Building my grooming confidence, "head hair" length

[Heather D.]

Bert is an 8 month old ALD with a nice wavy fleece coat (for now). I've given him a couple of home cuts and I think he looks cute, a lot of people tell me he looks like a muppet but I think that's part of the cuteness. I leave the hair on his head longer, in the more traditional ALD haircut but it grows so fast that it's always over his eyes so I'm thinking of going shorter, but i'm afraid it will be too short. How short do you all go with the "head hair" so it's not too short? A couple pics of my recent cuts are below, he's a little grown out in these pics but they're pretty close (sorry, he's hard to photograph because he's dark chocolate and is always on the move!)

[Lukai]

In my opinion, you're doing great! Bert is absolutely adorable! It looks good to have a shorter cut on the body, while keeping the head length a bit longer. I constantly have to keep the hair around the eyes trimmed! 

It looks good to have a shorter cut on the body, while keeping the head length a bit longer (like you mentioned). I constantly have to keep the hair around Lukai's eyes trimmed! They tend to grow the fastest and the longest! 

[Leslie, Yogi & Maci Bear]

Here's my doodle's head shot this morning. The hair on their head is longer than their body, but I keep it out of their faces.
Your pictures are actually quite nice. Bert is a cutey.

[Heather D.]

They are ridiculously cute!!  And i like what you did with their hair, it's a little longer but still stays out of their faces.  I think i just have to work up the nerve to go a little shorter!

[Leslie, Yogi & Maci Bear]

I'd say just be brave and try it. It grows out so fast, within a week it will look different. Their coat is very forgiving! I only use scissors for the face. Never tried clippers :-)

[Lucy & AnnaBelle's Mom]

Are you grooming with clippers or scissors or both.  What I normally do for AnnaBelle is I put the 1" to 1.25" (you could use longer to start and just keep dropping down in size until you are comfortable with it) clipper guard on the cippers and I run it through the top of her head from front to back.  Make you you have a hold of all the ears so you don't pull the ears into the clippers.  Then I comb it all forwards and take my scissors and just trim so it so I can see her eyes.  The part in front of the eyes on the bridge of the nose is just clipped into sort of an upside down "V".  

[Heather D.]

I went for it last night, and i think it came out pretty good!  I used a 1" comb on my clippers and buzzed his head, avoiding the ears (as suggested).  I actually ended up just doing his entire body with the 1" comb and it still looks like his head hair is longer than his body hair, which is what i wanted, because his body hair is curlier than his head hair.  I'll post a picture as soon as i get one.

I still struggle with the muzzle...how do you trim the hair on his muzzle without cutting his whiskers?

[Heather D.]

Here he is with his new short 'do