Anya's hair has been getting out of control of late. Tangles and split ends that likely formed more than a year ago (when she was a baby who lay with the back of her head scrunched against a mattress 16 hours a day) have formed an undergrowth of proto-dreadlocks on her nape.
The curls are really beautiful, as crisp as the ringlets on the heroine of a BBC Dickens adaptation and a gorgeous golden-copper colour. But run your hands through them and it can get like velcro. We've used anti-tangle spray, but her yoghurt-stained and crumb-bedecked hands can undo our work as quickly as it's carried out.
On Sunday we put a stop to it and took her to a hair-cutting stall at the markets near our house. I've previously had her fringe done there -- the woman has a lovely manner and, most importantly for Anya, a funny pet pug -- but this is the first full-blown haircut.
We thought this would be a nightmare -- Anya hates people mucking about with her face, and Kate and I become History's Greatest Monsters every time we try to wash her Barnet in the bath -- but in fact once she was sat on the stool she took on that slightly bored, slightly quizzical look that all hairdressees seem to adopt and contentedly watched some episodes of Dora the Explorer on Kate's phone.
