For the last month I have been giving serious consideration to cutting my hair.  Maybe it's just me wanting a drastic change for the new year, or perhaps I, like so many others have been tempted by the slew of celebrities that have been sporting shorter and edgier do's in the past couple of months, whatever the reason, shorter hair is really appealing at the moment. I've mentioned the desire to go shorter a few times to my hairstylist Pearson Knight, but he's been pretty hesitant, which is understandable especially considering that I have been known to ask for a drastic change without considering my lifestyle and hair texture, then regret my decision a week later.  (Can you relate?!) Instead of giving into my pleas to just chop it all off, Pearson suggested that I try wearing my hair in a faux bob, similar to the shorter length I was considering. He told me to try this for a few days to a week to see if I really liked the way I look with shorter hair or if I just wanted to be a part of the latest hair trend.  So I did as he requested and tried a faux bob, which was accomplished by pulling my hair into a loose, low ponytail at my nape and securing with a binder, I then left the ends of my ponytail in the binder.  I then slid the binder down my nape to gain a bit of space so that I would be able to roll the ponytail under and secure with pins to the base of my scalp.  When securing my hair with the pins, Pearson suggested that I criss-cross the pins so that it would be more stable and have staying power.  I then pulled the desired amount of hair over my hair and towards my jawline to create the desired length and fullness and lo and behold I had myself a faux bob! At first I loved how much lighter my hair felt.  It was also weird how naked my neck felt and my features stood out a lot more with shorter hair.  After trying the faux bob a few times, my faux shorter hair lost its novelty and I kept thinking about how much I loved my top knots, side braids and ponytails.  Needless to say I decided against going with shorter hair and instead went with shorter layers, which I LOVE.  If you are considering going shorter I highly suggest trying a faux short hairstyle before taking the plunge! Subscribe to A Girl’s Gotta Spa! for more beauty reviews! Watch our reviews on YouTube. Got a Kindle? We’re on Kindle too!

Just like me, you've probably thought that creating a ponytail is just about the easiest hairstyle to accomplish. I mean how difficult could it be? You grab a hair tie, pull all your hair back and secure it with the hair tie and voila! Well as I have learned, mostly from being on set and watching hairstylists, that way is just fine and dandy, but if you want to create the perfect ponytail you have to throw a few additional steps in there.

How to Create the Perfect Ponytail

Step 1: Create a part from ear to ear (from the back of the ear, across the top of the head to the back of the other ear.) Step 2: Clip the front part of the hair out of the way and tilt your head back slightly (to ensure that it does not end up saggy or buckles.)

Step 3: After deciding on placement (low, high or middle of the head), brush rear portion of hair into your hand loosely holding it, and with the other hand grab the ponytail tight against the head and secure with a hair tie.

Step 4: Release the top section with your head still tilted back slightly and brush front portion directly into the other section of hair (trying to avoid disruption of the other ponytail, but don't be afraid to brush the hair straight into and over the previously created ponytail) and secure with an elastic hair tie in the exact same way as above.

Step 5: Using hairspray for fly-aways, lightly smooth and spray fly-aways with hands or a fine tooth comb...only lightly skimming the top of the hair.

Bonus step: If you would like to make the ponytail sleeker or dress it up a bit, try grabbing a small section of the ponytail near the elastic hair tie and begin wrapping it around the elastic to hide the hair tie.  Secure wrap with a hair pin and bobby pin making sure that the pin is not visible.

And there you have it, two versions of the perfect ponytail...thanks to amazing hairstylist Pearson Knight for walking us through creating the perfect ponytail!