it's all about the hair

Admittedly there are times that baby T's hair and skin care stress me out just a teensy bit! And he's a boy...can't imagine the time and energy that goes into caring for the hair of a girl.

T had his first haircut at 4 months. It was so frizzy, fuzzy, and long on top as well as at the back underneath the stellar bald spot he was sporting. My hairdresser, who was very comfortable cutting T's hair, just trimmed it up and shaved a bit at the back. When I saw him after the cut I almost had tears in my eyes...gone was my baby and here was this big boy smiling at me. (And for all of you that know us personally...yes, I am very aware that my baby has been a big boy for quite some time now!).

His hair is getting longer and a bit fuzzy on the top again and I wasn't sure what to do. Do I get it cut again? Am I using the special hair products correctly? Is there something else I should be doing?

I have no problems asking for advice when it comes to this sort of thing. So this week I ventured out to a new hair salon owned by a black couple. A friend of mine is running their communications and marketing campaign so I had heard of this new boutique already and then a few fellow white moms with brown children had spoken with the owner and had great things to say. I felt this would be a good place to start asking some of my questions specific to T's hair and skin.

I walked into the salon and was greeted by three lovely ladies who immediately fell all over T proclaiming his cuteness! The owner was one of these women and she greeted us with such warmth and openness. I'm always just a tad bit nervous when approaching people of color because I'm not entirely sure what they will think about my family. I love the way my family looks but not everyone else will. The salon owner didn't even hesitate once during our conversation about T and as we chatted I became more and more comfortable with her.

We talked about T's hair and skin for probably 20 minutes. I told her about the "it's a curl" products we are using (shampoo, wash-out conditioner, and leave-in conditioner). I asked her about daily hair care. We chatted a bit about other products available. And finally I asked some questions about skin care.

Turns out we are doing a fairly good job at keeping our munchkin looking good! I did learn something really important tough. She sprayed some leave-in conditioner on T's hair and combed it. As I watched her I realized that she had just inadvertently taught me something...how to comb his hair! Such a seemingly simple task and for most white moms of white children this is a no brainer. The next day I used my leave-in conditioner and combed it the same way she did and success! His hair looks so much better for longer during the day now.

The other thing we've done to improve the look of his hair is start using satin. A friend sewed a lovely blue satin band that fits around T's crib mattress. So baby T sleeps on satin and it really does work to keep his hair looking nice after naps.

I will go back to this salon in the future. It's really important to me that T's hair is cut by someone who knows what they are doing and that this person has brown skin. In the end I didn't purchase anything from the salon but I gained some valuable advice. The owner gave me her card with her email address on it and said to email or call anytime with questions. How sweet and I will definitely take her up on that offer. I've also been thinking about ways she may be able to connect with other transracial families that live here. I'd love to attend a class about hair and skin care for brown babies. I might have to put the bug in her ear!

So the hair is looking pretty good around here.

Now if I could only figure out how to stop people from messing with his hair...