Almost three years ago, I got a haircut that changed my life. It was my first "real" haircut, the first time my hair was anything but all one length. At the time, I was 28 years old. It was a watershed moment for me because it was only after that haircut that I felt like a grown-up, like a real person. Weird, I know. But I guess I was ready to feel that way at the age of 28, fresh out of grad-school wife-dom, and just needed a catalyst. That haircut was it. From there, it was a slippery slope into wearing makeup. I KNOW. At the age of 29, I achieved the milestone of having used up an entire tube of mascara for the first time in my life. I still don't know how to put on eye shadow, though. Maybe I'll figure that out in my late 30s.
Anyway, possibly because that haircut was such a big deal to me, I never felt comfortable letting anyone except that original stylist cut my hair after that. So the only time I ever get my hair cut (in that same conservative, face-framing layers style) is when we are visiting my parents here in Oregon. Why yes, that does mean that I recently went two years without getting my hair cut or trimmed or anything! This is what it looked like this morning, pre-haircut, in the slight breeze, after two years of complete haircut neglect:
What were once face-framing layers were now elbow-framing layers. My hair was so long it was ridiculous. My arms hurt every time I braided it up, and I had to do that all the time because when your hair is this long you can't just throw it in a ponytail. I enjoyed doing hairstyles like a crown braid, but at this length, my hair was even too long to do that (I had a bunch of braid left over at the end and nowhere to pin it). If I wound my hair up in a bun, I sometimes got a headache from the weight of it tugging at my head, and my precious spin pins were no longer substantial enough to keep the bun in place.
So it was a happy day today to go in to my lovely Finnish hair stylist BFF and have her re-give me the MomChop 2.0. Hooray! I just realized I didn't take an "after" picture, though, sorry. It's the exact same haircut as the original, I promise. Sorry for the anti-climactic ending to this post!!!
Edited to add: PICTURE.
Edited to add: PICTURE.