A week or so ago I tried to flat iron her hair, hoping to get a result like I did with our Felicity. But they were still pretty rough because I didn't trim.
I had been thinking she would be very cute with curls, but I wasn't 100% sure how I wanted to execute them. I had read quite a bit online, and finally went with a boil perm. I didn't like the look of a straw set. Sometimes the curls behave, sometimes they don't, and if you don't use end papers the ends are weird.
I remembered I had Curl Formers and thought I would give them a try. Here's Hannah getting ready.
After I got started, I realized that her face was receiving quite a bit of steam, so I covered her eyes to prevent moisture in them which can result in rust. I held the cloth in place and proceeded to dunk her hair for 10 seconds per section. After I was done, I placed her onto towels, making sure to keep the water off of the cloth body so that we didn't get water staining.
I was curious afterwards if I could see a difference, so I removed this Curl Former while the hair was still wet and actually still warm! We have curls, and they were exactly what I wanted! I let her dry out a little more by draining onto towels for about an hour, then removed the rest and let her finish drying overnight. Then the next day I took each dried curl section and split it by hand into 2 or 3 and re twirled the hair by hand (no tools) and got this.
Z and I are very pleased with Hannah's new look. The curls suit her face and as well as looking cute, softened the ends considerably!
I can't say that we will do more of the dolls hair like this with the Curl Formers. Curls can be harder to keep looking nice vs. straight hair if the doll is handled and dressed frequently and her hair is not covered for laying down and cuddling. But we have several dolls with ringlet curls and we have learned how to care for their hair and keep it nice.
I would like to use much larger "rollers" and set Loreli with waves, but we'll see. I haven't found the right ones yet!
