Guest Post: Finding a Special Someone . . . For Your Hair

Today's guest post is by Brittany. She's has a super tall husband, two awesome kids, a dog, and a part time grad school habit she's trying to kick. You can read more of her awesome and funny adventures on her blog.

There is nothing more daunting, more perilous, more necessary than finding a good hair dresser. It is the difference between feeling like a rockin’ super star and feeling like Britney Spears circa 2007 (Google it. It’s not pretty).

About a year ago my go-to salon closed down and I was devastated. I’d rather walk across burning coals than go through the trial and error of finding that one special someone who gets me. 

Case-in-terrible-point: After said salon closure, I went to a hair dresser who came highly, if not unreliably, recommended. Let’s do this, I thought to myself. How bad could a hair dresser really be? 

(Hint: Really bad)

All I wanted was my dark hair to be a little lighter. A nice, light brown. Is that so much to ask?! (Hint: Yes. It is.)

What I got was bright yellow streaks throughout my still-dark hair. There are few words to describe how terrible it looked. 

It gets better…

My hair was so over-processed it literally just started falling out. Running my hand through my hair produced such a large amount of fried hair in the palm of my hand that it was absolutely panic-inducing.

Did I mention I was 8.5 months pregnant? And that the purpose of my appointment was to make myself look fabulous for the impending birth of my second kid. 

Total. Failure.

Enter my personal hair-angel. A neighbor revealed to me that she did hair out of her house and she could take a look at it.

Not only did she save my hair (save? Salvage? It took 5 months before my hair grew out enough for me to sport my trademark blunt bangs. My BANGS FELL OFF.), but she restored my faith in hair-doing-humanity.

And today, 1 year and 2 months after what I call “that one time my hair died and I looked balding-ly terrible right before having a baby” I finally was brave enough to ask her to make my dark hair just a little bit lighter.

Not only is it THE PERFECT COLOR, but my hair isn’t even damaged. And my bangs. They’re still there!

My confidence is through the roof and I’m feeling not at all like having panic attack when I look in the mirror.

Total. Success.

My advice to you? Find your special somebody. Find the person that knows you, and loves you for you…find your perfect hair dresser.

Saturday Snapshot: Work It

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A Post About Disney Princesses: Inevitable

Shannon Hale is one of my favorite authors and it's totally because she's all about the girl power. Her books are about strong, smart girls who rescue themselves (and usually the boys as well). I try to pick a favorite book of hers to recommend to people, but I can never pick just one and end up just telling people to read them all.

So, she posted this post on her blog the other day and, coincidentally, I have been thinking a lot about the Disney Princesses lately. Possibly because I spend a good portion of my day coloring and drawing Disney Princesses to the delight of the 6-year-old girl I babysit. I've been staring at these characters and started to really think about who they are and what they represent. They are all different ages and from different places and situations. They all (except for Snow White, she's just trying to not get killed) are rebelling against/asserting their independence from another main character; a step-mother, father, fairy caretaker, etc. They all end up with a handsome prince who comes and saves the day just in the nick of time.

Don't get me wrong, I love all of those movies (Sleeping Beauty especially, and it's one of the worst offenders of feminism). They are like romantic comedies for children. You watch and you dream of ways life could be or adventures that await you in some far off land. I think it's good to do those things. There's often talk about Disney movies instilling unreal expectations for life, but they really just tell some funny, exciting and beautiful stories. Also, Disney is doing a pretty good job, story-wise, in offering new princesses that learn to fend for themselves, save the day, achieve their dreams AND marry a handsome prince, Giselle and Tiana specifically. If you remember, Giselle climbs out onto a steep rooftop in an evening gown in the middle of a rainstorm to fight a dragon and save the life of her true love.

Still, with these small steps in a good direction, there is the notion of catering to an audience and making changes in order to sell more tickets to a wider audience. This isn't something that can be avoided, really, but it can be lessened (as Shannon Hale remarks). It's all about what we are showing our boys and girls. I know plenty of little boys who like princess stuff purely because it's the stuff their friends and sisters are playing with. On the other hand, I know plenty of girls who like dinosaurs and trains and cars because it's the stuff their friends and brothers are playing with. It's all fun and new and exciting. Kids develop their gender issues based on what they are taught by the world around them. And boys are not going to be fooled into going to see the new Rapunzel movie simply because the name was changed to "Tangled." That sounds more like a Harlequin Romance novel, if you ask me.

Media Moment: Tina Fey

I had a thought recently about how often we talk about the media and how it portrays women or how it tells us this or that about how or what we should be. It seems a little unfair to make such a huge generalization when there are people out there in the media that are showing us how to be strong, smart AND pretty and telling us that, not only is it okay, it's better.

So I thought and thought about how to approach this topic and, while trying to make a list of movies, TV shows, actresses, books, etc. that exemplify what I'm getting at, I found Tina Fey.

I kind of have a little crush on Tina Fey. I don't think I'm alone here...at least I hope I'm not alone here. It's more like I have respect for her and what she does. She's successful and funny and a hard-working mother. She's pretty, but in a normal person kind of way.

Tina Fey recently did a cover and article for Vogue. She talks a lot about fashion (because it's Vogue), but it's refreshingly normal and down-to-earth. She's not one of those supermodels who talk about how awkward and ugly they were when they were young - you don't want to groan and roll your eyes and refuse sympathy. She is incredibly easy to relate to because she is a normal woman. They even talk about her normalcy throughout the article - growing up with hand-me-downs, being curvy, being a mother. Instead of rambling on more (and further embarrassing myself with my newly confessed girl crush), here are a few quotes from the article:

A friend of [the interviewer's] recently said this: "Her existence is such a relief." By which she meant that women of a certain age who are cool, funny, and smart but who are by no means fabulous—who are in fact befuddled by much of what passes for fabulous these days—are relieved to see Fey celebrated as such. When I share this with Fey, she says in the most sincere tone imaginable, "That is such a lovely thing to say." She thinks it over for only a second. "I feel like I represent normalcy in some way. What are your choices today in entertainment? People either represent youth, power, or sexuality. And then there's me, carrying normalcy." Pause. "Me and Rachael Ray."

Tom Broecker (costume designer for SNL and 30 Rock) says, "She has subtly changed what women look like on a weird level: the acceptance of the dark-haired girl, the acceptance of the sexy librarian, the girl with the glasses who's smart but can be pretty."

And, funny enough, she talks about fashion magazines and their skinny campaign:

"People will say, 'Oh, fashion magazines are so bad, they're giving girls a negative message'—but we're also the fattest country in the world, so it's not like we're all looking at fashion magazines and not eating. Maybe it just starts a shame cycle: I'm never going to look like that model, so…Chicken McNuggets it is! And conversely, I don't look at models who are crazy skinny and think I want to look like that, because a lot of them are gigantic, with giant hands and feet. Also, my dad is an artist—a painter by hobby—and I constantly would see realistic nudes. Because we were raised around art and went to museums and the women I grew up around were curvy…there wasn't this value on skinny, skinny, skinny. Curvy was clearly meant to be the winner. I go up and down a few pounds with a relative amount of kindness to myself. And I have a daughter, and I don't want her to waste her time on all of that."


http://www.vogue.com/include/vogue/voguediaries/2010_March_Vogue_Cover_Girl_Tina_Fey/player.html

Guest Post: Bite Me

Today we've got a special guest post in honor of a certain movie release. Julie sent us this post yesterday and since we can all get behind the romance and the ridiculousness, we are delighted to present it here. Go crazy.

I am 29. In one month I will be 30. My bestest girl friend just turned 29 and is freaking out a little about this. Our lives are ruled by responsibility and repetition. We are feeling a little down about this. We have both been married 9 years, and are stay at home moms raising our children. At this stage of motherhood, the only way to shake things up is to get involved in something and feel a sense of accomplishment. Some join the PTA, others a book club; many get a part-time job just to get out of the house. But what about stirring up those emotions we felt when we were young? This good friend of mine actually told me we needed to ask a single 21 year old what she does for fun. Yes, we are that pathetic.

I read a comment on Facebook by a friend who was totally annoyed by all this New Moon hype. I had similar feelings about the Twilight movie release (I was still a little in denial). But this time I feel differently. What makes grown women attend a midnight showing of a movie geared toward teenage girls? What makes them wear t-shirts proudly announcing “Bite me Edward”? I will tell you what. It is fun. It is not because I am obsessed over the characters. It is because of the emotions it stirs up inside of me. I WANT my heart to race over something other than being late for carpool. And I can relate to the themes in the books.

Twilight: Falling in love; a forbidden love.
New Moon: Being dumped; loving two men.
Eclipse: Choosing between two lovers; cheating on your boyfriend with fiery hot kisses.
Breaking Dawn: Getting married, going on a honeymoon; pregnancy, childbirth; fighting to keep your family.

I have experienced ALL of these events, and let me tell you, it is sure fun to live them over again. To feel all these complicated and deep emotions through a book is awesome! I love escaping my responsible life to feel like a young desirable girl again. Is that wrong? I don't think so. It tells us something that almost every movie theater across the U.S. is sold out for opening day weeks in advance.

You know what a single 21 year old does for fun? She screams over hot boys on the covers of magazines, dreams about kissing the sexiest man alive, and goes to midnight premiers of movies. She doesn’t worry about the 5 am feeding of her 6 month old baby, or packing her kid’s lunch for school. She throws that all to the wind and giggles in the theater with her girlfriends while waiting for the show to start. And that is what I am going to do. This is how I feel alive: I embrace silly experiences to feel young again.

Special thanks to Lindsay Heinzen of Penguin Stands Alone for not being too mad at us that we didn't originally know where the awesome Edward/Jacob picture (above) came from. It's her lovely/hilarious work. We love it and you should all shower praise on her head. Thanks Lindsay!

Enjoy Being a Girl

I have four brothers, which I may have mentioned before. And let's be clear here - my brothers are AWESOME. Really, they are.

See?

However. For me, there was something about being the only girl that made it hard for me to embrace all girliness - or at least to openly embrace it. Sure, there were dolls and tea parties (many of both) and lots of pink and all that, but I didn't want my brothers to know that I thought girly thoughts - had crushes on boys, liked chick flicks, wanted to wear makeup, etc. (I'm pretty sure they figured out that I liked these things anyway, but when you have four brothers you either learn to deal with teasing or you try to avoid being teased - usually a combination of both.)

And to some extent, I convinced myself that these things were true. I'm still not very open about having crushes, I don't love chick flicks and don't admit to loving all of the ones I do, and I still pretend that I don't love putting on makeup every morning. (But can I be honest? Except when I'm running late and wish I didn't care about what I look like without makeup - which is a topic for another post - I love putting on makeup.)

But the truth is, I love many things about being a girl in the very stereotypical sense. Sure, I still have a tomboy side and a feminist side and all kinds of other sides, but I also really love giggling and accessorizing and playing dress up. I offer the following proofs:

I guess my point here is this: you can be whatever you want to be. You can be whomever you want to be. But never let perceptions about what you should or should not be force you to miss out on being something you would enjoy (especially when those perceptions are silly and carry over from not liking to be teased when you were 8). Don't think you can't be silly and squeal just because someone makes fun of you for it, because secretly -- they love it and wish they felt comfortable enough to squeal. And keep in mind that squealing doesn't have to be your thing - but finding exactly what makes you happy and enjoying it does.