Diwali!

This year I had the privelege of hennaing many of the lovely ladies at Capital One's Diwali Celebration. Many thanks to Christine Wampler for inviting me, and for the pictures.

They had a record crowd and served lunch to 200 associates, and I believe I hennaed about 50 ladies! It was really well done, the musicians were amazing, and I loved seeing all the beautiful saris and salwar kameez outfits!

Enjoy the pictures!

This is me!

Rangoli!

Tabla player

South of the James

I've been wanting to do a post about a really amazing market that I've been blessed to be a part of. Although I can't vend there nearly as much as I would like to because of other parties and events, I am one of the core group of vendors that saw this market open back in 2008 under the ownership of Karen Atkinson's Market Umbrella, and grow to the wonderful success it is today. With nearly a hundred vendors of local produce, meats, cheeses, and eggs - along with artisans, prepared food vendors and local musicians, it really is something not to be missed. Cute dogs and dancing children abound. Fans of this market come for breakfast, grab up all the best produce in colorful market bags, socialize with neighbors and friends, and stay for lunch.

Most of the time I'm set up, I barely have time to get a bathroom/ handwashing break, but recently I snuck in a 5 minute photo-shoot of those closest to me.

Henna and Glitter and Moonbounces and Cake

So I'm at the end of a very long couple of weeks that included visits from our out of town BFFs AND my parents, traveling to an out of town bridal mehndi, a late night club event and both of my kids birthday parties!! It was a fun time, for sure... Lots of UV body painting and happy kids, and some amazing bridal designs for a Nepali Bride. I survived, but have the remains of a nasty cough and I'm ready to spend the next two days in bed. Whenever I'm feeling down I like to pamper myself with some henna, but this time I chose a jewel toned glitter tattoo.

My work was featured...

In a blogpost by the talented Emily Hudspeth! She did hair and makeup for a bridal client of mine, the lovely Jaya R. Take a look! The photos are really stunning!

http://emilyhudspeth.blogspot.com/2011/07/beautiful-wedding-jaya-and-jeff.html

They've been threatening for a while...

But no one has taken the plunge until now! So happy for Amanda Anderson of www.amandaandersonphotography.com to be the first of my clients to get one of my designs permanently inked! Scott Calcaterra of True Tattoo www.truetattoova.com (who is GREAT) did this for Amanda recently. Here you can see the progression from rough iPad sketch, to scanned image of the design done in henna, to final version. How cool, huh?

Henna Bellies!

I love the joy that comes from sharing in a celebration of new life growing. These are some of the bellies I've been blessed to decorate over the last few years.

One-woman setup

Usually my partner, Jacob, and I set up together at events, where he does the glitter tattoos and I do the henna, and we both do the face painting. But sometimes he's at another event, or there is limited space, so I needed a smaller setup that I could manage by myself. I got the same rug in a different color and smaller size, and matched the details to that color palette. As you can see from the photo, everything fits neatly on the folding hand-truck, and I use just one small table, and the bin acts as storage as well as additional workspace with the round tray on top. My signs hang from the umbrella. Of course I was so busy at my last event I forgot to take a picture of the finished setup, but I will soon!