As so many other single fathers have lamented, one of the most intimidating parts of being a single dad to a daughter is learning how to style hair. For most men, especially men with short hair, this is a "sink or swim" moment in caring for a young daughter.
And like many other great single fathers before him, Greg decided to face the problem head on. Greg asked the cosmetology department at his college for help in learning how to do his little girl's hair each morning. Greg sacrificed his lunch breaks to get a crash course in beauty school with tutorials from a college cosmetologist.
Greg, a.k.a. the Father of the Year, caught on immediately. As he tells BuzzFeed News, "It blew my mind how easy it was to do a bun. I thought it was something super special, like real intricate, especially the one where you don't finish pulling the ponytail."
After mastering the ponytail and the bun, Greg was ready to move to the next level: complex little girl hairstyles that even moms have a hard time with. He says, "I spent a couple hours just working on a mannequin, and she showed me how to do a bun, a French braid, all the different styles."
Dad styles her hair
Moving from the simple ponytail to the bun to the French braid, Greg is now a pro-hairstylist. He has shared his new passion for styling his daughter's hair on Facebook, where he is now affectionately known as the "hair dad."
Greg posts pictures of his own hairstyle creations to Facebook and receives hair tutorials from other parents in return. Greg reveals that a few mothers have even asked for his help in learning how to do their daughters' hair. If that's not street cred, I don't know what is.
Cute hairstyle by dad
Perhaps the best part of Greg's adorable story is how it breaks down the bumbling single dad stereotype. This is the new millennium. Families come in all shapes and sizes. Greg has just proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that single dads can be just as dedicated and nurturing as single moms.
For Greg, learning this new skill was worth it because it gave him yet another opportunity to bond with his daughter. Greg says that doing his daughter's hair is the best part of his day, "My favorite part of the day is when I wake her up and get her out of bed, and she’s still sleepy, so she nuzzles her face into my neck. That love right there, feeling that love and that trust is the most rewarding part."
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