hair-raising adventures: April 2012

Sunday, April 15, 2012

April Carnival - Copy Cat Style!

We are super excited to be a part of this month's Hair Carnival, coordinated by the very talented Untrained Hair Mom.

This month, it's all about the copy cat styles, but with a twist (well, many twists in our case)! We have been sworn to secrecy as to whose style we would be copying, so this weekend is the great reveal!

The blog I had the pleasure of copying is Baby Bella Hair. I remember "meeting" blog author Tracey waaaaaay back during the Beads Braids & Beyond one month protective styling challenge in the spring of 2011, and I have been following her blog ever since. Her daughters Kae and Lea are just too cute! They are also close to JJ's age, and have hair textures similar to JJ's, so this was an easy match!

JJ and I looked through the Baby Bella Hair styles and narrowed it down to 2 styles for this post.

The first style was the one that Lea wore after her 26 days of mini-braids. You can see the original style here at Baby Bella Hair, and here is a photo from the original post:

Look at those shiny twists! As soon as JJ saw this photo she HAD to have this style! We started with clean, detangled, hair.

I'm sure I have mentioned that I love twists, and so does JJ. What amazing, versatile hair she has that it can go from fluffy, cotton candy hair in the left side of the photo (which I also love!) to the twists on the right:

This style was a hit (despite her funny face in the first photo - concentrate on the hair, not her annoyed look)! The first day we put clips at the ends of the twists - both for decoration, and to help the ends look a little more tidy. Because I usually used 1 clip per 2 twists, the twists kind of twisted together, for twisty twists, as you can see below:

The next day the clips came out, and the twists untwisted, for basic, still very cute, slightly kinky twists:

Later in the week, JJ added her own extra accessory, and insisted I include this photo - she was very proud of herself!

Thanks, Baby Bella Hair - we loved this style!

But WAIT - that's not all - JJ chose another style, this one was a mommy style that Tracey did on her own hair!

SOURCE: http://www.babybellahair.com/2011/06/mommy-monday.html

JJ loved the cornrows up and to the side, and here is our take on the style:

Thanks, Baby Bella Hair for TWO great styles!

Be sure to check out the Baby Bella Hair blog and also like Baby Bella Hair on Facebook!

Also check out Tracey's amazing handiwork at Clash of Designs and like Clash of Designs on Facebook.

Finally - be sure to check out the great reveals of all of the other Copy Cat Carnival participants!

Monday, April 9, 2012

Happy Easter: featuring Huffleblossoms!

Happy Easter!!!

Blessings to you and your loved ones.

We have had a wonderful long weekend full of reflection, joy and time with extended family. The weather has been beautiful and spring is in the air (yes, even way up north here in Canada!). Our tiny garden is beginning to blossom, and JJ is obsessed with looking at and learning about plants and flowers. This new interest has extended to choosing to wear dresses with big flower prints, as well as flower clips in her hair. Her absolute favorite clip, without a doubt, is this GORGEOUS Huffleblossom!!

Now Huffleblossoms are NOT your ordinary hair accessories.

Besides being gorgeous, they are unique - and durable!

Would you believe that the flower in JJ's hair is made out of duct tape?!?!?!?

I can't really believe it either. But it is pure genius.

JJ is one of the most active and rough part-tomboy, part-princess kids I know, and this Huffleblossom still looks brand new after countless wears. Many of her other accessories have become scraggly-looking very quickly. The duct tape is super strong, and doesn't attract dirt or become misshapen like JJ's other fabric flowers do.

At $6 for a flower clip these are a great deal - period.

But the other really important thing to know about Huffleblossoms is that they are handmade by the very creative mother-daughter team over at Tweeny Hair (aka Rae and Syd). And the funds they earn from their creations at the Huffleblossoms Etsy shop goes to a very worthy project....

You may remember that last summer Rae and Syd went on a 9-day missions trip to Guatemala (see the AMAZING trip photos here). Well, they are going back! You can read more about the upcoming trip to Guatemala here. They will be once again be helping with building projects, distributing food, and holding medical clinics. Rae and Syd are already making a lot of personal sacrifices in order to cover their expenses for the next mission trip, and are also fundraising through Pay it Square. Please consider making a donation if you can, and check out the Huffleblossoms Etsy shop for duct tape flowers, fabric flowers, and **NEW** ladder ribbon necklaces.