Hair Cuts and Crock Pots

Let me introduce my niece, whom I lovingly call, Bratling. She is five, recently started kindergarten, very clever, tomboyish, and has a penchant for getting into mischief the likes we child-rearing types shudder over.



Because of her being the way she is, things have been placed around this house higher and higher up in a frantic race to keep them out of "the reach zone". You know the zone; that place where kids can get their hands on things you'd rather they don't touch. Bratling has come up with numerous ways to thwart our efforts of keeping some things sacred and forbidden by doing everything from climbing to knocking things done with her longer toys. Tonight she reached one of the forbidden and like any child who has something we don't want her to use... Used it with abandon. My father's scissors to be exact.

Right after bedtime she went into action. Bratling went into the bathroom to do the nightly tinkle and climbed the toilet to get to the shelf. While me and my father were both on the computers and not thinking of the trip as anything more than the usual go in, go, and go back to bed routine as usual we didn't get suspicious until two warning signs alerted us.

It was quiet.

Brat was in the bathroom for too long.

It was my dad who called to Bratling and asked her what she was doing where upon she quickly toddled out and went straight to bed without skipping a beat. That made me suspicious and sure enough when I went in there I spotted on the floor something that most definitely didn't belong there. Locks of Brat's hair. I was in denial at first, leaning over and picking up the pieces of hair and looking at them before bringing them over to my dad. From there I woke up the kid, brushed out her hair (something that produced one final large lock of hair) and looked at the damage.

It was hard to notice, most of her snipping was done in the front and another in the back. I told her we should go to the salon and get her hair cut to the shortest length she made. With a cry she exclaimed, "No! I don't want my hair cut! I like my long hair!"

Gotta love the logic in kids.

I'm squirreling the locks of hair away, just like I have on all her other hair cutting incidents. I don't know why, I just feel like it'd be a darn shame to waste them. Someday I'm going to make jewelry pieces to be given to the females of our family with them. I think it'd make a cute sentimental gift. I'll be sure to post the project up when I do go out and get it done.

Speaking of projects. I'm improvising dinner. Country ribs with vegitables slow cooked in a crock with gnocci dumplings for tonight. You'll get the recipe once I try it out tonight.