Three Ring Circus

Everyone’s a critic and Ivy hates hats

Ok, I’m having a bad hair day…month..ok, ok I’m having a bad hair YEAR!

For the umpteenth time I am trying to grow my hair out from the short pixie cut style I have had forever. The kids are all encouraging me to do it. David is too. I want to grow my hair, I do…it’s just that…I can’t get past that stage. Girls will know what I am talking about. You know, that stage when it’s too long to look any good but too short to pull it up into something. Too short to have it cut into a longer style but too long to look anything like your previous do. *SIGH* I don’t think I’m going to make it. It used to be long enough (pre children, pre wedding) that I could sit on it. David would spend hours  making minute plaits throughout my long locks. It’s been short for so long now…I’m not even sure it will look any good with some length to it.

Last night I had a shower and this morning my hair was sticking straight up in all different, wierd angles. I expect looks from David when I get out of bed. He generally teases me when my hair supports the appaearance of someone who has been scared out of their wits but this morning, after his bottle, Noah came pottering over. I sat up to give him a cuddle. He looked me up and down then stared directly at my hair…"Ooohhh"! he exclaimed and patted my knee in some form of baby commiseration before beetling off again. How can I do this when EVERYONE, including the baby, is a critic? For now, I look like a mop and I try not to look at the mop too often. Cover it, I hear some of you say. Yes, I have thought of that but every time I put a bandanna on I get a mental image of mutton dressed up as lamb. I SO don’t want to be the mutton! So, here I sit with bad hair…

While my hair follicles slowly lay down each new keratin layer let me tell you about Ivy’s absolute HATE for hats. I’m not sure if it stems from being in the NICU and having to wear those beanies for so long but Ivy hates hats. I have tried many and varied types of hats. Beautiful Summer bonnets, frilly wide brimmed ones and all have found their way off her head and onto the ground (much like her bibs but that is another story). Winter is here and, wanting to protect her ears as much as possible, I have gone through a series of beanies for the baby girl, trying to find one that she MIGHT keep on her head for more than five minutes to no avail until Mum knitted an all in one beanie with straps going under the chin and secured with a button. At last! A beanie that she can’t take off! The thing is, if you can’t take your beanie off your head, in Ivy’s world that is the worst thing to ever happen to you! She pulls and grunts and yanks and when she realises she can’t remove the offending wooly mass, she screams and cries and has a stampy tanty.

A stampy tanty is an Ivy special. She stomps her feet very quickly, pumps them up and down, almost in a jog on the spot. All the while she grizzles and shakes her head and her fists. This is a new kind of tantrum for me. I have had a ‘head banger’ tanty girl and a ‘face puller’ and I’ve also had the ’stand and ball’ tanty queen but never a stampy tanty girl. I usually difuse said tantrums by having my own stamping fit and we end up in some kind of primal mother/daughter war dance and fits of laughter but not with the beanies. Beanie escape, or lack there of is serious business.Not being able to escape woolen beanies is the end of the universe, according to Ivy. We have tried to redirect her efforts with diversion and bribery without much success so for now we are about learning to deal with the beanie application tantrums. I’d like to say that I am going to win this battle, hands down. I’d LIKE to say that but Ivy is a very strong willed young lady, so I’ll have to say the victory of the beanie battle is pending.