Something new

For this blog post I decided to do a henna design that is more complicated and has a prettier look on the hand. This design consists of many dots that connect all the little flowers all over the hand. The tips of the fingers are also more complicated than the previous designs I have done on the blog posts. I was excited to take on a new challenge and attempt to do something a bit more complex and pretty.

I was scrolling through my Instagram explore page when this design caught my eye. I was really interested on the shapes of the design so I decided to give it a try. This henna consists of multiple flowers on the back side of your hand being connected by dots. There are many empty spaces that make the shape of a square. Then, on the fingers have a little design that are made up of lines.

Just as I did on my other designs, I started at the beginning of my hand. I first finished the part of the henna on my wrist and once that part was completed, I made my way to the hand. It was difficult to do the henna on my wrist because I was scared I would smudge the rest of the design. As I would go down my wrist there was more of a risk of me resting my hand with the cone on the design which would cause the design to get messy and not the way I wanted it. I had to be careful. While doing my wrist I was shaking a lot due to the fear of messing up the design.  Therefore, the swirls in the first swirl in the flower was a little squiggly but became more clear on the flower above it.

I finished the wrist part of the design and it turned out almost exactly as I wanted it to. However, when I reached the hand part of the design it got more difficult. The flowers on the back of my hand had to approximately be the same size for it to look its best. I first started drawing in the flowers on the right side of my hand and they are about the same size. But it was harder to finish the design on the left side because the right side of my hand was still fresh which meant that it'd would be harder to make the flowers the same size. While I was doing a flower on the right side of my hand, I made it too big which made it stand out, out of all the other flowers. I hide to wipe it off but it still stained in the five seconds it was on my hand. Throughout the week, the stain became more nonexistent which made the design look nicer than it did before.

The finger tips were the favorite part of my design. After about two hours of having the henna on my hand, it was time to remove it. In the book, Teach Yourself Henna Tattoo, the tips on removing the henna are very helpful. On page 21 it says, "The simplest way to remove the henna paste after the appropriate amount of time has passed (as little as 2 to 4 hours, but 12 to 24 hours if possible) is to let it crumble up and fall off on its own like an autumn leaf falls from a tree in due time" (Abdoyan 2012). The author gave a very thorough analogy on how to remove the paste that makes the process a lot more clear.

This is a picture of the henna a few minutes after finishing.

This is a picture of the henna a few minutes after removal.

This is a picture of the henna the morning after removal.

What kind of design do you think I should do for my next blog post?

Abdoyan, Brenda. Teach Yourself Henna Tattoo: Making Mehndi Art with Easy-to-follow Instructions, Patterns, and Projects. East Petersburg, PA: Design Originals, 2012. Print.