the fancy brush--avoiding tangled hair and tearful mornings

This Quick Trick is a little bit funny to me.

It’s not about how to make the school year a success. It’s not about how to teach kids to tie their shoes. And it’s not about how to use magnetic letters or how to keep kids busy in line or how we force game-playing manners upon our troops.

I honestly thought I’d never write anything like this.

I never thought I’d need little-girl tangley long-hair trick–my girls always had cute short cuts, easy to style and easy to brush.

But times are a-changin’, so here it is.

I totally stole this one from one of my incredibly smart pals, tweaked it a little, and made it my own.

Here’s the silky-smooth skinny:

The Fancy Brush–Avoiding Tangled Hair and Tearful Mornings: My girls finally have hair that touches their shoulders, looooong, luxurious hair that blows when they walk and that bounces in their ponytails. Long hair that they love and have begged me to never cut.

Personally, I’m a fan of cute bobs in little girls, short hair that can be washed and dries quickly, hair that doesn’t require a swim cap in the summer or no-more-tangle spray after showers.

My thought is that if we can avoid a bump in the road (knots in long hair), then let’s take try a different route (short hair). But for my two sweets, short hair is not their current choice. So I’m trying to step back a bit, let them make more choices, and let them learn a little along the way.

How much more fancy can a brush get, really?

I can’t stand the knotty hair battle. It seems to happen every morning, when the girls come running to me with a hairbrush and ponytail holder, asking for piggies or a pony or a braid.

So when my pal was telling me that she, too couldn’t stand the knotty hair battle so she made a deal with her girls: they brushed first, and they brushed out the knots; whatever was left was for Mom to handle, no complaints, no tears, or no ponytail.

I liked it.

But I knew Maddy and Cora wouldn’t buy it without a little sugar, so when I saw fancy brushes on sale a few weeks ago, I let them each pick one out.

You may each choose a fancy brush, I said. But there’s one condition: you use this fancy brush to take out all of the knots in your hair every single day. You brush first, and then I brush your hair and style it. And the minute there are tears from me brushing your hair too hard or hurting you by brushing through knots, I take the brush and we cut your hair. Comprende?

I will not put ponies in your hair if you are going to be crying each morning. I won’t do it. It’s not fair to me, to Owen, or to Brady to listen to this first thing in the morning. So from this point forward, if you want long hair, you handle the knots like big girls.

And that’s it. Only a few days in, but we’ve been tangle-free each morning. Woot! Huuuuuge thanks to my pal Sandy for the inspiration!