I spent last week lying on the couch fighting a virus. Since I have permission to leave the house to attend church, and I didn’t want to miss those few hours, I found myself staring at the bathroom mirror Sunday morning. I still looked pale and there was a long curl, right in the middle of my forehead.

I decided it was time to cut my bangs.

I blogged about getting my hair cut once a year on October 10, 2012, (“ONCE A YEAR WASH AND WEAR HAIRCUT”). I maintain my haircut by cutting my own bangs. I have been cutting the hair of my husband and children for decades, but it is different cutting your own hair.

My 2012 haircut.

I found a great tip in “Real Simple” magazine a few months ago. I had to adapt it to cut my own curly hair. They recommend pulling the bangs down, grasping them in your fist, and cutting around your thumb.

Those of you with curly hair know the difficulty in judging how short to cut it. It bounces back into a tighter curl and may end up much shorter than you had planned.

My solution was to grasp my bangs in my fist and pull them down straight until my thumb touched my nose.  I cut around my thumb and they bounced back up into a perfect length.

I borrowed my title from a poem my mother used to recite to me.

There Was a Little Girl

By Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

There was a little girl,

Who had a little curl,

Right in the middle of her forehead.

When she was good,

She was very good indeed,

But when she was bad she was horrid.