Even Gymnasts Go To Prom

Prom!?!  Thank Goodness Mine Isn't There Yet.....

So my one of my daughter's gymnastics coaches sent me a picture of her prom dress.  Yes, I do feel old.  In fact, my daughter's head coach, was the coach to this same girl!  Time flies - so sad. 


Anyway, as I looked at the back of her dress I wanted to come up with a style that would work for her, but would also work for younger girls as well.  Perhaps this would work for Flower Girls, Jr. High dances or even dance recitals.  This hairstyle probably would be fine for gymnastics practice, but I highly doubt my daughter's coaches would approve it for competition.


There are a few variations (depending on the thickness of your hair). I did my daughter's with four braids, but I have seen it done with three thicker braids and it looks a bit looser, but really pretty for an older girl.  You would need more pins for the three braid style to hold through the night. 
I think I will try the three braid variation soon and post it.  I have to convince my daughter .... hummm time for a bribe!  


Start by evenly dividing the hair into sections and securing them with loose bands.

Then take the band out begin braiding them one at a time.  

As you can see my gloves made an appearance.
Too tired to take them off for pictures.  Gotta
love being allergic to hair products :-( 

As you can see by the picture below, in this style the braids will be hidden so you can get away with stopping the braid if you have layered hair, putting a rubber band in it, and then restarting it.  

Depending on how you want the style to end you will want to leave hair at the end of each braid: anywhere from 2 inches (if you are tucking the hair in), about 3 inches (if you are going to rat the hair for a funkier look or put small curls for a cute look) and up to 4-5 inches (if you have long hair and want to cascade curls down).  Please remember that if you choose to cascade the curls you should pin them in place as they can weigh down your hair and can cover up the style you worked so hard to do.   I left about 3 inches as I assumed I was going to rat her hair or curl it - I figured I would decide on it when I was done.  


Continue braiding the same way with all four sections.

Now you will simply be knotting the sections together.  Begin going left to right (for these instructions lets call the braid on the far left "braid 1" and the far right will be "braid 4".


Take Braid 1 and Braid 2 and tie them together. Then pull the ends of the braids to the knot is laying against the head.  You will then repeat this.  Now, Take the longer braid which is in position 2 and tie it with Braid 3 the same way you just did with 1 and 2.  Then, take the longer strand and repeat the process with Braid 4.  Always making sure you are pulling lightly at the braids so the knot comes up and lays against the head.  

When you tug at the braids they should come up and
lay against the head like this.  I tugged after knot 1
Then repeated and did knot 2 to make it easier.
Then I went on to tie strand 2 with BRAID 3. 

When you are done with all your knots you should look like this :-)  LOVELY!  

By the way... Don't worry about the lines you see from parting the hair.  

We will take care of those at the end.  

When you are all done knotting your braids together, gather the ends in your fingertips as shown in the picture and secure the ends with a rubber band.  I suggest using a band that matches your hair color.  However, my daughter wanted it to match the green in her shirt :-)   Then you can add only one or two hair pins IF you see that the mini ponytail you made is pulling forward.  I tried this style on my hair and it pulled forward, but it didn't seem to on my daughter.

  Now since this was for my daughter I just tossed in a ribbon.  However, you can fancy this up for a wedding or prom.  There are so many accessories you can find at your local store that are super cheap!  In fact a friend of mine asked me to help with a wedding this summer so I have kept my eyes open and found a few for her and her little Flower Girl daughter (you can see some of the ideas at the end of this post).  

I wish my picture of the finished style had turned out.
I just tucked in the few hairs that were going astray. 

Love the side view.  The accessories below show some of
those gems that they sell that go in like corkscrews.  If you
tuck in the top and simply put simple gems on the sides
this would be stunning! 

Anyway,  at this point you can tuck in the ends, curl them, spike them... be creative.  As far as the lines from the part go, simply spray the hair lightly with hairspray and take a fine-toothed comb like the one I have pictured below and comb downward joining the hair together.  You will see them disappear.  Then you can do an overall spray of the hair.  

you can see the lines in the pictures above... this is after
combing them out. 

Here are the accessories I found at my local drugstore.  I have always seen them at stores in the mall too, but I always get my bank account in trouble when I go to mall accessory stores so I stay clear!  ha ha ha 

Obviously I am not trying to advertise for any of these companies, but the accessories are cute and they can be found easily :-)