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Monday, March 15, 2010

Rag Curlers

My little girl wants curls everyday now. When I was little, when I stayed at Grandma's, we always put in rag curlers and slept on them.

So, I took a knit sweater (We used to use flat cotton material, but the thicker and spongier the material the better, keeps your hair from being really tight at the ends) and cut it into pretty thick 3 inch strips.

When you start the hair on the middle of the strip, be careful to get the end of the hair tucked around nicely and not off to the side otherwise you'll have a kink instead of a curl at the end.

For this day, she wore the curlers from 9 am through her nap and took them out at 5pm for church. She's modeling her curls. She's proud of them.



8 comments:

Melissa said...

Myself and my little one both have curly hair, but as soon as I saw this post I thought of my mom and the lack and white photos of her and her sisters all with rag curlers in. Good things don`t change much do theyƉ

Shanaka @ Mama Bee Does said...

This reminded me of the days when I was little that my grandma did this to me but she used paper bags cut into strips. Your version is more eco friendly. Thanks for sharing, now I just need a little girl lol!

Melissa Jagears said...

Wow, I cannot imagine sleeping on the paper bag strips! But then, my grandma said she used to use tin cans and bobby pins. She claims she slept on them, not quite sure I believe her! :)

Susanne said...

MJ, your grandmother must be quite young! And I'm in my mid 50's! In the early 1970's, my sister used orange juice cans and long roller pins (they were metal then) to roll up her hair. I do remember the plastic, large curlers back then but, she want the curlers larger than those so, she used the cans. Me, I just wore my hair long and straight as a stick.

Rag curlers have been used for a LONG, long time. That is how they made the "banana" curls that hung in ropes in the 19th century. The'd roll them up very carefully and then when they unrolled them, carefully combed the curl around a finger, creating the rope of curl that would hang down.

Melissa Jagears said...

My grandma is in her 80s so they must have been doing that for a long time too! :)

Donna said...

Oh oh my! She's so darling...love those curls! What a great idea MJ! Ok, I'm going to post this on show and tell..it must go! This is an idea that definitely needed to be brought back!

Shari said...

When I did my own (I used old sheets, but the spongier would be better), I laid the rag across a fat marker, rolled the hair on that and tied it then pulled the marker out. my mom used to put my hair in bobby pins w/ the same concept!

Melissa Jagears said...

Good Idea, Shari, I shall try that next time.