he knows I deleted this picture.  NOPE!

Back in high school, I had super long hair.  It hung all the way to my butt.  Straight as a board.  Most of my sisters and myself are doomed that way.  A couple of them developed a natural wave to their hair that they hate, but don't we all hate our hair at some point?  I guess we should be content with what we have...

I'm the sister on the far left with one of my shorter styles.  Although I think it's in a pony tail and COULD possibly hit my bottom if I let it hang.

The sister in the middle once drew a picture of me with staticky hair wrapped all around me.

Once.

ANYWAY!  I got my hair cut and was wearing a striped sweater.  I got home from the cut thinking I looked super cute and looked into the mirror.. One side of my hair hung down to one stripe, while the other down to the next 2 inch stripe...  My head was NOT tilted!  

I went back to the salon immediately and they fixed it.  My current hairdresser did that once too.  

ONCE.

So now I'm in the habit of wearing striped shirts when I get my hair trimmed...

BUT poor Leon.  No amount of stripes will help him as a guide.

Annual Lowering of the Ears

THIS kid...  The local beauty school was offering free cuts for school bound kids under the age of 12, so we took them up on it!

And they ARE students.  It was obvious that they didn't have kids either...  BUT she was patient with him.  The cape wasn't snug enough around the neck and hair clippings fell down inside his shirt and pants, making for a very itchy boy who squirmed.  AND my phone died just after taking this picture.

Got him home and got him in the bath quick with fresh clothes.

All better now and looks pretty spiffy for school.  It starts next week here.

Has yours started already?

One Day at a re-Belle-ious Time

Busy much?  yes please...  The story of my life.  

Today is the dress rehearsal that we get to go to for Beauty and the Beast!  

And we get to take pictures!!!  So expect some tomorrow.

WAY back at Christmas-time, I never thought it would take so long, yet only seem like a few days since we knew Meri would be Belle.  The stress has taken it's toll on her.  A deep one.  Friendships have been gained and a few lost.  But I hope after the first performance tonight, in front of a live audience, she'll realize her worth.

She got her hair dyed for the production and it's a deep deep brown.  It's only supposed to last a few weeks and then fade out.  I hope so.  It's weird to see her with such dark hair.

Before.

After.

See what I mean?  but it was either dye it or wear a wig.  She has such beautiful hair and it's so thick that a wig would look odd over all that.

Planning college visits and scheduling last minute things for the end of her senior year are coming up too.  But I can't think about that yet.  I still have a prom dress and a tux to make...  

I should probably order the fabric, huh?...

I'm looking forward to digging into that, but for now, one major event at a time.

The Price of Swank

This was Leon's hair 2-3 weeks ago.  Long, unruly and he hated having it combed or brushed.

His parents said that we could have it cut IF Leon was in agreement.  He was, off and on.  It depended on the day and if he'd had a nap. or if you'd bought him a toy.

Well, it was getting closer to the wedding and something had to be done.  His hair only looked good immediately after a bath with it combed JUST so.... maybe...

So last night, Maddy and I dropped off Ryan at work and headed to Great Clips with the boy.  He'd fallen asleep on the way.  Word of advise to anyone with small children.  

"Feed them Mountain Dew before a hair cut so they won't fall asleep on the way."

He woke up SO cranky that he just clung to my neck and it was a struggle to set him in the little booster seat.  And HECK NO was he going to let them touch his hair!!!  I had to take him into the restroom and have a talk with him.  Apparently one of the employees came out from the back and said that some kid was screaming his head off in the bathroom.  

Oh yeah... That would be my nephew, says Maddy.

I got him calmed down and in agreement again for the cut, until he came in sight of the booster seat again.  Maddy was brilliant and asked if Leon wanted to play games on her phone.

Oh yeah... Second tip of the day. 

"ALWAYS have games on your phone to distract a small child getting a hair cut."

It worked.  Granted she only had Unblock Me and 2048, but he was distracted and calm.  And the poor young pregnant woman attempting to his hair slow up her hyperventilating.  I think she was wondering just what she'd gotten herself into wanting to be a mother. 

And Maddy will be purchasing fifteen phones with games on them for her upcoming kindergarten kids. 

just.in.case.

Apart from the hair bits falling down his back, he was ok with the cut.  This isn't completely done, but mostly.  She layered a bit on the longer top hair and it falls nicely now.  

But WHAT a contrast!  

He's going to be SO swank in that suit!!!

Guess my age

Meri had a rough day Friday, even before the really rough one Saturday night... and after talking with a friend, decided to cut her hair as an internal gesture of starting fresh.

And before you get as shocked as I was when she announced the grand event was taking place, it was only 3 inches.

Yeah - a drop in the ocean.

THEN Robb and I were out shopping on Saturday morning and came around a corner in Walmart and who should we run into but Meri and her two cohorts, shopping for hair dye.  

WHA???!!  

Your hair is already beautiful!!!! Why color it all in??!!!!

Turned out beautiful...  Just a smidgen darker than it already was and isn't a solid color like I had dreaded.

Whew!

And this is why I get my gray hairs, which I will never color.  

Unless someone guesses my age as 40 years older than I really am.

Receding Hairlines and other business

I picked up Leon last night from his mom's and he'd gotten a haircut!

I hadn't seen that much forehead on him since he was 18 months old...  

I'm sure it will grow on me as much as it will grow back on him.

I took him to the Burger thing playland for a supper date.  He was playing just fine on it until he thought that there might be zombies in the tunnels...  ???  I was sure he'd be sleeping on our floor last night, but he didn't!  I wonder where he picked up on that!

Anyway, we had a great date and eventually had to head for home.  He was talking pretty steadily about his plans for the bowling shirt that included moving the dinosaur picture to the front because he didn't want it on the back.  AND he wanted his name on the back.

I guess he can wear it backwards.

And then for your jazziness, I had a request from the lovely Southern Gal to post some of Meri's jazz music up here.  I've only uploaded a couple so far onto Youtube, so here you go!

Enjoy!

The one below reminds me of the Austin Powers theme just a little... LOVE it!

   

Have a great Wednesday!

It's like... this.

The girls wanted to be just a teensy bit rebellious for the beginning of the 2015 school year and asked if they could dye just a small strip of hair a different color.  Maddy had done this in the past, so we said, ok.

They did a brown streak of hair and Meri came out to my office to show me.  It's underneath her beautiful hair so you can really only see it when she pulls her hair back.  I don't have a photo of it.  Then since I thought it was pretty, she asked if she could do her whole head of hair that color now.

REALLY??!

I mentioned that the little bit of hair was just a monotone color and her natural color had SO many colors in it already, people spend a fortune to duplicate her hair color in a hair salon.  Suddenly an analogy hit me.

It's like having a beautiful voice where you can sing all KINDS of notes.  Fa la la la trill!!!  But then suddenly it's only one.  Faaaaaaaaaaaaaaa...  Her hair is a beautiful blond with so many various tones of color that God naturally put into her hair.  Why would she want to change it to just one monotone?

She smiled and acted like she understood my analogy and went inside.  

I thought I'd reached her.

She complained to her sister inside.  "Yeah, Mom came up with another story..."

A Hairy Situation

Lately my hair, I feel, has looked like Ruth's hair, from the Middle.  Way too long and so many split ends, they can catch static from a passing airplane.

Ruth is the one with the obviously long straggly hair on the right.

I haven't made time to get a hair cut since, I think, as far back as July.  So I'm trying to get a cut in with my gal either today or tomorrow.  I hope she can fit me in!

Or I'll wear a wig to the company party tomorrow night...

When I was a teenager, I rarely got my hair cut.  It grew so long, it reached my bottom and was my pride and joy...  I french braided, braided, ponytailed, macramed it, playing with my hair like it was a crafting tool. 

 Wrote to my penpal whenever I DID get it cut and told her how many different ways I could still wear it.  She thought I was a dweeb.  I didn't find that out until I was an adult.

But anyway, my sister and I drew pictures of each other on a long car trip once to pass the time.  I don't remember what I drew of her.  I was a good artist, so I'm sure it was complimentary!  But her rendering of me has stuck with me all my life.  

There was a tall skinny girl with long flowing hair that was wrapped around my body like a billion snakes bothered by static, strangling me.  I guess my hair WAS rather dry and staticky... 

I think I'm back to that status again. :\  It WILL be remedied!

 

Didn't do any sewing yesterday.  I plan to do a little over lunch and then I have all evening tonight.  It'll get done.

Due to a fundraiser at the schools, we now have a huge box of grapefruit and another huge box of variety fruit.  Meri didn't know I'd ordered the grapefruit from someone already.  So we've got fruit coming out of our wazoos!  If this doesn't kick this cold, I don't know what...  I'll have another grapefruit at lunch along with some fudge.  mmmm

Lots to do for work today.  I went through my emails and past to do lists and made up a new one.  It's pretty long!  I don't think I'll get it done today, but maybe I can pick one or two off.

Have a great day!

April's Fools

Third attempt at french braiding for Meri.  Looking good chick!

 

She and a friend splatter painted some clothes on purpose Monday after school.  I wouldn't let them splatter paint in the house or while the shirts hung on the wood fence.  I'm pretty mean, huh?  They didn't want to lay the shirts on the grass because yucko!  They'd get dirty!!  You know what?  I know how to wash clothes!!!  

Just so you know they're not crazy, I will tell you that there is a Glow-in-the-dark dance on Friday night at their school.  So this neon paint is glow in the dark variety.  

Oh!  I get to work in the school kitchen during the dance!!  So I'll keep an eye on my little girl...  And then on clean up duty.  Meri and same friend have promised to help out.

Meri painted up an old pair of jeans too.  

While they were painting, the wind suddenly picked up something fierce and the rain started.  They moved to the deck under the overhang and ended up just using paint brush strokes rather than splattering.  There was no mess!  The rain lasted all of 3 minutes but was extremely powerful.  Whew!  

 How did your April Fools Day go?  No one really punk'ed me at all.  GOOD!  At least I don't think so.  I need to ask Maddy again today whether she did or did NOT actually get into College choir...  There are 4 different choirs at her college.  The red robes, which she's in this year and is an all female choir.  The blue robes, all men's choir.  The green robes, which is a LOT of students that didn't want to be in any of the other choirs.  And then the black robes, which are the best of the best.  

This year, the black robes got to go to Florida and have concerts at many and various schools and churches AND sit on a beach.  This group gets to travel...  a lot...  I didn't even know she was going to try out for it!  

So if this is true, then she needs to work harder on her smug attitude, even though she SAID she's "got it down", in her words.

And while I was downloading some photos from my cell phone, I found a picture from Nebraska from the visit to my folks!  Leon playing, King of the tree stump!  

 

 

We're supposed to get some rain this afternoon, but that won't stop Meri from riding her moped to and from school today.  

I didn't tell you that yet, did I?!  Just after spring break when Meri got her moped permit to drive, she was bound and determined to ride it to school that Monday.  But we wouldn't let her because we had a blizzard.  I didn't want her to get within a block of the house in an unplowed street and land flat on her back on pavement...  We let her on Tuesday because there was just a dusting of snow.  She wasn't happy that I insisted on following her over...  But she got to drive it home by herself.  And that was cool...  literally.

So if the weather isn't too yucky, she's "little miss Independent"!  Yesterday she drove it on a county highway to get to piano lessons!  6 miles!!  No amount of rain will stop her now!!!

Unless it's a torrential down pour like it was on Monday.  YEOWZA...

Bait and Switch

Getting ready to take our sewing to the State Fair tomorrow!!!  After reading the judges comments, I know NOT to take one dress because I had rushed on the hem hand stitching...

I can read between their lines.... It looks like a 7 year old hand stitched it...  

No!  I get it!!!! 

I'm ok...

;P

A few of you commented on my daughters hair so I thought I'd give you a before and after of my daughter's decision to change the hair color of her youth...  She wanted to try something different that didn't involve anything permanent that she'd regret when she's older.  The senior pics were out of the way, so that wouldn't be affected.  She's a smart girl!

AND I think she may have been getting a little sick of blonde jokes...  BUT...  she's pretty good at flinging out those same jokes at the drop of a hat... so that might not be it.

It took a lot of convincing her father and he finally just threw up his hands and said "whatever..."

For me as a teen out of 7 (at the time) kids, my parents really didn't care what we did with our hair as long as they weren't going to have to go to therapy with us later about it.  I used Sun In.  Remember that stuff?  I don't even know if they make it anymore.  I was a dishwater blonde, a little darker, but one summer I used the Sun In to lighten things up.  I kind of liked the results!

At the end of the summer when I wanted to get a perm before school started, the hair dresser refused to give me one.  She took a clipping of my hair and dunked it in perming solution and it dissolved...  Yep.  I was almost a bald chick showing off the mole on the back of my head...  THAT would have involved therapy... I stuck with the straight as board hair for that year until it all grew out.

Anyway... BACK to Maddy's noggin'!

Before

After

 And then a week later at the fair.  Her hair color had lightened up a little and she looks a bit less like she's going incognito!

 But inside and out, she is still a beautiful girl.  

I love you Mad-girl!

Sweetheart Saturday!

On Saturday morning I got up REALLY early! Maddy was performing with her jazz band in a town about an hour away at 8:30am and I had a lot to do before Meri and I could leave home.

They did awesome! This was the first time I'd heard Maddy play the accordion, but it was kind of quiet anyway. Don't know why that is... I guess she's shy.
When we got home late morning, I got back to work getting the house prepared for the upcoming baby shower. More about my miracle cleaner Wednesday! Let's just say my carpets haven't looked this good, since.. well... forever. Well, I exaggerate. 3 years maybe.

Meri and Tiffany went swimming and then Meri went to an overnight birthday party. Tiffany worked like crazy getting the cupcakes made and frosted. She made 78! Being that we had invited a LOT of people and it was an open house, we wanted to be prepared. Didn't know how many to prepare for, so better to be safe than sorry...

Around 4:30, I went over to Maddy's friend's house where the pictures for the Sweetheart ball were being taken. The girls and their dates were going out to eat before the dance, and I wanted to see them in all their glory.
Even tho the zipper was hand stitched in, it held! She looked beautiful.
They DID have shoes! They're just sitting by the door...
Her friend did most of the girls hair from info she found on Pinterest.com.
More merriment about Sunday tomorrow. What's that old saying? "A story about Sunday is worth a hamburger on Tuesday?"

That doesn't sound right.

You look Fabio!!!

My son is growing his hair really long. Unfortunately he never got the speech that I gave the girls in elementary school because we didn't anticipate this length for him. *ever*

The speech consisted of this...

Your hair is mine until you are taking care of it yourself or 5th grade. Whichever comes first.

I figured in 5th grade, the girls will be girly enough to want to take care of their own hair. Competition amongst friends in cliques is pretty fierce at that age. The girls will WANT to take care of their hair and learn trends...

So until that time, I was in charge of how long it could be. If they got a perm. If they got it layered.

As a child my scalp was very tender and my mom couldn't take it any more. She made us all get "little girl" hair cuts. Which basically made us look like Tinkerbelle. No - not Tink... Kathy Rigby as Peter Pan. Very short and sweet and very easy to comb thru in the mornings.

So as a boy, Ryan missed out on all this. We did agonize over his hair because of his alopecia condition and figured out comb-overs when necessary, but for the most part, his hair was short.

When he turned 16, he started growing it out. Some of the conditions to borrowing the car or having super secret permission was that he get a hair cut. He did on just those occasions.

Lately he's been giving it a lick and a promise to comb it out for a quite a while. So it's turned into dread lumps. That's dread locks, but in lump formation. I finally cornered him last night and said "Your hair is mine for the next hour." Perfect. We washed it, got it gooped up with about half a bottle of conditioner and got to work. Well - I worked. He watched tv, perched on a stool in the middle of the kitchen. We rinsed the conditioner out afterwards. His hair is almost to his waist. If it were my hair, being a girl, I'd be very proud and comb it out all the time.

It took a solid hour from start to finish and when he saw himself in the mirror, he did a happy dance. Have you ever seen a 19 year old do a happy dance? It's a bit disconcerting...

You know... If he were a long haired cat, I wouldn't have bothered. I'd have just clipped it out.

Sorry no before or after pics. I think just me telling about it is humiliating enough...

My hairdresser is so darn popular...

The girls and I get our hair trimmed every 5 weeks or so and at each appointment schedule the next one 5-6 weeks down the road. The week that I'm scheduled for the trim, my bangs seem to know it and deliberately poke me in the eyes and annoy me...

We had 3 appointments lined up for a Thursday evening just before New Years and I had to cancel. I don't even remember why, but something came up that was more important than hair cuts. I figured that we'd be able to get in over the holiday, but nope. Our hairdresser runs a one-man shop and really needs to schedule the 5 weeks in advance to make sure you get in. We kept calling just in case someone canceled at the last minute, but no one ever seemed to.

Well, it is now February 17th and Maddy is desperate. I've personally trimmed my bangs with my husbands beard trimmer several times since the canceled appointment and unless you've seen it, I think it's ok.

Since it's been so many weeks past when we should have gotten it cut, I thought we could last a few more, so I scheduled at least 2 of us for a Saturday morning in March. Maddy is thinking that she'll probably trim it herself. The last time she did this, she was 3... Maybe she'll do better this time...

I'll probably blog about it...

When I was 15 or so, I watched the TV show Dallas a while, until they jumped the shark with Bobby dreaming a whole season... But during that time, I noticed that Charlene Tilton had the coolest hair and would french braid it among other styles.

From her braided hairstyle, I figured out how to french braid my own hair. I had super long hair during my teen years and my arms ached as I worked and worked at a long braid running from the top of my forehead down the back of my head until I'd perfected it. I was a master at that style!

My sisters soon realized this and took advantage of it as often as they could. Their hair was much shorter than mine, but it still looked pretty cute if I did two french braids, one on each side of their head and it worked best if their hair was freshly cleaned and still wet. I tried to charge them for the work, but you know... they're my sisters and could get away with it if they threatened me... No more wearing their clothes, going to movies with them, etc. So I guess this was rent for wearing their clothes...

They both worked as nurses aides at a local nursing home and during the summers would have to be to work really early. There were many mornings when they would wake me up from a sound sleep and order me to french braid them. I just remember being SOOO tired, combing their hair and saying, "That looks nice..." "NO! FRENCH braid it!" sigh...

So I basically learned to french braid in my sleep... A pretty good skill to have now that I have a teenage girl of my own...

Last night, I was awoken from a dead sleep at 11pm by my 14 year old daughter, who will be 15 tomorrow. She had stayed up late working on a debate project and had finally gotten done and showered. Her hair was wet and she wanted me to french braid it so that it would be wavy today. One of her friends had french braided it a few days ago on a band trip and when she pulled the braid out later, it was all nice and wavy and she liked the look a lot.

So I'm in my pjs, groggy, in the bathroom, braiding... Complaining... cranky.

When I got done, she thanked me and said that she was sorry she woke me.

So I told her...

Not to worry dear... I'll probably blog about it in the morning...

Alopecia Aloschmeesha!

Ryan's hair... When Ryan was one, we started taking him to get his hair cut at my beautician, Joni, who had a shop in her home. His first cut with her consisted of me holding him on the floor while she cut one side of his hair, then I flipped him over for the other side... Little did we realize what a struggle his hair would become.... The below picture is nothing. His hair is much longer than mine now and his father and I don't mind too much anymore. It's better than what it HAS been...
When Ryan was three, Joni noticed a bald patch on the top of his head and asked if he'd gotten a hold of scissors or a razor. Nope... We discovered that he had Alopecia Areata, which means loss of hair in areas of the body. The clinical reason for this was that he had some stress in his life and it was coming out thru his hair... Or at least that's what it said in Joni's hair manual. We disagreed. The only stress was that his sister had just been born...

He eventually lost all hair on his arms, back and legs and at one time only had a half of an eyebrow. He kept most of his hair on his head, but at times it was pretty obvious. Sometimes it would grow mostly in, then one morning a bunch of loose hair would be on his pillowcase and it would start all over again on a different side of his head.
As time went on, Joni moved and we had to take him to a cheap hair cutting place and they spouted off the entire paragraph that they had learned in beauty school. "What kind of trauma has he been through?" We explained his sisters birth... But I'm pretty sure that's not it...

We took him to specialists and dermatologists who prescribed or "practiced" on him. Apparently we hit every specialist who had never had a patient so young with this condition. They prescribed meds that made the bald patches red and irritated, so much so , that Ryan called his bald spots holes. He hated those meds! This had nothing to do with nutrition. Not too many hotdogs or mountain dew...

We got a hold of some Rogaine thru a prescription (at that time) and started applying it daily. We were not going to let him lose his hair until he was 18 and wanted to just shave it off. The insurance company gave us some flack saying that they couldn't cover the cost of Rogaine since it was for cosmetic purposes. I believe I started crying on the phone at that time and stated that my son was 3 years old... This wasn't a cosmetic thing in our eyes. We didn't want him made fun of at preschool... They changed their minds.
As he grew, he discovered various ways to deal with strangers curiosities. Not the right way at first. At first whenever anyone commented on his hair, he took it wrong and ended up in several playground fights. Threw a glue bottle and broke the glasses of a boy in 5th grade that is now one of his roommates...

We talked with him and gave him some new ideas on how to explain his condition. He then started telling people in a joking manner that a bird had pecked off his hair, or his little sister shaved him while he slept, etc. But when he told a new teacher that he had cancer, we had to talk with him again... His sense of humor was developing, that's for sure!
He grew to hate swimming and didn't want to go with us to the pool anymore. It exposed his scalp too much and he didn't like looking "uncool" with girls around.

Since the cheap cuts places every single time asked what type of trauma he'd had, we switched to a local barber with a shaky hand... He must be 90, but wow, he could cut Ryan's hair so it fell over the spots and looked really natural, unless of course it was windy or rainy.

At one bagpiping event (my husband plays), they gave out bagpipe temporary tattoos. Ryan put one on his bald patch. People thought he shaved that spot on purpose for the tattoo. He used about 10 for a couple weeks. My crazy brother thought that Ryan should have his whole scalp tattooed with wires and crazy exposed things like that, so when hair fell out, it would look like he was a cyborg... Ryan wanted to do it, but we put a stop to that. No tattoos!!! Especially on your head!
Ryan hasn't seen any barber since the summer of 2008... He had really been fighting us on hair cuts. We held it over his "head" for everything... If he failed a test, if his grades dropped, if he didn't stop hanging out with certain people... He was destined (in his mind) that he would look awesome in dreadlocks. Not sure on that... We won a couple times, but when he went thru the really rough time that fall & winter of 2007-08 and we pulled him out of public school to homeschool, we let him do what he wanted with his hair.

We figured a girl would someday ask him to cut it for her. He'd do anything for a girl. Throw himself into a wall, act like a monkey, whatever it took to get her attention...
Above is Ryan and Maddy. They seem so happy together and wow, did she idolize her big brother.
In this picture... not so much... Maybe younger sisters DO cause stress...