Oh my goodness! I just has to post this because I just transformed my daughters frizzy doll’s hair into silky awesomeness! I can’t believe it worked so I decided to share the joy! This will work on Barbie, American Girl and other dolls that have the silky plasticky hair. Let me start by saying that this was not how I planned to spend my Saturday. But daughter Maizy was so upset at the state of her dolls hair that I thought I at least had to try. After I tamed that beast into submission (the doll not the daughter) I decided to try the not as crazy mane of Lila’s doll. Let’s start with that method as it was easier and there is no point to go through all of the steps I needed for Maizy’s doll if the hair is not that bad. Here you can see lila’s doll, one side of the hair is fixed, the other is not…I think you can tell which is which….
This was an easy fix. I simply took a pump of frizz serum and worked it through the dry hair. Then I combed out a section and pulled the section through my hot curling iron. You can use a hair straighter for this too but I don’t have one. Repeat until you have done all of the hair. You can snip any ragged ends if you need to. Easy peasy, about 15 minutes total time.
Maizy’s doll was a different story, have a gander ant the “before” picture:
Yikes! Sorry about the poor photo, I had one of the girls snap a pic before we started so we could see before and after (I didn’t think it would work!) and I didn’t plan to blog it but it was such an amazing transformation that I had to share! Here are the steps I took to turn this dolls hair from scary to silky!
- Brush hair as best you can, don’t worry if you can’t get a comb through it.
- Wash hair with mild shampoo, rinse well.
- Condition with about 1/4 cup of conditioner.
- Comb through the hair with the conditioner in then rinse in hot water.
- Squeeze out as much water as you can by hand then squeeze with a towel to remove more water.
- I let the hair air dry a bit but I got impatient, I’d say it was 90% dry when I added 2 pumps of frizz serum to the hair.
- Plug in a hair straightener or larger curling iron and let it heat up.
- Working on the left side first comb through a small section of hair then pull the hair through the curling/straightening iron and comb again. You might need to repeat a couple of times on each section. Trim off any straggly ends. Place the finished hair to the left. Note, I held the doll with my legs so my hands were free to manage the brush and curling iron. Repeat with all of the hair.
I found it easiest to put the hair in a ponytail after I washed it but that is up to you. In the photo you can see the hair I did not straighten yet on the right and the silky straightened hair on the left. The hair was still a bit damp when I worked. I think you can do this on dry or damp hair as my other daughters doll’s hair was dry when I straightened it. Here is the finished doll and happy daughter:
Well, this was not so much a crafty post but I’m sure many of you mom’s out there will find it useful. If you have any questions just leave a comment. Til next time happy crafting!
The Frugal Crafter Blog 