Self assesment

Step by step notes and tools used:

•  Brush through hair with paddle brush to get rid of any knots, especially in the front section.
• split the hair into two sections. Leave three quaters of the hair for the bun and a quater of the hair for the plait. 
• tie the hair that will be used for the plait into the ponytail.
• Start the french plait, making sure that I hold the hair really tight to give the illusion of the front section of hair being scraped underneath the plait.
• once the plait is completed,secure and let it hang whilst doing the bun. 
• For the bun, tie the hair into a relatively high ponytail,making sure that the hair is tightly scraped back and their are no bumps to be seen. 
• Crimp the entire ponytail.
• Backcomb the base of the ponytail with a pintail comb and then backcomb the rest of the ponytail using an afro comb, as this creates texutre and actually creates more of a frizzy affect and makes the hair a lot bigger than normal backcombing. 
• fold a quarter of the ponytail over and then place the rat onto the folded part of the ponytail. Holding it tightly, wrap it until i am left with a bun shape. 
• secure the rat to the scalp using grips.
• use pins to mould and create the bun that i want.
• Once the bun is in place, place the plait on top of the head and swirl it round. use pins to secure.
• With the remaining hair at the bottom of the plait, take a pin and wrap the hair around it in a figure of eight motion. hold in the postion and use straighteners to set the zig-zag shape.

tools used:

• pintail comb.
• paddle brush.
• hair grips, pins and plastic bands.
• crimpers.
• hair rat.
• straighteners.

In the beginning, I really struggled with Marianne’s design. It felt really strange working with someone elses' design and I felt really pressured. Looking back, I feel like it would have been a really good idea for myself and Marianne to have got together and did a demonstration of our own designs, before we handed them over. I just think I would have felt a lot more confident doing it if I had watched Marianne do it first.
   I have never been good at plaits and the plait in her design was pretty complicated. She wanted the front section of the hair to be scraped back and going into a plait that then sort of swirled back over the head in a different direction.  As she has so much hair, the bun wasn’t easy either. Because of the amount of hair, I didn’t know where to put it all! But Marianne was very cooperative and let me practice on her as many times as I needed to. This enabled me to overcome all of these issues and feel confident for the assessment. I feel like Marianne was very patient with me and I know she would have been happy to tweak her design if i was to decide i really couldn't do it. If im honest, I’d say the timed assessment wasn’t the best I had done it, the bun wasn’t as perfect as I would have liked. But overall I’m happy with my first hair assessment. 
 Overall, I did really enjoy this assignment as it was something completely new for me. I had never done any hair, so it was pretty daunting. But it taught me how to adjust and adapt to difficult situations. As well as overcoming my fear of hair, I actually learnt lots of new skills that will come in handy throughout my career. 

What were my strengths?
 Id say my strengths for this unit would have been my perseverance and determination. At one point I honestly thought I was going to have to ask Marianne to alter her design as I just couldnt do the plait. But I practiced until I could do it and so happy that I managed to do it. I now feel a lot more confident with plaits than I did before starting this project. 

What could I improve on? 
I feel that I need to approach tasks with confidence in the future, as i found that they generally go to plan when i do. However, as I spent so long concentrating on  the plait i actually struggled with the bun in the assessment. I need to look at the hairsytyle as a whole, rather than just looking at one tricky section and panicking.