When every day is a bad hair day

I have the same hair that you described for Ellie!Cutting it short will give it volume and it will take a lot less time to blow-dry. Plus is will hold up better till the end of the day. Using clean rinsing shampoos and body building conditioners has worked for me. I put NO product in my hair at all. Any and all products just weighs my hair down. Even "volumizing" products. A cold water rinse will "close" the hair shaft and make it more managable too! Good luck to Ellie!

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I say cut it short (maybe a cute little bob?) and just put a couple snappy clips or a headband in to keep it out of her face during the day. Also, towel dry and comb it right when she gets out of the tub and make sure she doesn't go to bed with it wet. BLow dry when you can...Maybe she would like to dry it herself? Or make it in to a beauty parlor game? It will only take a few minutes if it is short and already partially dry. Poor Ellie--hope you guys get it sorted!

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My daughter has the exact same hair! It looks neat for about 1 minute after brushing. To make matters worse, her best friend is Indian, with beautiful, thick, long straight hair. At 6, my daughter is already jealous of her hair. But she won't let me cut it much, she wants it long. I let her do what she wants, I'm breaking the cycle of mother/daughter hair wars. I'm just hoping it gets thicker and nicer as she gets older. Mine is pretty nice now, but it was stringy like that too when I was a kid.

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I agree with both of the above commenters. Sometimes after it's cut it grows out easier to manage.

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My hair too. If she washes it at night (the more often the better for mine) then have her wet her fingers and dampen the roots in the morning. Definitely keep it short. Small barrettes (or pierced ears) keeps it feminine.

My most recent change was to have the back "stacked" or layered. I never believed my hair could look so thick!

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Flat Iron. I know, it probably seems insane for a child, but I have terribly fine hair that is sorta wavy and mostly just poofy and unkempt looking. A quick pass over it with the flat iron makes it sleek and shiny and it will look quite nice all day without any other work or products.

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I agree - flat iron's are great. Spend the extra $ and get a ceramic one. Don't cut it too short! School kids are mean enough without giving them "bait" like a short-short haircut on a little girl.

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My daughter had/has difficult to brush hair and it turned into a daily battle with her. But she doesn't want it cut or else she can't be a Princess.

What I found was some kind of oil at a hairshop that works wonders. Its ten times better than detangling spray. I don't have the brand name on me, but if you look for it its basically oil that you put a few drops on the hair and as you brush it the oil spreads with the bristles of your brush, and its like going through butter with a hot knife. It works especially well on wet hair.

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My hair's extremely thick, so I can't sympathize with the thin issue. The puffy, wavy hair, though, is the story of my life. A flat iron is wonderful, like the above two posters said, and since she's got thin hair it shouldn't take too long.

If getting her to sit for blow drying and straightening is too much, Remington makes a flat iron called the Wet-to-Straight, which I use. You can use it on wet hair, and it both dries and straightens your hair. It's an awesome time saver - with it, I cut my styling time from almost 3 hours to dry and straighten down to just over an hour. HOWEVER - it does get VERY hot, and it does let a little steam loose on very wet hair, so a)it's best to towel and/or air dry the hair for 10-20 minutes before drying and straightening, to cut down on steam and b)it's definitely not something to let Ellie do alone, because of the risk of burned fingers.

Also, it tends to stay straight overnight, if doing it before bedtime is better in terms of time constraints instead of doing it before school each morning. That's what I do every night. :)

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My hair sucks (it's limp at the top, foofly at the bottom), I use Got2b products and they seem to do a decent job. But the real trick seems to be never using the same shampoo for more than a week in a row. Buy 5 different brands of shampoo, rotate weekly. One of them should be unscented Dr. bronners castile soap.

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Man, my daughter also inherited my straight, fine hair. It is so straight that we could spend hours curling it only to see the curls fade in less than 5 minutes -- it just hangs and looks dirty by the end of the day. My son, lucky kid, got my husband's gorgeous, manageable hair.
I remember admiring girls with long, thick, wavy hair. Sniff... I've cut my daughter's hair to above her shoulders and that helps cut down on the stringiness.

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Cut it. Even if it doesn't solve the problem, it'll be easier to deal with. Don't cut it too short, no - but plenty of girls have short hair nowadays for just this reason.

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dd me to the flat iron club. And definately spend the extra money for a good one. CHI is the best and to protect her hair also use CHI's hair serum. What works best for us is to shower at night and flat iron in the morning. Also it does not need to be done everyday unless she needs to wash her hair everyday. On the off days a bath will do fine.

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Thank you all for the great tips! I have tried a flat iron, but that Wet-to-Straight one is worth a shot. (Ellie is a princess, too. She refuses to cut it short.)

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I think you should convince her to cut it into a cute little bob. A good stylist can make it look terrific and it will be much easier to deal with! Otherwise, I'd suggest wearing lots of ponytails, pigtails, braids, french braids, headbands, etc. Bandannas are great!

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i had wavy hair for a while and i found out that big hot rollers gave it some wavyness with out the frizz.

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This is coming several days after your post, but I hope it still helps.

I had/have that same fine, limp (mine's straight) hair, and INSISTED on long hair throughout my entire childhood. The first time I cut it short was in college. I've had lots of hit and miss experience.

First, learn to do French Braids, and as she gets older, teach her how to do them. They are cute and classy on little girls, and even if she takes out the braids at school, all of the hair will be wavy, not just a section of it. (I used to have my mom do the braids before I went to bed, so when I got up, my hair looked all wavy. Then I'd curling-iron the ends, and it would stay pretty well) Also, fb's stay like crazy, whether she's just sitting in class or playing soccer.

Second, keep a "hair journal". I discovered this just recently. I was having tremendous trouble - it kept getting greasy and itchy at the end of the day. Nothing I did helped. I started keeping track of everything that I did with it, how it felt/looked at different times of the day, etc., and took that information to my hairdresser (find a really good one). We figured out that I was using the wrong kind of shampoo and conditioner, and she helped me find the right kind. I also don't use a wash-out conditioner. Leave-ins give me the same de-tangling benefits but also help add a little managability. I like Infusium (dump it out of the weird bottle it comes in and into a spritz bottle so she can spray it herself) and Nutrogena Triple Moisture Leave-in. With any conditioner, remember to just apply it to the ends, and not to the scalp.

Finally, I don't know how old she is, but perhaps a perm might help, if she likes curly hair? Or a medium-length cut, which will maintain the length, but add shape and body.

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