Avainsana: feather braid

Braiding marathon – part 2: festival stall

So last Saturday’s story continues at Skidit Festival. After doing all the wedding hairstyles, I rushed to Kallio in Helsinki. Skidit Festarit is a really nice children’ festival with lots of kids’ activities, music, food etc.

festival braiding stallI got the idea for a festival braiding stall last summer when I went to some music festivals and noticed all the boring ponytails… But as I am only a self-taught braider, whose main experience is doing kids’ hair, the kids’ festival was the perfect place to try out how it would work.

It was a hot day (+30 degrees), but luckily I had a tent, so I was in the shade. It took about 15 minutes for the first person to stop for a braid, but after that, it was a constant queue for 5 hours!

two lace braids into a heart braid At first, I had a few little girls, with very thin hair, but I managed at least to do a little lace braid with a ribbon or a quick heart, which looks good on everyone, and is easy to make even when the model is moving a lot.

When the queue started to be quite long, only girls with a lot of hair thought it was worth waiting, so my job got a little bit easier 😉

Some little girls were very specific on what they wanted, many parents wanted something to keep the hair out of the face, some girls chose their favourite colour ribbon, and some gave me free hands… So it didn’t get boring!

waterfall into a french braid

A national news paper’s website had published an interview of me the day before, so some girls had already been on my Instagram or Facebook for ideas.

The most popular style, which I did 6 times, was the corset braid, followed closely by the star braid:

two dutch braids with ribbon star braid

In the end, I did 31 braids in 5 hours. I didn’t even take a break! I remember queueing for face painting with my girls once, and when we got to the face painter, she said she’s going for a break… I couldn’t do that to the little girls (and parents) who had been waiting for their turn! So I just had some quick snacks and water between braids, and carried on!

I was exhausted in the end: my back was aching and I was hot and hungry, but I had really enjoyed it. I didn’t notice the time at all while I was braiding!

I thought it was such a fun experience, that I have already agreed for another event in a week’s time! So everyone, who is near Porvoo, Finland next Saturday, come to Bubbles-event at Taidetehdas! I will be braiding kids as well as adults this time!

braids at Skidit Festarit

PS. as you can see, I used stickers, stamps, crayons etc to keep the little ones occupied while I was braiding.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Memories of the Carribbean

We are finally settling in our new home in Finland. I didn’t have a chance to blog while we were travelling, as I only had my mobile… My Instagram followers have seen more than enough of my ”travel braids” as I posted at least one braid from each country we went to. So now for those, who are not on Instagram: I’ll show you a few favourites from our Carribean trip.

First, we went to Jamaica. It was amazing. We all agree that out of all the countries we went to, Jamaica was our favourite. The people we super nice, food was good, atmosphere, music, weather, the sea… everything.

There were braiders everywhere! And so many amazing braids! When we first got out the plane, my 5-year old said ”mummy, everyone here has much nicer braids than what you make!”… So, I took it as a challenge, and this was the first morning in Jamaica:

Interlocking french braids, french braid feather braid combo

I got so many compliments for this and other braids throughout the 2 weeks in Jamaica, I even got job offers from the local braid-salons! Really felt that my work was appreciated in Jamaica 🙂

Next, we went on a Caribbean cruise visiting six of the Eastern Caribbean Islands. On each island we did a little trip to a beach, did some snorkeling or just relaxed and went swimming. The braids were always destroyed in the end of the day from all the seawater, so perfect excuse to do new braids every day. Here are some of my favourites (snake braid in St. Kitts, rope braid in Antigua and fishtail-french braid in St. Lucia):
Snake braid on a beach in St. Kitts rope lace braid into rope braid ponytail french feather braids into a fishtail braid

After the cruise we went to Mexico, where I’ve always wanted to visit. It was really interesting with all the history, Mayan ruins etc. and of course Mexican food, one of my favourite cuisines!

Again, we swam a lot, so needed to re-do the braids all the time. I was trying to decide which photo to put here, and then found this:
french braid

This braid was done by my husband. He was complaining he never gets any braiding practice anymore, as I always do the hair! So he came up with this braid, which I thought was beautiful!!

But that’s enough from our holiday (I might do another post with a bit more, but if I add it here it will be too long!)… I hope I’m better at blogging regularly now that we finally have a home again!