Tuesday, October 30, 2007

Big Stuff

Charlie is five which means he's big stuff. Ask him and he'll tell you. He can dress himself- unless it's for school or for church because suddenly on those days he's incapable of pulling his shirt over his head and wanders around the house shouting "Help! I can't see!" He can brush his own teeth, he can make his bed (mostly), he can clean his room (if bribed), and apparently he can do his hair.

Last Sunday morning Charlie miraculously dressed himself, brushed his teeth and did his hair without me asking. His hair is at an awkward stage. Because he is a boy and gets wild and dirty and hot in the summer I shave his head. He has two massive cowlicks on the back of his head that give me grief when his hair starts to grow out. I bought some pomade/wax to make his hair do one of those messy, spiky looks until it gets to a decent boy haircut length. He knows how I do the pomade so he attempted to do it himself.

I use enough pomade to cover the tips of my fingers. He used half the container. HALF the container of wax 10 minutes before we left for church. He was so proud of himself I made sure I gave him praise for his hard work and then hinted that maybe we should wash a little of the wax off to make it just right.

Lesson: wax doesn't "wash" out. I stuck his head in the sink and washed it/scrubbed it three times before I called my husband in a panic. "It's THICK with wax! I can't brush it! It's got chunks of wax in it!" He walked over and attempted to style it. Imagine tiny little pastor's kid with a mohawk. That's pretty much what it looked like. Thankfully he proudly told the 60 and older crowd that he did his hair himself and they all laughed because they lived in the pomade era and they totally get it.

After church Chad tried washing his hair (3 more times). That stuff doesn't budge. I got online and found that olive oil will take the wax out. I grabbed my olive oil and went to work. Ta-da! No more wax. Only now his hair (and the tub) were full of oil. I went back to the internet and discovered that Dawn dish soap removes oil from hair.

I marched into the bathroom with the dish soap and started scrubbing while Charlie pleaded "Please stop washing me with kitchen things!" And it worked! And I'm pretty sure Charlie will never do his own hair again.

4 comments:

Jenny said...

This is hilarious! I laughed picturing you trying to get all that wax out, and Charlie begging you to stop! Ha!!

Leah said...

Oh, too funny! I'm sure it'll be something you all will never forget! And why does that stuff always happen on Sunday morning??!!

*carrie* said...

Tracy,

You have so many funny stories! This reminded me of when I ate bubble gum ice cream from Baskin Robbins and some of the gum got stuck in my hair. Needless to say, I was not allowed to order that flavor again!

Monica Wilkinson said...

I got a laugh out of this - look at the things I have coming with a little boy in the house! :)