It came to my attention yesterday that e-mails to elaine(at)handfulofhenna.com were bouncing back. I logged into my host admin panel and discovered that my e-mail address simply didn't exist anymore! This is now fixed.
I'm not sure how long this was going on (or why it happened in the first place!), but please be assured that I'm still alive, kicking and doing henna here in Reno. Please feel free to drop me an e-mail anytime!
Darcy of the Henna Lounge hosted a wonderful weekend of henna, Indian food, craftmaking and crude jokes!
So a few people have asked about henna on eyebrows. I actually rememberd to take photos of the results the last time I did it. :) It took me a few tries to perfect it -- you really need to take care to keep water from lightening it up too much for the best results.
First photo: A few hours after taking the paste off. It's a little orangey. In the shower, I put beeswax lotion (courtesy Darcy) on my brows, because normally, a shower will significantly lighten them.
Second photo: The next morning (over 24 hours later). It's more of a henna red color, and stays this way for a few days. I did the beeswax lotion again this morning to maintain the color.
I used to glob it on and clean it up with a Q-tip. Now I just outline my eyebrows with a cone and then fill it in. I use a heavily molassessed paste, because it stays soft, making it easier to get out of your eyebrow hairs after it's been on there for a few hours.
Oh, and a tip: Don't go to the DMV to get a new liscence photo taken the morning after hennaing your eyebrows! It looks kind of funky to have uber henna hair with these weird orange eyebrows, lol.
After several months hiatus from the internet, I'm back with the news that I've moved home from San Francisco to Reno! The main Web site is also up with basic pricing info, contact info, etc.
Here's a bit of what I've been doing lately, with promises of more to come!
Summer festivals and some leaky glitter poofers have reintroduced me to the joy of sparkles!
I like having glitter poofers for festivals because it breaks up the monotony of eight hours of squirting green goop on people. It gives me a reason not to hate my less favorite festival designs (because who can dislike glitter?). I think it also adds value to designs, which is integral for those tiny kanji or horoscope signs people want that barely meet the minimum design dollar amount.
This particular design is from Darcy's Indo-Arabian e-book. The glitter was kind of a mistake -- I meant to sprinkle a little bit on, but I hadn't used the blue glitter poofer from Amerikan Body Art yet, so I didn't know that the particular bottle was "looser" than the other bottles of glitter I ordered. After dumping a large amount at the tip of the design, I figured, why the heck not completely glitterize it?? It certainly goes well with jeans!
I'm experimenting with different henna recipes to get a consistently good consistency for doing designs -- not so dry that it immediately cracks, not so sugary that the design flattens out and bleeds like a bad batch of cookies, not so thin that it just dribbles down the skin.
Last night I mixed the following recipe:
I tried it out immediately after mixing, straining, and coning it and was able to do a beautifully delicate design:
Unfortunately it won't stain because the henna didn't have time to set, thus there was little to no dye release. :) I coned it and left it out overnight, and popped it into the refrigerator this morning before work. I'll test the staining power of it tonight sometime.
For a sealant, I nuked a bit of lemon juice, sugar, and honey in the microwave, stirred it up, and dabbed it on with a paper towel. That stuff did NOT want to come off in the morning! Nor did any of it flake off in the tissue I wrapped it in.
After I get this straight, I'm going to experiment with using molasses instead of honey, making my henna vegan.
Also, I found out that these oversize holographic origami papers from Japantown make awesome cones:
In other news, be on the lookout in the next couple weeks for the launch of my new henna site, HandfulofHenna.com! My ultimate goal is to integrate this blog and gallery into the new site using Moveable Type, adding sections for articles, recipes, designs, and booking information should you need a Bay Area henna artist. ;) I promise to dedicate an entire section to henna hair care with photos and summaries of the experiments I blogged here in the past year or so.
Thanks, and happy hennaing!
A lot of interesting things have been going on in my blogging absence! Here's an attempt to keep you guys up to speed.
The UK-based henna artist Cat Hinton, who has a background in biology, is running a series of henna experiments that challenge the Western notion that lemon is the ideal liquid for henna mixes. She hypothesizes that lemon juice inhibits enzymes from breaking down plant cell walls. The dye in henna, lawsone, is in a plant cell wall. So, lemon juice might actually inhibit staining, rather than make it darker and better. Her experiments deal with lemon juice vs. papaya and pineapple juice, two fruits that have an abundance of enzymes. The nitty-gritty comes to this: Henna Tribe artists are discovering that mixes with plain water stain way better than lemon mixes.
For those of you who find tap water less than romantic, try substituting plain water for your favorite tea. You may need to add more sugar to your mix, because lemon juice has a certain amount of fructose that makes a lemon mix need less sugar for the right consistency than a water mix -- around a tablespoon or two per 100 grams of henna, as estimated by Henna Lounge artist Darcy Vasudev. And don't forget your terps!
In the world of henna for hair, results are similar. I've pared down my henna for hair recipe to henna mixed with hot chamomile tea. (You can also use hot liquid in your mehndi mixes if you want to use them sooner rather than later.) I also learned that there's no need to shampoo it out. Henna is a natural cleanser and conditioner for hair. Drawing a bath and soaking it out is a wonderfully relaxing experience, and leaves your hair clean and silky-soft. (You may have to scrub your tub with some baking soda to get any residual henna stains out, but don't worry -- it won't permanently stain your tub.) No conditioner is needed, either.
However, if you do want to condition your hair, a few drops of oil (olive, coconut, or a hair oil like Weleda's rosemary hair oil), you just need a drop or two combed through your wet hair. For a deep conditioning treatment, saturate your hair with oil, wrap with a scarf, leave on overnight, and wash out in the morning. (Beware that coconut oil starts to smell sour after 5-10 minutes; if it bothers you, you might want to use a different oil.)
I should be doing more henna as spring and summer come into full-force, so look for more updates soon. Until then, happy hennaing!
Things have been quiet lately here -- I haven't done much henna since Thanksgiving. :(
Today things were extremely slow at work because all of our clients skipped out early for the three-day weekend, so we had nothing to do. I had a couple old cones and lemons in the fridge there, and some design ebooks on my flash drive, so I sat down and started doing henna on whoever wanted some.
I started with the boys, ironically. My good friend told me just to doodle (and requested Spiderman's face after I outlined the Moroccan frame -- so I gave him a spider in a spider web). I unfortunately didn't get pictures of the two scorpions I did. They turned out rather well.
Then I did the ladies. We had a heart with my coworker's son's initials in it, and a racy little flower just below my other coworker's collarbone. I also did some designs from Amira's books on myself, one of my other good friends, and a coworker's girlfriend.
Unfortunately, I don't think anybody's stains are going to be that great. Those cones had been sitting in the fridge at work for over a week, and prior to that they went to St. Maarten and back without ice packs. I know it's not totally dead though, so hopefully with good aftercare, everybody will enjoy their henna!
Wow, have I been busy lately! However, on Thanksgiving I made it a point to meet up with a good friend and henna the hell out of her. :) Thank you Rebecca for being such a willing canvas, and for sending me your after-pics:
She reports that the stain got even darker the next day. It's all about the aftercare -- congratulations on taking good care of your henna!
She chose the designs from some of Amira's books that I brought along. I also recently bought Lezard's first (and much-acclaimed) book, which is amazing -- it has a lot of Asian elements that I've been wanting to eventually integrate into henna designs.
I did a festive little flower design from Lezard's book for myself for Thanksgiving:
And Darcy was sweet enough to invite me to a Henna Happy Hour at her place the Friday before Thanksgiving, where she created this beautiful & fabulous design on my right hand for me (I love you, Darcy!):
So that pretty much sums up the last half of my November. I'm hoping to do some more henna before my upcoming trip to St. Maarten to visit my brother (I can't pass up the chance to show off some henna'd skin in a climate warm enough to show skin!), and then perhaps more for Christmas, despite my relatives' misgivings. My grandma actually thought my Thanksgiving henna was a permanent tattoo. O_o; And no telling what was going through everybody else's heads... they all just pretended it wasn't there.
In any case, Happy Holidays everybody! I hope to share more with you soon!
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Okay, so this is my third before-and-after of my henna-head. I think my hair has reached maximum henna saturation, because this application blended in my roots but didn't seriously affect the overall color!
Today's recipe:
I left it in for only about 3 or 3.5 hours this time (instead of a full 4). I also slopped it on right after mixing it (with lukewarm chamomile), without waiting for dye release. I did this because I've heard that hair takes henna so much more easily than skin that you could use water, mix, and apply immediately with good results.
I applied it to my roots first, using a condiment dispenser I got for 85� at a kitchen store down the street:
I always had problems before with getting the henna near my scalp, though obviously it didn't harm the final outcome. If you just goop it on, it doesn't really saturate your entire head -- it just sits on the clump of hair you lathered it over. So, with this dispenser I could part my hair in segments all over my head and just squeeze a big line of henna into the part. Then I glopped the rest on over that and massaged it into my scalp. I so love the cooling effect the henna has on my scalp!
I used the olive oil and conditioner in this batch because I had problems with a larger-than-usual amount of hair falling out when I rinsed the henna out. Others have reported alleviating this symptom by adding olive oil, which is really good for your hair anyway. This batch worked just as advertised -- I only washed out the normal amount of hair I shed in the shower every day.
I hadn't added olive oil before because I heard somewhere that it kept the henna from staining as well as it should. But others reported use of a moderate amount of olive oil with no problems. I guess it's the same with terps -- a little is fine, too much ruins stain. On a side-note, I used vegetable oil around my hairline, applied with a cotton ball, to deflect the orange halo you can end up with if you don't apply the henna very carefully. Worked like a charm!
I didn't add any essential oils this time around, either. But come on, I already have a mixture of chamomile, garlic olive oil, and Herbel Essences on my head -- adding another scent to the mix would probably have been nauseating!
And so, there you have it! Here is my hair before the most recent application (which is the shade of two mellowed-out applications of henna over the past two months):
My hair immediately after combing it out with conditioner, rinsing it really well, and blowdrying:
As you can see, there's really not much difference in color. The red might be just a little bit redder. My roots are nicely blended in. And my hair is wonderfully soft and strong! The reason it doesn't look so shiny in the second photo is because a) I didn't use the flash on my camera or have direct lighting, and b) I didn't shampoo my hair before applying henna this time around, so it's all greasy and nasty. :) Sorry.
Since I seem to have reached the conclusion of this experiment, I'll put all my findings on one easy-to-reference page -- hopefully sometime in the next few weeks. I'll blog on any other interesting developments I might have, but otherwise, I won't bore you with my now monthly henna-head routine!
Suffice to say, I think I'll be hennaing my hair for a long, long time to come.
