Saturday, July 7, 2012

Putting Up Hair Without Pins

I have basically just been braiding my hair and wearing it up since it got so long.  I first tried it with only 1-2 safety pins or by tying the hair ends in and then I was using bobby pins sometimes.  Today I had the same hair style I had done yesterday (which I had actually braided in the car on the way to Coos Bay on Thursday).  On Thursday it turned out to be braids across the top and then 2 circle loops at the top.

The circle braid over the top (like a halo!  ;)) happened last week sometime or a little earlier.  I was doing this french and crown braiding thing around the head perimeter, and then one day I incorporated back and forth and back and forth and once ended up with this totally random circle loop spot on my head under it.  That's when I put the fern next to it.  I went to bed with my hair that way and the next day it was sort of cool--the fern had dried and fronds crinkled a little and folded back and forth and you could see all of those little dots that are under the fern frond.  So I left it.

Then another day I braided (I don't look at the back of my head, I just braid and see what I get if I'm not doing a traditional wreath style braid around the head) and ended up with one long braided end and a spot on my head to sort of strategically cover, so I looped it and  then looked at the back and sort of laughed.  It was a halo!

Which is sort of whimsical since I don't know if any of us is very angelic all the time.  It was standing up sort, or sitting suspended above my head was the funny part.  You know, like the christmas angel with the little band around the head and there's this wire that extends a halo to suspend above the head...the rest of the braids were flat on my head, but in rounds and back and forth and then somehow this one just stuck out over my head, with a space of a 1/2 inch in the air, and I had pinned it at the front and it was this perfect circle.  Really, it was like a halo, and I thought this was really almost hilarious.  So then I wore that a day or two. 

I didn't contrive for it.  It's the length of my hair at the moment and sort of what just happened.  If my hair wasn't this length, it never would have happened on its own. 

After I saw how it happened, I did end up doing it again that way, knowing how it would leave the end halo effect.

So then on Thursday I had to braid my hair in the car and was feeling very Native American as we approached their place, because in that moment, I had done braiding on the top to secure it (the crown braiding just gets to secure the braid to the head so you need less pins and things) and then what was left was two braids I braided down and then had to put up and affix.  So I did, not being able to see it and later that day I saw it was like a figure 8 across the back of my head.  A large symmetrical figure 8.  There was other braiding but that overlapped it and then there was a small loop at the top.  It was a figure eight turned sideways though.

Then today I was feeling lazy and decided not to be lazy and just wash my hair and braid it and thought, "Is this a day to braid randomly and see what happens" or a traditional day? and I braided at random, not knowing how I was going to finish up.  So I crownbraided the sides back and forth and then had to cover a part with the braid and noticed one section of hair on the left side sticking up, a bump from the braid.  So I braided under and into the other braids to anchor the weight, and went around the perimeter in the back to secure more of the length that way, and then still had hair left over.  So I crossed it into a braid again and then there was that bump on the left side.

Since I already had tied a skirt on, with a knot to the right, and it looked like there was a bump to the left on my head, I finished braiding and it was this long tail, hanging from the knot.  It really reminded me of Indian stuff.  So I couldn't leave this skinny braid just hanging in a straight line from the bump so I wound it around and it made a knot and then I tied the ends.

I didn't use one pin or fastener.  I guess the first few times I ever did the crown braiding in a wreath, I didn't use any pins either, not even safety pins.  I tied the hair ends into a knot.  So today I was sort of happy to find it's possible to use only my hair and have it on my head without anything else.

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