Mendhi

As a very special treat to celebrate the birthday-fest that is March, the fact that I am again losing weight, and because I've been running a high fever for the last three day (mendhi very cooling), I did mendhi on my feet. Its the first time I've done it, and it was a bit tricky to do on my own feet, but overall I'm quite pleased with the effect.

For those of you unfamiliar with mendhi, it is essentially a temporary tattooing of the skin with henna paste. The henna powder is mixed with tea, lemon juice, sugar and essential oil (I used eucalyptus) into a paste. After two or three hours when the paste has matured, you put it into a cone or bottle tipped with a fine metal tip and draw patterns on your skin. For the best colour, leave the henna in place for 6-7 hours. I remoistened mine with more eucaplytus oil and then wrapped my feet loosely in cotton to protect the henna from being rubbed off while I slept. In the morning I used a butter knife to scrape the dried henna from my skin and the photo's above are the result. It will last anywhere from 1-3 weeks as long as you don't rub the bejeezus out of your skin when drying off after bathing. It was actually a lot of fun and I think I'm going to order more henna powder and have a mendhi party with my girlfriends....Dori, Carol, get your tuchuses up here for that slumber party!