Haircuts

Molly was born with a ton of hair, and had long hair -- long enough for an adorable ringletty set of ponytails -- by the time she was 2 1/2. When she was a little over three, she had her baby curls cut off and her hair cut into a pageboy style. Just before she turned five, she got a pixie cut. Then at some point that year she decided to grow it out; it's now very long, well past her shoulders, and she says she's NEVER going to have it short again. She likes it long, even though it is nearly always messy. (Seriously. I brush it, and 15 minutes later it's messy again.)

Kiera, like me, was a mostly bald baby who grew sparse amounts of cornsilk-blonde hair as a toddler. She didn't have enough to cut until she was three, when it finally started growing. It grew almost as long as Molly's, and mysteriously stayed reasonably neat most of the time, tumbling in silky ringlets past her shoulders.

But, she decided she wanted to have it cut, so today I took her in and the stylist cut into a chin-length bob. She gathered the hair into a ponytail before cutting off the length. I picked it up to keep, but as soon as Kiera saw it she appropriated it to keep herself (and it's her hair, after all). It's beautiful, and makes her look older (always a good thing when you're four-almost-five). I held the ponytail while the stylist trimmed and shaped her hair, playing with the curls.

(I was wistful when Molly cut her hair, too, but now I look at those pixie-cut photos and think, "she was so CUTE...and it never got messy!")