Hairy Important Info

A few weeks ago I was asked for some advice by a friend on what sort of brush to buy for her daughter. I had me thinking that this could be a relevant question that a lot of parents would have, and led to this post.

 

Obviously, with my background in hairdressing, I have professional opinions about products but I am also a mother. A busy Mum, of 4 little kids, and I know just as much as anyone else, that you have to be realistic about the cost of products and also the fact you will be using them on impatient, unreasonable mini people!!

 

As far as brushes go , I have bought our kids Bobble Art brushes. They are cushion backed, firm yet soft enough and are obviously pretty cute too!

We are lucky that our kids are fairly good at brushing their hair. In fact , they fight about who goes first to get their hair done. I really believe however, this is because we have brushed or combed their hair from a very young age. Regardless of whether your child has no or very little hair, or a mop of it, you should still brush it every day to get them used to the sensation and pain (because it does hurt when there is knots).

 

By brushing, I don't just mean getting the knots out and making it look nice, I also mean making sure that the bristles of the brush, rub on their scalp. This helps with exfoliation and reduces the risk of Cradle cap and dandruff. (The scalp is just like any other part of your body and sheds skin, and needs to be exfoliated) . The same goes for brushing your own hair.

In my professional career, I saw more boys than girls with cradle cap, and they seemed to get even as a 2 or 3 year old. I really believe it is because as parents, you tend to not worry too much about brushing boys hair over girls. So as a Mum of boys now, I am very conscious of this.

 

We also use a comb, the help when parting hair, doing pig tails or other styles for the girls!

 

In our Hair station, I also keep a spray bottle, as we spray the kids hair every morning when we either put it up, pop a clip in or comb it neat and now also a Lice Preventative spray!
The spray is not a necessity , but it is a great detangler in our eldest hair (as she has beautiful curls) and I figure that you have to stack the odds in your favour , especially where little hair critters are concerned!
At the moment we are using the Nit Wits spray, and are loving it!

 

When it comes to lackies to use in your girls hair, or even your own, its important to find ones that are going to create as little damage to your hair as possible.

Unfortunately, by wearing your hair up, you create a wear zone on the hair shaft that makes it susceptible to breakage and damage.

With Stella's hair, I like these Woolworth's Select brand lackies. They are made of a soft fabric type elastic and are great to use over and over. I hate when lackies stretch straight away and you have to wrap it around the pony tail lots of times! These are great too, as they don't have a metal clasp that can snag and damage the hair. They come in a multi coloured pack and are only a few dollars.

 

For Lacey's hair, as it is a lot finer and shorter, I am using the small rubber bands, but these are only a  one time use, but are so cheap it doesn't matter.  When her hair grows a bit, we will just use the same lackies for both girls.

 

When you are putting your girls hair up, it is important to try and vary the position that the lacky will sit on their hair. In other words, don't put their hair up at the same height, in the same way, everyday. Vary the style from a plait to a pony tail, a half up then pony tail or get fancy with some plaits or braids etc. Again, this means that the lacky isn't at the same spot, isn't creating a wear spot and isn't causing breakage or indentations. I have seen many , many kids, when they have come in for a trim, with a short breakage line where their lacky sits everyday. I like to have Stella's hair back for school everyday, again, it minimises the risk of nits, but do try and vary to a bun, pony tail, plaits etc.

 

A few other tips include-

 

Regardless of whether your child has nits, or lice, you should be doing a lice treatment every few months or even just on the holidays. Sometimes you don't know they have them,and they could be the child that keeps re infecting all the others in the class.

If you do find lice or nits in your child's hair, don't just treat them at night and send them back to school the next day, as a parent and hairdresser, I would be keeping them home the next day also, retreating a second time and then they should be OK to socialise again.

Your children have hair that is important too! Really, a regular trim should be part of your hair maintenance routine, say every 8-10 weeks. Hair grows a centimetre a month, therefore you can easily trim that amount off every few months and still be growing it.

Regular hair cuts means that their ends are staying nice and healthy, are not splitting and are not susceptible to breakage.

 

If your kids do swimming lessons, or swim a lot in chlorine water during the warmer months, try spraying their hair with a water spray and rubbing some solar protectant cream through before swimming. This will reduce the amount of chlorinated water that the hair absorbs and stopping that build up over time, and the green effects that it tends to have on lighter coloured hair. Hair is like a sponge, once it has absorbed enough water, the excess will just drain away, so you want the clean water to be the stuff that is absorbed , and the chlorinated to drain away.

 

We usually wash our kids hair 2-3 times a week, however since Stella starting school, I tend to just wash it on a Thursday night, when she has finished school for the week , so that when she returns on a Tuesday, it is a little dirty. You see, nits don't like dirty hair, they like clean hair. Again, just stacking the odds.

 

When it comes down to it, every child is different. All their hair is different. You are their parents and you make the best choices for them. I am just sharing some info that I know, and products we use!!
Do you have any cool products you use and love?
Do you have any questions you may want answers for? Send me an email.

I am not promising anything, but I will give it a shot!!