Once or twice a year, I let my pre-teen daughter have a sleepover with as many girlfriends as she wants to invite. The ordeal is a huge one, involving all kinds of food, entertainment and driving around. I acquiesce because it's evidently important to her to host an "event" and show her friends a good time. My sons and husband just cringe and try to stay as far out of the line of fire as possible.
While I'm not actually invited to partake in their fun, I am expected to help out. First, with the food. Later, with their beauty and style treatments.
The girls love taking turns in the make-up artist chair, otherwise known as the floor in my daughter's room. We'll start with facial treatments, eyebrow waxing, and teeth whitening strips. Then we move on to their hair, and that's where things get really interesting.
Everyone will have brought their hair dryers, flat irons, curling irons and hair accessories. They want me to try out a new style on each of them. With some national entertainment magazines as guides, I can often mimick the hairstyle a star is wearing with enough hair product and some of the flat irons.
Dealing with all those heads of hair, I've learned a few tricks I can share. If you're going for sleek, straight hair then avoid drying it upside down. Yes, that will help add volume. But it seems to make hair "bigger" which can be hard to combat with some flat irons. If you already have nice thick hair, then just use a natural boar bristle brush to comb it straight with the dryer nozzle pointed straight down from the crown of your head.
After all the girls are "beautified," it's a good idea to clean the excess product off the curling and flat irons. With the surface slightly warm (not hot!) use a damp cloth to erase the sticky residue.