As for the straitening....If you want to rebraid it or if you want it "dead" strait then you should do that. What I did for my Molly and Josefina was while the hair was still damp from the downey dunk I took my CERAMIC ( heard metal is bad for the dolls hair) straitener and on the lowest setting, continuously moving it so it didn't sit on one section of hair for a period of time, straitened it. This is good for braiding especially and getting out wierd kinks like you mentioned that don't match the rest of the hair.