Draw a Braid

Ever wanted to draw cute braids? Here's how. It's easy and fun! Enjoy!

Steps

Draw two guidelines along the outline of the braids, for you easily lose track when you're drawing the strands.
Then you draw tilted bows whose open ends meets with the side of the next mirrored bow. That's all already! You can draw braids in one long line with a little training. Here it is done on the right side of the picture and drew the line a bit separated to show how.
Begin shading. Give the bows a tip, curving along the next upper bow a bit.
Then shade like the strands in the first tutorial. Where one strand slips below the other it is darkest of course and at the thickest point (where another strand is below the one you are just drawing) there are the highlights. Draw the shadowing line along the contour of the strands, drawing an outer shadow where the hair comes from back to front, too, and tada, the braid is finished! And if you analyze this closely you will find that it is absolutely correct, three strands entwined.

Be careful of your sharpened pencil. You can have infections with your basic senses.