Hair braiding day 8

It was interesting today to realize that I received no compliments on my hair from the teenagers that I teach but several from other teachers. Although a while back one of my students came in excited to share that she had figured out how to do this one after seeing my hair up. I suppose this is either a little girl hair style or a more elegant up do.

Style 8: braided crown

This is another variation of a normal french braid. I comb my hair so that it is cascading all around my head from a center point. Then starting over my left ear (I find it simpler to braid towards my right) I start braiding around. The hard part to this braid is that I always  have to change my hand hold at some point. The first few times I tried this I ended up with a twist in my braid, which while it looked cool was not what I had been aiming for. The best thing I can recommend is when you reach that point to collect all three strands in one hand and then move the hand that is currently from the far side around before you really think about which strand is supposed to be going over next. I promise it does get easier. This time I actually had to change my hands twice. Once as I got just past my left ear, the second time after I had all the hair but needed to finish out my braid. When you are finishing out the braid it is important that you pull your hair and braid as if you are still going around in a circle so that it will lay well. Tie of the end with the smallest band you can (often the end of your braid will end up somewhere towards the front of you head so a big hair band is really obvious) and then use a couple of bobby pins to attach the tail of your braid behind the braid at the front of you head. I suppose there is no reason you couldn't start this braid at the back of your head so that you'd have a smoother front but I've never been able to sort that out in my own braids. If your hair is long enough the end of you tail will end up over your ear or past it and so it can still have a smooth look in the front with a double braid.