This really devastating thing happened: my child stopped taking two naps and now only takes one. The sum total of the time she naps in a day is roughly the same, but we now have an entire morning free for outings and errands and play dates. Which is good, right? I remember when she was still taking 3 then 2 naps a day I thought fondly of a time when she would give me a longer chunk of time to be out and about with her instead of rushing from place to place and planning activities precariously around her nap schedule. And please don't do the thing where you tell me she can sleep ANYWHERE if she's tired enough you can TAKE her don't be a SLAVE to her schedule...unless you want to hold my hand and fend off angry glances from strangers during the we-waited-too-long-get-her-home-and-she-likes-to-sleep-in-a-quiet-dark-place meltdown.
Now that we do have our mornings free though, what I've gained in freedom of movement I've lost in time to get ready for my day. Her first nap was also known as the 'mom showers, gets dressed, drinks tea and writes e-mails' period of the day. And suddenly POOF. It's gone. Since our little Vesper is an early, pre-dawn riser there is no way in hell I'm purposely getting up in the 5's just to shower and get dressed. I'd rather shave my head and never shower again. And while I could probably find time to rush in there before Dave leaves to the rink each morning, there is NO heating of ANY kind in a Japanese bathroom and I just can't force myself to get nude under those conditions! I have standards!
So all this means that I often wait to shower until afternoon when she naps or even later when Dave is home. And sadly I don't have the kind of hair that wears well overnight. It's too a) greasy b) short c) weirdly wiry. For a while cute winter hats were my camouflage of choice but spring is springing here in Japan and I needed a new plan. I hit up Pinterest for some ideas for quick up-dos, but so many require hair at least shoulder length. Seeing as it may be a decade before my hair grows long enough, I improvised a plan for those of us with less length (though it certainly will work for those with longer hair as well). So for a 90 second hair fix that works on short, dirty and unruly hair, this is my new go-to.
First, I pin my bangs back like this (using a tutorial I found on Pinterest, of course) and place any cute headband just behind where my bangs are secured (please ignore the layer of small hairs that line my face...I shed hair like a maniac after I gave birth and suddenly I appear to be regenerating a new layer):
Then I proceed, with no vision, plan or skill, to twist the entire back of my hair in to messy buns of various sizes (starting with the top of my head with the longest hair first and working down) and using criss-crossing bobby pins to make sure they are toddler-chasing-secure. It looks a hot mess, but some people pay someone to make their hair look messy, I'm just lucky to come by that naturally. If you had more time or hand-eye coordination than I do you could certainly make sure the bobby pins are hidden, but for me I don't mind them as part of the unkempt nature of the look:
And TA-DA, that's it. I did this with a 15-month old hanging on my leg yelling 'Mom. Hi. Mom. MOM. MOM. Up. UP. UP. HI. HI MOM.' and still was able to pick her up before a full meltdown ensued. I left for the park 2 minutes later and felt just a little more put together than I had before. Mission accomplished.
-Lane
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