#@$%ing frustrated

[Monkey962]

Alright, so I need to vent, or maybe get some help if possible. So my normal day to day hairstyle is usually just a single english braid, since that's about all I can do. As my hair's grown though, a single braid isn't enough to get all my hair out of the way. For the longest time I wasn't able to learn how to do updos because I didn't have any hairsticks. I recently made some of my own after realizing that simple bamboo skewers could do. My issue though is that I have no idea how to use them. Some of the time, the skewers will hold my bun, but not without considerable pain, or they'll be comfortable, but the bun will sag within minutes and feel completely unstable. Very rarely can I get my hair up with both comfort and security.

This has led me to do what I usually do, which is fold up my braid once, then put it in an elastic, then fold it again, and put it in another elastic. Doing this gets my hair up, is comfortable, secure, and simple. However, I'm fairly certain that it's the source of a lot of damage. In fact, I think it's why I have a noticeable amount of taper.

To top it all off, I'm a fairly active individual. Everyday I'm either in the gym or on a bike, and as the road biking season ends, I'm trying out a discipline called cyclocross. Here's a video that should show what it's like pretty well: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VRZOa_E9Qs8. Here in New England, it's common for an off-road course to have lots of rocks and roots, and cyclocross is usually rife with barriers, crashes, and falls. I have to wonder if there's a bun out there that can stand up to that kind of abuse for an entire race, even if it's a short newbie one (that I'd be in). And even if there was, I doubt I would be able to secure it in any way that it would stay up.

I hope this post makes at least a bit of sense. I've been meaning to ask for help for awhile, but I've been a bit too busy to collect all my frustrations.

[Kelikea]

Do you know how to make a cinnabun? I love bunheads hairpins for holding cinnabuns, and they stay all day if secured with a pony tail first. A figure 8 bun is also fairly easy and will hold all day with 1 hairstick. Chopsticks also work as hairsticks.

[Anje]

Try a lazy wrap bun, but attempt it both untwisted and twisted (one often holds better than the other). I suggest this one specifically because it does a great job with the principle of your hair mostly holding itself, and the stick just keeps everything together.

If you want an easy alternative to the skewers (I've had issues with bamboo splintering and getting caught in my hair, but if yours aren't a problem, there's no reason to not use them), I've heard good things about using colored pencils as hairsticks, and you can coat the exposed part with clear nail polish to prevent any snags. I've found Ficcares and fakes with strong springs are good for exercising because they don't slide out like sticks can.

Honestly, I think your folded and secured braid is probably a good way to go for cyclocross. Many buns interfere with helmets, and the helmet is more important than your hair, ultimately.

[GRU]

I find a Nautilus Bun (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tS-BQ5OMV2Y) to be the easiest to make, fastest to make, and very comfortable with a single stick.

[Monkey962]

Do you know how to make a cinnabun? I love bunheads hairpins for holding cinnabuns, and they stay all day if secured with a pony tail first. A figure 8 bun is also fairly easy and will hold all day with 1 hairstick. Chopsticks also work as hairsticks. Not really, unfortunately. I can coil my hair up, but when I finish, it just looks like a lump of hair, and not at all spiral-y like it's supposed to.
Try a lazy wrap bun, but attempt it both untwisted and twisted (one often holds better than the other). I suggest this one specifically because it does a great job with the principle of your hair mostly holding itself, and the stick just keeps everything together.
Do you know of a good tutorial?


If you want an easy alternative to the skewers (I've had issues with bamboo splintering and getting caught in my hair, but if yours aren't a problem, there's no reason to not use them), I've heard good things about using colored pencils as hairsticks, and you can coat the exposed part with clear nail polish to prevent any snags. I've found Ficcares and fakes with strong springs are good for exercising because they don't slide out like sticks can.
The skewers haven't given me any trouble yet, though I've been meaning to get chopsticks as I feel their thickness over the skewers would help hold things together. Also, I find that ficcares are a bit too feminine looking for my tastes.:D


Honestly, I think your folded and secured braid is probably a good way to go for cyclocross. Many buns interfere with helmets, and the helmet is more important than your hair, ultimately. I actually figured that I would only use it for road races and cyclocross where crashes could mean a skewer spearing myself or others.
I find a Nautilus Bun (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tS-BQ5OMV2Y) to be the easiest to make, fastest to make, and very comfortable with a single stick. When I attempt to make buns now, I usually try to do Torrin Paige's knot bun, which I discovered along with her Nautilus bun. I think I tried both and was more successful with the knot bun, though the fact that the Nautilus can stay up without any hairsticks seems promising. I'll have to try it again sometime... Also, are there any hairsticking tutorials out there? I don't really know what I have to do apart from trying to scoop up some scalp hair.

[Juneii]

Have you considered spin pins? When done right they stay in place all day for me. And they are safer - no poking out anyone's eyes with a skewer :)

[torrilin]

There's probably a couple things going on here. Since you're typing as a 1... how slippery is your hair?

At 32-34", no bun would hold for me with just my hair. I haven't seen many folks with straight hair reporting that their hair would hold itself up before 40-50", which is um... REALLY BLOODY LONG. This is mostly due to the slippery factor. A regular twisted bun (cinnamon bun) would hold and stay up with pins, but they didn't really start looking pretty and neat til I'd been doing them for years. This is normal... learning a new hairstyle takes practice!

Since you're doing a folded braid style anyway... why not try some of the variants where it is held flat to your head with hair pins, hair sticks or spin pins? I know Torrin has a video for this, and it was the first one where a folded braid made sense to me.

The other easy thing is styles based around twin braids. Split your hair in half, make two braids. Then you can pin them up in a crown to make heidi braids, or wrap 'em around each other to make a kind of figure 8 bun.

[spitfire511]

Just thought I'd throw this in there too - I don't have anywhere near your length or texture - but

I am a runner. I've been coiling up a cinnabun (or as much of one as I get with my short hair!) and using a couple of small or medium sized plain claw clips. One on each side. If I coil it tightly (sometimes I dampen it just a bit) and really make sure that I get both scalp hair and bun hair in the clips it hangs on nicely for me.

Just thought I'd throw it out as something to try. It's not the cutest thing in the whole world, but I feel better about it than an elastic all the time.

GL!! :D

[bumblebums]

Have a look here:

http://www.prismnet.com/~cortese/hair/styling.html

Especially this one:

http://www.prismnet.com/~cortese/hair/styling.html#pinless

If you can do a braid, you can do this bun. And it's very comfortable to wear (though probably not the best for excercise, as you say).

For pins and such, Good Hair Days Magic Grip pins work very well for me. They sell them in drug stores in the US, four a pack.

[Monkey962]

Have you considered spin pins? When done right they stay in place all day for me. And they are safer - no poking out anyone's eyes with a skewer :)
I have, I just have no idea where to get them, or how to use them.:confused:

There's probably a couple things going on here. Since you're typing as a 1... how slippery is your hair?

At 32-34", no bun would hold for me with just my hair. I haven't seen many folks with straight hair reporting that their hair would hold itself up before 40-50", which is um... REALLY BLOODY LONG. This is mostly due to the slippery factor. A regular twisted bun (cinnamon bun) would hold and stay up with pins, but they didn't really start looking pretty and neat til I'd been doing them for years. This is normal... learning a new hairstyle takes practice!

Since you're doing a folded braid style anyway... why not try some of the variants where it is held flat to your head with hair pins, hair sticks or spin pins? I know Torrin has a video for this, and it was the first one where a folded braid made sense to me.

The other easy thing is styles based around twin braids. Split your hair in half, make two braids. Then you can pin them up in a crown to make heidi braids, or wrap 'em around each other to make a kind of figure 8 bun.

I've no idea how slippery my hair is. It doesn't seem as silky as a lot of other LHCers hair. Could that really be the issue? Also, I have considered Torrin's Masara, but that involves french braiding, which I haven't even tried to figure out yet, and I'm pretty sure the braid would interfere with my helmet.

[GRU]

I have, I just have no idea where to get them, or how to use them.:confused:


Spin Pins should be available in any store that carries Goody products -- Walmart, Target, Walgreens, CVS, RiteAid, etc.

To use them, you just "screw them in" grabbing both bun hair and scalp hair. The weight is distributed along the length of the pin (no pulling) and is much more secure, IMO, than regular hairpins/bobbypins.

[bumblebums]

Taper makes buns easier, by the way, because it allows you to hide the ends better. Especially for buns like the pinless braided--they are hard to do if you have no taper and super-blunt ends.

For everyday wear (as opposed to exercise), if you find hair sticks hard, you could try a fork instead. I like 60th street forks (http://www.60thstreet.net/). Another easy-to-use but gentle accessory is the Flexi 8 (http://www.flexi8.com/).

You can sometimes find hair sticks at stores like Claire's. They won't be the nicest out there, but they are a start.

[Anje]

Do you know of a good tutorial?Oh, there are a bunch of videos on YouTube. Here's a good one. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sG9-gLSqnoc) You'll want to note that how many fingers you wrap around depends a lot on how big your buns tend to be. If it's too tight, make the outer wrap bigger; too loose, make the outer wrap smaller. I like to twist the hair before making that first wrap, as this makes everything a bit more secure for me.

If you find normal Ficcares a bit feminine, how about a Ficcarissimo (http://www.ficcare.com/Products.aspx?collId=29), say, in black?



At 32-34", no bun would hold for me with just my hair. I haven't seen many folks with straight hair reporting that their hair would hold itself up before 40-50", which is um... REALLY BLOODY LONG. This is mostly due to the slippery factor.At about that length, I think I'd be able to manage a bun that held itself. However, I have thinner hair than many, so I can get a few more wraps in, and I've got a special bun that works. Effectively, it's a celtic knot/slip knot tied at the head, the leftover hair gets wrapped around the base, and then loop of the slip knot gets pulled over the whole bun. If the bun slips, this tightens down and keeps it intact.

[Sheltie_Momma]

If I were a guy and needed an up do for sports I would do this: Go to any store and get one of these plastic stretchy headbands, the ones that are a zig zaggy circle and connect at the back. Then I would get a bandana and fold it like a headscarf/doo rag and I would get needle and thread and I would baste the headband to the inside of the bandana. So when you put it on it looks like a regular guy's bandana style but it has the sleek, no hair falling outness because of the headband. That's what I would do.

[Ithonna]

I find that vortex buns hold like cement whereas cinnabuns fall out in five minutes in my hair. Also, I find that my hair doesn't like being bunned with it's natural texture. Maybe you could try sleeping in braid or ragrollers?

[LouLaLa]

Spin Pins should be available in any store that carries Goody products -- Walmart, Target, Walgreens, CVS, RiteAid, etc.

To use them, you just "screw them in" grabbing both bun hair and scalp hair. The weight is distributed along the length of the pin (no pulling) and is much more secure, IMO, than regular hairpins/bobbypins.


Spin pins are amazing. I also reccommend you get them. They are the best zero fuss hair accessory. You dont see them, theyre secure, they are fantastic. I always have them in my bag- so easy to throw your hair up in an instant, no skill required.

[spidermom]

Try making a braid more on one side than the other, then fold it so that it is positioned side to side (rather than up and down). This method secures much better for me.

[Monkey962]

I just went out to two CVSs and they only have mini and small spin pins. They look so small that I don't think they could hold up even my modestly-sized bun. Does anyone with experience with them know what sizes can hold what?

Also, I wanna thank everyone for being so helpful. I hope my post didn't come over too nasty or anything.

[kidari]

When I'm very active I will do a messy cinnamon bun low at the nape of the neck that's secured with a small scrunchie that's the same color as my hair. For daily wear, I would suggest a braided cinnamon bun that is secured with mini claw clips all around the bun.

[C.H.]

If you find normal Ficcares a bit feminine, how about a Ficcarissimo (http://www.ficcare.com/Products.aspx?collId=29), say, in black?

I thought of a Ficcare as a solution as well. I think the OP is on the right track with a folded braid. A folded braid held with something like a black Ficcarissimo would be super easy and hold like the dickens without being too bulky.

[Alvrodul]

Since you lead such an active life, I would suggest you look into Flexi-8 (http://www.flexi8.com)s. They hold really well, and are pretty - you can use them for several kinds of buns instead of forks or sticks. They are not going to fall out! Right now, I myself are reaching for my flexis most of the time - I am doing some renovation work which means I wear a scarf on my head, and that is not really compatible with forks or sticks. ;)
The cons are that some people find that their hair may get caught between the beads (happens to me, sometimes) and if your hair is slippery, the Flexi may slide out - but that is also dependent on the style. I did not like the Flexis at first because of this.

[silverjen]

Torrin Page has an old video that shows the basics of using hair sticks. It's one of her first, so if you go waaaaaay back in her channel, you can find it. You have to insert the hair stick backwards first, opposite the direction you want it to ultimately go, then reverse direction and push it in, picking up scalp hair as you go. It's hard to describe, easy to do.

I will say I think most guys will find Flexi-8s too feminine. I have one of the plainest versions, and I've still gotten compliments on it being really pretty. I have a feeling that's not the look you're going for. :) Unfortunately I think a lot of the hair toys recommended on this thread will be too feminine.