Archive for the 'Tattoo' Category
My New Tattoo
Quite awhile ago, my Mom helped me design a tattoo for my lower back:
I really like it and the pain was nothing to speak of, so I began thinking of another I may want. I have so far thought of three I want for sure, one a maybe. Normally, I like to wait a year or two to make sure I still like the idea – then if I do, I get it. I really wanted a foot tattoo for a long time so that’s what I decided to get. I wanted to go to the old place I went to in East Lansing, but the artist I had before moved to California and I didn’t have much luck getting a response via email so…Eric found some info online that Mos Eisley’s was the place to go in Grand Rapids.
After showing up two different times, once for an appointment, once for a consult, the date was set to get my new ink. I love the design he came up with and am very impressed since my description of what I wanted was less than stellar.
Here he is applying the stencil:
Preparing the tools:
He started by my heel and worked up and out, to avoid smudging his stencil. Therefore, the words went first.
They took a long time.
The Achilles tendon area didn’t feel all that great being done. I kept telling myself that this was the worst part and it would get better…
One word (outline) down, two to go…
Working on the outline of the last word:
Adding a little green to the outline:
I had to flip onto my stomach so he could do the rest of the last word – “Loyalty”:
Almost finished with the outline:
Now to fill in the words:
The finished words:
This was the first time I realized I lied to myself. The outline hurt a whole hell of a lot more on my ankle bone than it had on my Achilles.
I had to do something with my hands and I needed something to grip – at the same time I knew it was kind of freaking Eric out so I hid my face from him:
When he moved to the ridge before the inside curve of my foot, I realized I had lied to myself again – more pain:
Finally, what I had been telling myself would be the worst part (the outline), was done:
Next he started to fill in the color:
The pain of the outline was nothing compared to this, this was torture. Every time he wiped off the excess, I flinched, it was painful.
The pain was bad enough that Eric and Adam moved up so I could squeeze their fingers…and my whole upper body was one tight, clenched muscle. It was excruciating.
Here’s a couple of bloody photos:
I reached the point where I wasn’t sure I would be able to hold my body still much longer…and then we were done and I got the final wipe-down:
Eric and Adam had to uncurl my fingers for me, they were stuck in the position they had been in the entire time I was getting tattooed. I had not looked at it since the outline had been finished (and I needed a bathroom break), so I was surprised at the finished product, and very, very, very pleased. I think it turned out beautiful. 
The flowers turned out very realistic and it’s just lovely. I’m so happy with it!
We trooped home, 3.5 hours later and I fell into bed and asleep, hard. I came to enough to eat dinner and then laid back down. Eric woke me up a couple of hours later – the new tattoo needed to be cleaned and ointment applied before I could go to bed. Something I had not remembered from my first tattoo but came back with a vengeance was the nausea and pre-faint conditions that I develop afterward it’s over and before cleaning the first time. It was bad enough that I ended up begging Eric to clean it for me this first time – which he did, a tad grudgingly. I was still feeling like I may faint so I stretched out on the floor while Eric applied the soap (which STUNG), rinsed and applied the ointment. Then I stumbled into bed for the rest of the night. These are the photos from me in the bathroom, that’s why they’re so dark, but it’s all we’ve got right now.
I love my new tattoo – which is actually a birthday present from Eric – THANKS BABY!!! 
