But let's start at the beginning.
Calvin was born with a head full of thin, brown hair. A lighter shade than mine or James'.
Over the first few months of his life that newborn hair all but completely fell out and around 4 months he was nearly bald except for a mullet-like patch at the back. One friend asked if we cut his hair like that on purpose. Um, no we did not.
Slowly his hair grew back, though not evenly. By his first birthday, he had a section of long hair right on top of his head, still the long mullet patch in the back now complete with a little curl of a rat-tail, but short hair on the sides of his head. We could have easily styled it into a mullet-mohawk.
We had considered cutting his hair before his first birthday, but my parents talked us out of it. By the time we finally did cut it I think it was overdue. These beach pics are from the day before the haircut. He is looking pretty rad.
The plan was to even it out: trim those long hairs on top and in back to make it match the short parts around the sides. We were pretty confident that it wouldn't be that hard to cut it ourselves and we bought special hair scissors and clippers that came with a little kid-size salon smock. When we finally got set up to make the cut, James said he'd better do it because I was starting to freak out. In the end, all of us freaked out.
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| Poor kid! |
Here are the videos I took... Sorry about the technical difficulties you will see. I still do not really know how to use our fancy camera, which is problematic for this blog!
Part 1: Running with Scissors
Part 2: Um... Maybe if we use the clippers...
Part 3: Damage Control
After Part 3 ends, we didn't film any more because things were getting really tense between James and me. Yeah, we should have taken him to a barber shop and learned from a pro before going rogue on our son's hair. But James did the best he could and in the end it really looked ok.
The video Calvin is watching on James' phone is a cartoon called Bloop and Loop. It's just a little 3 minute long show with two funny creatures that babble and laugh and blow bubbles. He LOVES it. We don't generally let him watch TV (unless we are watching a Giants game), but in moments of desperation I am not above letting him see a little Bloop and Loop via YouTube. I came across this gem in one such moment of desperation when I turned on the Baby First channel to pacify Calvin while I was trying to get his dinner together.
Here are some "after" photos of Calvin the next day. I couldn't get any that night because he was too fussy and needed to have his dinner and bath and go to bed right away. Ok, we were all too fussy.
The flash photos make it look a little more severe than it does in real life, so here are a couple more in natural light.
It's a little patchy, but not nearly as uneven as it started out! That night I couldn't shake the feeling that I didn't recognize my own baby. I kept thinking, "Who are you?? And where is my Calvin??" But by the next day I was over it. He's a cutie no matter what mama and daddy did to his hair. And it will grow. And maybe next time we'll take him to a barber shop!
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