Yes, her long beautiful, tangled, messy blond hair is totally gone. I will share the entire story, but first I want to invite those with similar stories to share!

Post a comment at the bottom and I will send you a free clippie just for joining in on the fun! Invite your family and friends to join in and they can earn a free clippie, too!

So, the day this happened I was sick. I was very tired and worn out. I slept in. I know, I know… what was I to expect, right? Leave a 3 and 5 year old to their own devices and this is what you get. And I agree. But in my own defense, I have kids that do not lean towards destructive behavior, as a general rule. They can make their own breakfasts, play a movie on their own or start a project, color and draw and they understand what the house rules are. We just never covered “you are not allowed to cut your hair off” – my bad.

What woke me up was Marin crying. I will learn later that Riley had clipped her earlobe with the scissors, but I’m getting ahead of myself. She came into our room and I tried to focus on what I thought I was seeing… I focused and saw her hair mangled and chopped and Riley right behind her holding the scissors. Remember that her hair was all one length and she had a high ponytail left over from our trip to Disneyland two days prior. “Had” being the keyword in that sentence.

“WHAT. HAVE. YOU. DONE?!!” Each word escalating in volume. I was more shocked and anguished than angry.

On the few occasions I have needed to sleep in, I have woke to find their creative breakfasts all over the family room, or every book we own stacked to create forts, or the like. Once, they opened the back door and let in our two, large outdoor doggies and I found them roaming around. Muddy footprints everywhere. I can’t get angry, I am grateful for the extra hour or so of sleep and we get it all cleaned up eventually. But this was irreversible. And what was I going to tell my husband? Crap. He was going to think I planned this whole thing.

I hopped out of bed and tried to ask questions, but the only things that I could think of to ask were “why?” and “why did you let Riley do this?” It didn’t make any sense. This isn’t like either of them. I started to cry. And I called my husband to tell him.

Eventually, the shock faded away and I realized that Marin did not have any remorse… she was ecstatic (she did say repeatedly “I’m so, so sorry”, but I realized that she was not sorry that she cut her hair – she was sorry she made me cry). Marin LOVED her new hair cut. And as I pieced it all together, the truth was that this whole event was her idea. She made the first cut and Riley jumped in because he wanted to “make her beautiful”. Luckily, it was a really dull pair of scissors or she would be missing part of her earlobe. And THAT would be a travesty.

But a short hair cut on the world’s biggest tomboy… eh, who really cares? It’s only fitting. Her long hair was pretty, but she ROCKS this new change. It is totally her. Instead of noticing her hair as her best feature, you now see her big brown eyes, wide smile and – what we’ve seen all along – she is gorgeous.

So I emailed my stylist, Irene Baker at Regis Salon at the Lakewood Mall with a hair emergency and she told us to come the next day. Irene is amazing and she did a great job blending it all together (and didn’t charge me – I love her!). Marin and I had a mini “girls day out” celebrating with some ice cream before heading home to pick up Riley who was at a friends house.

We are all happy that we no longer need to argue about brushing out the matted tangles and the best part is that the bangs are long enough to hold a clippie – YAY!

My mom tells the story about me cutting my younger sister’s hair when we were little. Her words couldn’t be truer: “what comes around, goes around”.

So… I would love to hear your story. I’d like to continue laughing about this :)

Posted by Julie Covey on February 19, 2010