~*~ Stick It! A thread for Gymnastics Parents ~*~

[dis4me]

We have an official team hairdo-I'm serious. (I about flipped when all the new moms had to come in for hair lessons!) You part it 5-7 times in front and do this little pull-through, then put it in a pony-tail, then either tight curls or a bun.

Use LOTS of gel.

Do you know how to do those skinny little braids that lay flat on the head? Lots of girls do rows of those, then a ponytail or bun.

Our coach dictates what hairstyle we do as well. Usually it is a bun or ponytails but sometimes it is curls. She usually doesn't tell us until the night before.

 

[Terry36]

I think pulling her hair back and using gel will work just fine.

Thanks everyone for the advice...

Carone - is your daughter @ a meet in the 1st picture where she has all of the rubber bands in front of her hair? I have braided her hair @ the top like this several times.

 

[mom2cinderella]

Okay ladies - this Saturday will be my daughter's 1st meet.

Yay! Have fun!

My dd was a nervous wreck before her first meet and got a terrible night's sleep. Then we went apple picking that morning, so she had no energy at her meet. Make sure your dd gets plenty of rest. Sometimes those meets drag on forever, so put some healthy snacks in her bag that aren't messy. And water/gatorade/whatever to drink.

Our girls have to have their hair in a bun. No bangs allowed so I use gel, mini bands, pins and hairspray, hairspray, hairspray until her hair is a little helmet!

She did good, improved from the first meet with the exception of beam.

Yay Barb!

Michele

 

[sharlon]

Wow! Sounds like we had some great meets this past weekend!

I'm going to ask for some pixie dust thrown at my DD. I mentioned way back on page 1 that her first season was cut short by emergency surgery. She had a bowel resection. She missed 4 meets and state. Anyway, there are 3 meets that compete compulsory in the winter/spring, and she is going to compete at those. The first is Saturday, and it will be her first meet since surgery, exactly 3 months to the day since her surgery. Please be thinking of her. She has made a miracle recovery, so this is a big deal.
Thanks so much!

BTW, as long as our girls have their hair up, there is no required style. My DD has long hair, so we typically do hers in small little pony tails in the front that pull to a big pony tail in the back. We do have a scruncy that is part of the uniform that we have to use.

 

[mom2cinderella]

I'm going to ask for some pixie dust thrown at my DD.

You got it!

Michele

 

[dis4me]

Her's some pixie dust. Good luck to your dd and everyone else competing this weekend.Make sure you come back and give us a report.

Wow! Sounds like we had some great meets this past weekend!

I'm going to ask for some pixie dust thrown at my DD. I mentioned way back on page 1 that her first season was cut short by emergency surgery. She had a bowel resection. She missed 4 meets and state. Anyway, there are 3 meets that compete compulsory in the winter/spring, and she is going to compete at those. The first is Saturday, and it will be her first meet since surgery, exactly 3 months to the day since her surgery. Please be thinking of her. She has made a miracle recovery, so this is a big deal.
Thanks so much!

BTW, as long as our girls have their hair up, there is no required style. My DD has long hair, so we typically do hers in small little pony tails in the front that pull to a big pony tail in the back. We do have a scruncy that is part of the uniform that we have to use.

 

[carone0318]

Wow! Sounds like we had some great meets this past weekend!

I'm going to ask for some pixie dust thrown at my DD. I mentioned way back on page 1 that her first season was cut short by emergency surgery. She had a bowel resection. She missed 4 meets and state. Anyway, there are 3 meets that compete compulsory in the winter/spring, and she is going to compete at those. The first is Saturday, and it will be her first meet since surgery, exactly 3 months to the day since her surgery. Please be thinking of her. She has made a miracle recovery, so this is a big deal.
Thanks so much!

BTW, as long as our girls have their hair up, there is no required style. My DD has long hair, so we typically do hers in small little pony tails in the front that pull to a big pony tail in the back. We do have a scruncy that is part of the uniform that we have to use.

Good luck to your dd too I hope she does well!

 

[TnTsParty]

Sharlon - good luck to your daughter on Saturday. That is a miraculous recovery that she is able to compete 3 months after that kind of surgery (my sister had to have that and had all kinds of complications and ended up being in the hospital 5 weeks and had another surgery etc) So 3 months is GREAT. Good luck to her.

Also wanted to wish anyone else who has girls competing this weekend good luck. My neice's comp is Friday morning at Wide World of Sports.

As far as her team and hair - I think they just require it to be up and out of their face. She has really long hair and my sister normally pulls it back into a ponytail and then the ponytail she does little braids (like 4 or 5) and then tucks it under. The also have a "team" scrunchie that matches their leo. Recenty she cut her bangs (don't know what she was thinking since her hair is all one length normally.)

 

[missypie]

Sharlon - good luck to your daughter on Saturday. That is a miraculous recovery that she is able to compete 3 months after that kind of surgery (my sister had to have that and had all kinds of complications and ended up being in the hospital 5 weeks and had another surgery etc) So 3 months is GREAT. Good luck to her.

Also wanted to wish anyone else who has girls competing this weekend good luck. My neice's comp is Friday morning at Wide World of Sports.

As far as her team and hair - I think they just require it to be up and out of their face. She has really long hair and my sister normally pulls it back into a ponytail and then the ponytail she does little braids (like 4 or 5) and then tucks it under. The also have a "team" scrunchie that matches their leo. Recenty she cut her bangs (don't know what she was thinking since her hair is all one length normally.)

Ah, to be young again and recover that quickly! I had a wisdom tooth out at about the age of 45. It was very slow in healing and the oral surgeon basically told me, "Well, you aren't 16 any more!"

Are we the ONLY ones with a required team hair style? I guess it does look neat, but between the pull throughs and the curls, it takes over an hour to do, then DD has to sleep on the curlers and it takes another half hour to take them down. Girls get extra conditioning the next week if they show up at a meet without the official 'do.

 

[carone0318]

Are we the ONLY ones with a required team hair style? I guess it does look neat, but between the pull throughs and the curls, it takes over an hour to do, then DD has to sleep on the curlers and it takes another half hour to take them down. Girls get extra conditioning the next week if they show up at a meet without the official 'do.

Ok, I think that extra conditioning is crazy due to a hairstyle. We don't have an official hairstyle, but it needs to be off their face - no bangs (which to an extent I disagree with, because if you have short hair, you don't have long bangs.)

Our HC/O doesn't like really long hair. She told one girl at dd's level to cut her hair on more than 1 occasion. It doesn't matter to the HC/O that this girl is waiting to donate her hair to locks for love (her confirmation community service hours.) She just doesn't like it, she wants it cut.

She told another girl to cut about 7" off her hair, because she doesn't like in practice the messy bun look.

To me this has nothing to do with how well of a gymnast you are, luckily she hasn't said anything to me, because my dd's hair is not under her control.

If you look at dd's picture in my signature, you will see how she wears it for competitions. I basically do a what I call a spider web look, it's 3 rows and then a straight ponytail (this was the first yr I didn't have to do curls in the back - dd's request). No glitter either! Maybe in a couple of years she will just be a straight back pony!

 

[mom2cinderella]

I basically do a what I call a spider web look

I can't wait til dd's bangs are long enough to do that!


Based on what I've seen at this year's meets, very few gyms have a required style. Most of them seem to wear ponytails of some sort.

Our gym requires buns w/matching scrunchie and hair off the face. Another mom said they want the girls to look as uniform as possible to help scoring? Huh? I find that hard to believe.

Michele

 

[carone0318]

Our gym requires buns w/matching scrunchie and hair off the face. Another mom said they want the girls to look as uniform as possible to help scoring? Huh? I find that hard to believe.

Michele

To me the uniform look has more of a ballet class feel - there are gyms that dd has competed against though that go for the bun look too. Some gyms score well, others don't - don't think it has much to do with their hair though !

PS - Cute dd, like the leo!

 

[missypie]

I can't wait til dd's bangs are long enough to do that!


Based on what I've seen at this year's meets, very few gyms have a required style. Most of them seem to wear ponytails of some sort.

Our gym requires buns w/matching scrunchie and hair off the face. Another mom said they want the girls to look as uniform as possible to help scoring? Huh? I find that hard to believe.

Michele

When DD started competing, the gym required buns. Last year they started allowing the supertight curls. After having girls in soccer who were forbidden to have a single bobby pin or metal clip in their hair, I was floored that the gym required buns.....so in soccer you could be severely wounded by a single bobby pin in your hair, but in gymnastics it's okay to have 50?

 

[mom2cinderella]

Cute dd, like the leo!

Thanks! And (just like ds & soccer uniforms ) we started in the second year of the two-year leo cycle so we get to buy new leos & warmups again this summer. Get used to it right?

so in soccer you could be severely wounded by a single bobby pin in your hair, but in gymnastics it's okay to have 50?

I know, gymnastics is crazy.



Michele

 

[missypie]

Here's a tip. When ordering new leos, try to get the gym to require the vendor to send over/bring samples for sizing purposes. I have a drill team daughter, and the dance vendors ALWAYS do this, even with the middle school kids. However, with the ultra-expensive competition leos, we are forced to rely on the measurement charts which are SO off! (The leo was way too small and the warm up pants were way too large, all based on the same measurement chart!)

 

[mom2kazkids]

"Our girls have to have their hair in a bun. No bangs allowed so I use gel, mini bands, pins and hairspray, hairspray, hairspray until her hair is a little helmet!"

Hey that is the same that I do for my DD. Our coaches require buns, but truely I think that I like the look of the girls with buns vs those with ponies or braids.

Here is a picture of DD in her competition leo (we had team picutes in December, this was a quick bun that I put in for the pictures), since she is level 3 she just has a no sleeve leo, we will need to move up to the long sleeve leo next year. I think I will be like you mom2cinderella and get into the middle of a 2 year cycle and have to buy a new leo the next year.

Barb

 

[paigeandmorgansmom]

my daughter who is 12, but wears a girls 8 slim got a child's large in her new warm-up. The jacket fit, but the pants are about 6 inches to long. We had to order a size adult x-small in her leo. They need to come up with a better sizing chart. I am just glad we got to try on samples before we ordered this year.

 

[mom2cinderella]

Here is a picture of DD in her competition leo (we had team picutes in December, this was a quick bun that I put in for the pictures)

Such a cutie! I can't wait til dd's bangs grow out - looks so much nicer when you can get all the hair into the bun.


Our leos/warmups are from Dreamlight. Thank goodness dd was XS for both the jacket and pants. Somehow the group order got messed up (don't know if it was due to a mistake on our gym's part or Dreamlight's) and the size requests got switched. So if someone was medium jacket and small pants, they got small jacket and medium pants. And with custom orders it seems to be a case of too bad, so sad.

Michele

 

[Disneyoverload42]

can I join the party?

About you and your gymnast:
How old was your child when they started gymnastics? She was a late starter 9 been doing this for 4 years now...
What level are they at now? 5 (we've had many many injuries)
Do levels 1/2/3 compete in your area/state? no
When is your "season"? October-March
Do you have other kids? Yes
Are you juggling their activities too? Luckily they aren't in any anymore but the two little princesses would like to start gymnastics.
Do you follow gymnastics at the National level? Somewhat, the local girls who compete nationally.

 

[carone0318]

Thanks everyone for the advice...

Carone - is your daughter @ a meet in the 1st picture where she has all of the rubber bands in front of her hair? I have braided her hair @ the top like this several times.

Just thought that I'd give you an answer. The picture below in my signature is her in Disney. Instead of doing hair wraps or anything, I do her hair like this and it's off her head and it's FREE! But, this is how she wears her hair at competitions, but she has it match her leo.

This is probably one of the best that I have of her in her comp leo with her hair done. She is getting into her starting pose for her floor:

I do have the teal bands that I can use in her hair, but this season we went with white because she is in catholic school and the teal doesn't match her uniform and she will get in trouble for that - so white it was this yr.