New Tattoo

What did you do with your Leap Day this year? Anything wild or exciting? Or was it just another day? I love Leap Days - they always feel so full of potential. To try to harness that, I booked a tattoo on the day when my regular tattooist Nini opened her books just before Christmas. It felt like an auspicious day to get tattooed. 

I was considering getting faces of Poppy and Jasmine to match my tattoo of Ivy's face, but the space was a bit small. Then I considered getting silhouettes of Poppy and Jazzy but decided this is something I might do in the future. So I decided to get flowers instead - poppies and jasmine, so that I know they're for my lovely cats but other people might not. I left the design with Nini and she definitely delivered - one poppy surrounded by jasmine. I absolutely loved her concept and then I waffled as to whether to get it coloured in or not. You may know that it turns out I have an allergy to a lot of red/pink/purple inks, and my body makes the tattoo very swollen and itchy and raised, and eventually most of the ink falls out. This was the case for the rainbow on my foot, so I've now had it coloured in with yellow and green and blues, instead. It is entirely fascinating that this happens, but also really, really annoying. I've paid a lot for those tattoos! 

So I decided I would just get Nini to do lines and shading, and if I decide later I want colours, I can always add them. Nini mainly works in black and grey now and she's really good at it. She is based at The Ink Station in Heckmondwike by the way and I love her - she always seems to get what I'm going for. I've also been tattooed by Kimi there and I really like her style too. 

I was thinking this tattoo would be smaller than it's ended up being, but Nini was absolutely right and put it so that it's in a good position however my arm is. That's why she's a tattooist and I am not. It only took about an hour and wasn't too painful - the worst bit actually was having to sit with my arm at an awkward angle for all that time! 

I absolutely love it and I am so glad to have it!