But why hair shelby?

The first blog post I ever wrote for you was all about me and how I got to where I am as a Stylist. However, I wanted to give you a little more insight into who I am and why I chose Hairdressing as my ultimate career.

So where did my passion begin?

To be honest, it didn’t begin with hair. As a young child all the way up into High School I enjoyed everything and anything creative. Art projects were my life! I would spend hours and hours painting or coloring on my bedroom floor. When it came to painting, I definitely preferred watercolors because I enjoyed creating those seamless blends of color. I also dabbled in pastel chalks, charcoals and water color pencils.

Later I jumped into Photography. I wasn’t the best with Photography but I enjoyed learning about it! I remember taking a Photography class in High School and learning all the technical terms, angles and rules. My favorite subjects to photograph were trees and gutters! I know gutters sound disgusting but after a fresh rain, I promise you it’s worth taking a look! Just for your enjoyment I have placed two images from my High School class here to share with you. I love seeing how much I’ve progressed!

Crocheting and sewing were also in the mix of projects I did! I used to run to Joanne’s Craft Store when the sales were crazy picking out all kinds of fabrics of different textures and patterns. I would quilt them together and make huge blankets or purses. Crocheting is actually something I still enjoy and do from time to time! If you follow either my personal, or business page, on Instagram you’ve definitely heard of my Sugar Plum Baby Blankets. I usually bring those back in the Salon around the holidays and they make wonderful gifts for you new mom’s out there! There are very few crafts I hadn’t tried at least once, but to be honest I preferred the more tedious of them.

Hair came into the mix of my creativity at the young age of thirteen, but I didn’t get too crazy until I was fifteen. My Hairstylist growing up I’m sure hated me because I changed my hair color quite often, and never subtly. I also totally rocked that whole “scene” look for most of my teenage years, so I really challenged her with my mullet haircuts. For those of you who are my age you know exactly what I’m talking about but for those of you who are not, please refer to my fifteen year old self to your right. Bet you didn’t know I was about to embarrass the hell out of myself? Yeah I’m dying laughing too!

So when did you start hair and where did the idea come from?

I was sitting in my Hairstylists chair one day and she said to me, “Why don’t you start Beauty School? I bet you’d love it, you’re so creative and daring with your hairstyles.” Well that there folks planted the seed!

After weeks of researching I discovered something amazing! At my High School they offered classes through ROP Programs. These ROP Programs were designed for students that wanted to go into bigger fields after school. These larger fields included things like trades, the police force, forensics, nursing, etc. One of the classes on their list was Beauty School and that’s where my story all began!

I started my journey the following semester! I began part time after school at first while I was still in normal classes. Then within a few months I jumped into full time, and moved myself into a program called Fresh Start. Fresh Start was an independent studies program that only required you to go on campus for testing, so it allowed me to be a full forty hours a week at Lake Forest Beauty College. I graduated and was license only a year later and a few months before I graduated High School. Here I go embarrassing myself again with a fun picture of me on the day I graduated from Lake Forest Beauty College!

From there, I began my career with Toni & Guy for the following seven years. Then I jumped from salon to salon, until I finally decided to take the leap and follow one of my biggest dreams. I opened up my own Salon, Sugar Plum in October of 2018! That then leads me to where I am today and I couldn’t be more proud of myself and what I’ve accomplished!

Okay, but why hairdressing?

Little did I know when I started this journey twelve years ago, that my career was not just going to be hair. I was going to change lives!

At first, I was just doing hair because I enjoyed it! I met incredible people who worked in all type of fields. I got into education and this was definitely one of my larger passions! But I got to a point in my career where I just felt burnt out, I felt that there was something bigger out there that I was meant for. I decided to go back to school at a local college. I was there on and off for five years… I hated it. The only class i truly enjoyed was Spanish Class but that definitely would not have been a career! I looked into a complete job change because I felt like I was not able to progress any further as a Hairdresser. I had already been a Stylist, an educator and even a manager so what else was there?

I’m going to back up the bus here for a second because when I was a child I struggled with something very crucial to this story. I struggled with self-confidence and not feeling deserving or good enough. It really damaged my relationships with the people around me, it held me back from accomplishing things in my life and it had the largest impact on myself! This lead to the real reason for becoming a Hairdresser and it hit me around 5 years ago.

I did something huge and way out of my element, a Boudoir Photoshoot. I met one of the most incredible people I could of met at that time in my life, Alyssa Michelle. Alyssa taught me that I could love myself and who I was, as I was. I no longer saw myself in a negative way, I no longer was trying to please everyone around me with who they wanted me to be, and I definitely was not going to let anyone bring me down and keep me from chasing my dreams. I began to see how strong, beautiful and powerful I was! I’m telling you guys… when you love yourself and are confident in who you are, the world begins to see you the same way. I wanted to share this with everyone! Everyone needed to feel this empowerment! How could I help people, women in particular, to realize their value, beauty and how incredible they are? Hair.

You guys I took this and ran with it, because I had finally found my purpose for doing hair! It is my goal to make sure that every woman who sits in my chair feels their most confident and beautiful self that they can be. When I have a guest come in who’s in a rough time period in their life, they are going through a break up or they are just struggling with their appearance this is my time to be that change in their life. It’s my job to make this guest feel their absolute best and that they can conquer the world! And they can!

This is why I chose Hairdressing. I chose to be the person in each guests life to change how they felt about themselves. Their experience with me could be that break in their life that they needed to recuperate themselves, bring them back to life and give them the confidence to move forward!

I can honestly say that this is the best job, no not even job, opportunity I have ever had and thank you for giving me this opportunity daily!

In conclusion…

This is not my job, this is my gift to every single one of you and I look forward to every day when I get to walk into my salon, do my guests hair and change their life. You are beautiful, confident and strong I promise you that!

xoxo,

Shelby Alexandra