Mohawks

All the guys in our household had haircuts today, and we were presented with a parenting dilemma. Sam has beautiful thick with slightly wavy hair, which he absolutely dislikes because "only girls have curls". As a result, he has preferred for his hair to be in a buzz cut for over a year now. His hair has been growing out lately, and he has been having me spike it in the mornings. Sometimes, he wants a mohawk. (I thought I was exempt from morning hair styling with boys, but apparently not!) So this morning, as we are eating breakfast and telling him he has a haircut after school, he announces he wants a mohawk!

Russ and I talked quite a bit about this parenting step throughout the day. My mom was rather particular with our hair growing up, and I have always wanted to allow my children more freedom in their expression of self. Crazy hair - so be it! On the other hand, I also feel like controlling the situation due to Russ' employment in the church. I can just hear it now, "...that rebellious mohawk wearing six year old always running around." Thing is, I thought I wouldn't deal with any of this issue for at least six more years!

We decided to come up with what an acceptable mohawk would look like to us; one hopefully we could flatten or wet down for more formal occasions, and one that showed no bald head and didn't run all the way down the back. But most importantly, we wanted to give Sam some choices and hear his voice in the matter. Because bottom line, isn't that what his request is all about in the first place.

Beth, our hairdresser was wonderful; very creative and most open in walking us through this step. The picture shows what she did, and Sam was absolutely thrilled. We think a mohawk to him is simply some hair sticking up on the top, not the radical punk style we all tend to think of. Thank goodness. However, we will be preparing ourselves for all the steps of expression on our children's roads to independence, and if we have some expressive purple hair in the process, so be it.