Captivating

I'm sitting at the front desk of my salon today & the phone rings & its this lady inquiring to get a hair cut. I ask if she has ever been to this salon before & she answers no I found you on Facebook. Happily I ask for her information to put her in for a colour & cut with myself. Around noon this lady walks in & we get to talking about what it is we are going to do with her hair today. She explains to me how she hates her hair & who she has been seeing for a stylist for some time now, has managed to cut it all off on her & the colours all wrong and she begins to get emotional!

I turn to walk away and I see this poor woman balling her eyes out! Immediately I'm like Oh my gosh! Are you okay?!? She says to me you don't understand I found you on Facebook, I need help with my hair I am so scared of the outcome today but can you PLEASE make me beautiful again. At this point I'm over whelmed with feeling so bad for this woman I promise her a beautiful outcome. As I dig into her hair a little more I see regrowth of 2 1/2 inches, unblended & untoned highlights, spots of lightener & her hair cut was a lot shorter on her right side. I'm thinking to myself at this point this is going to take a long time & this poor woman's concern is about money. Continually crying I take her hand & once again assure her it will come out beautiful & don't worry too much about the coast. I get my colours & my foils ready, section her hair & go to town!

 During her hair process she begins to tell me & show me photos of herself in her younger years of her being a Gap model & photos of herself when she tried to audition for Victoria Secrets. What a beautiful young lady she was, now being fifty. She continues to tell me she cant stand to look in the mirror any more because tears just come to her eyes about how bad her hair looks & shes nervous, I try to keep her calm & tell her funny geeky stories about myself. She opens up a bit more about her life & her past and my heart just aches for this women  & what shes been through & for her have to go through such a mess with her hair. About an hour later & probably about 100 foils later its time to rinse her out. At the sink after our continuous conversation she hasn't even seen her hair and shes thanking me over & over again saying "I just know you made me beautiful". 

I bring her back to my chair and consult her on the damage & length of her hair, she says frowning "cut it". I take off as little as possible. When I'm done drying her hair I turn her chair around so she can see the results of our two hr long process & she begins to cry again, as shes running her hands through her hair & gives me a hug full of tears saying "I love it, it's beautiful". This woman & her story is why I love what I do. I feel as though if her last hair stylist had maybe listened a little better & been a little more educated in what she was doing with her clients hair this woman would not have had to go through that. Just seeing the end results & the look on this captivating woman's face & to know I just made her day, her night, her week that much better by doing her hair, that's the most rewarding part of my job.

True Serendipity

I wake up one day in my third floor apartment with my daughter Destinee, one & half at the time next to me & I think to myself, I need to seriously do something with my life for us. I call a friend of mine at the time & say, "what do you want to do with the rest of your life"? She explains to me she wants to be a hair dresser. I at the time think its a silly idea and continue to tell her, "people always tell me to go to beauty school, that cant be for me. I'll sell houses for a living." We then decided we would get up for the day, get ourselves and our kids ready and go check out schools together. I printed out some programs in the area you take to get licensed to sell houses & she says well first lets look at cosmetology school. 

So I go in with her with no intention of being a stylist. I fall in love at first sight. The energy, the atmosphere, the ART being created, the possibility's in that school were endless! I'm instantly over whelmed. The lady giving the tour ( Christina Balasco ) was giving my friend all the paper work needed to sign up for the program and I instantly asked for one too. She then starts giving her the tour of the school and I asked to join as well. Everyone looked so focused, so beautiful, so well put together. I had to do this. I always enjoyed helping other people & making them look & feel beautiful. As a teen I would offer make overs, to girls my age from church, I'd put some eye shadow on them & straighten their hair, Just something little but it would make them smile. But could I do it as a profession? It looked hard....     We finished the tour & I informer her I also would like to attend the program & come back and fill out the proper paper work.

 Some time goes by and I got scared. Could not make an actual commitment to something for TEN MONTHS OMG! The school continually called me, said it was a decision I had to make & had to do it fast. I prayed & prayed if this was what I was supposed to do for me and my daughter God will let me know. More time went by and it became clear to me it was meant for me. Found out my aunt was once a hair dresser, people out in public would randomly come up & ask me if i was & that had never happened to me before. Just more & more signs it was meant to be. So I called the school went in the next day & filled out my paper work!! 

First week was so nerve racking learning to hold the shears & all the proper terms of things I'm thinking, omg I am never going to do this why would I do this to myself. After a while of sticking it out & focusing on this is what has to be done for me and my daughter, it became less of a "job" but and amazing talent unraveling I never knew I had. A "happy accident" or "pleasant surprise"; specifically, the accident of finding something good or useful without looking for it; serendipity.  

My Motivation My little girl Destinee <3

Valentines Day Special

VALENTINES DAY SPECIAL!!!

Shellac manicure $30
Styled sexy hair $35
make up & eye lashes $70

SPECIAL ALL FOR $85.00
Look your best this Valentines Day!!
Call/text my cell 654-9985 or the Salon at 401-732-6750

Tattoo Artistry

Recently posted on my facebook timeline was a link to a website where a young woman was heartlessly trashing woman with tattoos. Now since reading that trashy article it has been weighing on my mind, and mostly because I too, do have quite a few tattoos that get comments & compliments. So I've decided to throw out my piece of mind on the subject at hand. Tattoos can have a million reasons behind them. Maybe a loved one died, maybe something took place in their life they learned a big lesson from and they want to remember it by some tattoo artistry. Maybe they really enjoy a character and think it would be "cool" to get a tattoo of it. What ever the case being I dont see anything personally wrong with a woman getting Ink work done. Tattoos can be a very tasteful asset to someones identity. I feel as though people jump to judge someone a little to quick once they see some Ink on their body. For what reason?

I feel as though times have changed, and a woman's role in society has changed as well, and to say just because shes a woman she cant Ink her body is quite sexist. I can be a mom, a wife, sole bread winner, full time worker, but as soon as you decide to get a tattoo your a trashy? I dont know, just things I dont understand. I wear my Ink and I wear it proudly, for it has many meanings & lessons learned behind it.

Facebook/Jaclynnbarry.com

Link below was my "inspiration" for this Blog.
http://www.facebook.com/l.php?u=http%3A%2F%2Fhopegallery.wordpress.com%2F2012%2F01%2F31%2Fspectrum%2F&h=CAQG-oCUsAQG36T1-HMKeMFPflyoWtVJ7OhVkrbKPSynNvw&enc=AZPaC_h2hZfEa3xTG20RTt9HbQ5HeM-JKUSxvLzQi9RGYeh-Ed8LTc0xymu5X9pRgc5fbPIwwzCW2g6OGduYrFJa

Game Change

Blogging from work can only tell you one thing. Life behind a chair is not what it used to be. More and more people are not coming in for their weekly wash & blow out. The salon game has changed. You cant just depend on walk-ins for a hefty pay check at the end of the week its not going to happen. Now you need to target your market and go out there and bring them in. Reward your clients. Make them feel special that they have your time. Let them know & remember what sets you aside from the other billion stylist out there, remind them why it is they come to you. Maybe try a thank you card from time to time, or a birthday card. People respect the little things. Try local advertisements to draw in new clients, and never let go of social media. We all know word of mouth is the best form of advertising, well hows a Facebook status for word of mouth? Its an easy concept, someone updates their status that "they got a fab up-do by so and so" and advertised that FOR YOU to all her friends ONLINE!!? Talk about word of mouth!!! And the best part is, its FREE!! Have you tried social media advertising yet? Has it worked for you?

Simplicity

The 60s winter attire. How I would describe as perfection. These ladies dressed appropriately not provocatively..... Things I don't understand, when I see a young girl posting photos of herself on the internet dressed to go out in mid December wearing less clothing then I would if it was mid August. I feel as though the years go on & a woman's choice of clothing obviously get more provocative, but why? Attention? "Fashion forward"? When did it become acceptable to walk out of the house half naked? Or when did parents allow it?

FOLLOW ME ALONG A STYLIST JOURNEY

A stylist journey through the eye of an artist, where I will be blogging about life behind the chair & on the road. Blogs on fashion forward do's and fashion don'ts. Blogs about classic taste, advice on how to make it in the beauty industry and what to do when you hit road blocks, and of course silly things from my personal life.