New Hair

I've been thinking a lot lately (like for the last year or so) that I need to do something new with my hair.  I have really fine hair that grows ridiculously slow (as in, I had it cut up to my shoulders 5 days before Paxton was born and in a year it had only grown down to the bottom of my shoulder blades), so I don't change it up very often.  And it usually is in either a "messy" bun or a pony tail because it is constanly static-y since it's so fine.  It's also bone-straight and refuses to hold a curl for more than a half hour no matter how much product I put in it.  I realized a few weeks ago that I have been doing the messy bun since about grade 9 ... and my 10 year high school reunion is this summer ... so that's about 13 years or so of pretty much the same 'do, pretty much every single day.  Definitely time to change things up.

So I just decided to stop thinking about it and do something about it.  I called the salon and made an appointment for a cut and some hi-lites for the next day.  Then I started thinking again.  I've never colored my hair ... well unless you count that one time in grade 7 when I used Kool Aid.  Long story short, in a frenzy of school spirit I dyed my hair red with Kool Aid (our colors are red and white).  My friends assured me that it would wash out within a week so my Mom let me do it.  However, my dirty blonde hair took the color extremely well and we had to cut about an inch of pink ends off a few weeks later.  But I don't think that really counts as coloring my hair.  I've had blonde hi-lites put in a few times, but that's playing it safe since it just looks like I've been out in the sun all summer and that it's growing out when it does in fact eventually grow out.  So when the stylist at the salon asked me whether I wanted to do hi-lites or an all over color, I decided to jump in with both feet and join "the dark side" as Kelly calls it.

And this is what I ended up with:

I know it's not the best picture since I'm wearing a black shirt ... but it's the only one I have so far :)  I've had this same sort of cut before, but this is the first time I've had bangs since the very late 80s or very early 90s ... let's just go with 1990 to be safe.  I distinctly remember that we were staying with our Aunt Kay for a week during the summer and she told us that we didn't have to have bangs.  In fact, if we wanted to, we could just grow them out until they were the same length as the rest of our hair.  What a novel idea!  And since then I have never had bangs.  I'm just fortunate to have 2 sisters who have been far more adventurous than I with their own hair, so I sort of knew what would work for me.  I mean, we don't really look alike or anything do we?

I mean, other than the fact that I apparently have had some sort of defect since birth which causes me to have no ability whatsoever to keep my eyes open while outdoors?  Really.  Just call me Squinty McSquinterson.  And guess what?  I had my hair in a messy bun for these pictures as well.  See?

Ok this one's sort of a messy bun/ponytail hybid.  But Kinsey did it for me so it's looks far more stilishly messy than what I normally can pull off by myself. (and yes this is one of my favorite pictures of Jay and me so I posted it.  Hey, it's my blog.  I can do what I want.)

But, getting back to my new hair ... I've just decided to embrace the fact that I was not blessed with great hair (and all those of you who say you'd kill for straight hair like mine, you can just shush.  This is my whine-fest.), and just go with something that's low-maintenance.  I've never had nor will I likely have the patience to maintain any sort of 'do that requires more than 5-10 minutes of effort.  I'm really happy with how the color turned out.  Now I'm just stuck with whether to go back to the salon for a touch-up when my roots start to grow out or to try my hand at a kit from Wal-Mart.  See?  I always find something to worry about.  I'm ridiculous.  I think I'm going to stick with the length though.  I really like it and I think it makes me look more my age.   What do you think?