Henna Caravan BLOG

Hello Henna Friends!

There’s hardly a month and a half until the second annual HC conference. We’re busy trying to make everything perfect for you. If you haven’t signed up, yet, there’s still time! Check it out!

I’ve been visiting the Ventura County Greek Festival since i was a little girl with my grandmother. My gramma and I took an amazing trip to Greece together when I was beginning 6th grade, it was my first trip out of the country.
For several years I saved my babysitting dollars and would wash (poorly and left spots) my dads car for a few bucks to put towards my travel fund. I’m pretty sure I didn’t have enough saved to buy that ticket to Athens but my gramma took me anyway, I will be forever grateful to her for showing me how large and amazing the world really is.
A few years ago George (I’m told by George that all Greek men are named George) invited Henna Caravan to come have a henna booth at our local Greek festival. We jumped at the opportunity since it’s a local event, a fundraiser for the Orthodox Church and they have the best fresh pastries! A zillion different styles of baklava and gooey honeyed treats that the grannies spend weeks before baking.

The Greek grannies have been fearlessly lining up at our blue and white henna booth for greek inspired ankle patterns to sport at church since our first year at the event. This year was no exception! The gals made the rounds, stopped by the Monks honey and bookstore booth, grabbed kettle corn and let us decorate them. Lots of blue sparkly glitter embellished the henna too. In between visits we snuck off for vanilla ice cream with baklava crumbs on top. YUM!

Till next year – Opa!
Jessica

PS – in case you’re wondering my gramma is not Greek, but always loved Ancient Greek History and taught herself how to read and write a bit of ancient Greek!

We are so lucky to have so many wonderful festivals we get to be a part of. The Simi Valley Cajun Zydeco Music Festival

is one of our favorites! We’ve been pulling out our feather boas and snacking on beignets while hennaing at this event since it was tiny. They bring in amazing bands, killer food, gumbo, sweet potato pie, and crawdads and have added several stages for great live music.
Everyone in my family actually knows how to Zydeco, we learned in Louisiana and then took a zydeco cruise. It was awesome, port visits during the day, dance instructors and live bands at night before the famous midnight cruise buffets.
Carrie, Flavia and I are usually dancing around our booth with our customers all day! It’s so much fun to be around so many folks that dance.
For the last several years we’ve had the pleasure of applying matching henna designs to a family involved with the Rotary (festival volunteers/organizers). The grandaughters consult with gramma about this years pattern and then they all jump in. They are so great! We henna identical patterns, in the same location, with matching glitter, to 3 generations.
Henna is fun and a bit of a luxury, but it’s also a thread among women and families. I love seeing these girls each year, and enjoy being part of their connection and memories to their mother and grandmother.

We’ll see you next spring!
Laissez Les Bons Temps Rouler!
Let The Good Times Roll!

Jessica

We received the most amazing, soft, hennaed elephant this past Christmas from a fellow henna artist, Dyp Sajne, check out her blog at .

Dyp made a silk blankey with beaded trim and henna decorations for our little Elli, a feather head dress and jewelry too! This is a living version of our logo! (almost) Dyp packed Elli up in a box and sent her cross country to live with Flavia, our amazing manager.

Elli loves to float around our office and has headed out to several festivals with us!
Who knows, maybe you’ll get to take a picture with her at our next event too.

This was her first weekend out at work with us to the Simi Valley Cajun Music Festival, she danced, ate gumbo, lounged on the booth and helped sell henna kits!

Thank you Dyp,
Jessica, Flavia, and the HC girls

Last weekend was so busy and fun and henna filled! We did a fantastic summer party in a park for Ojai’s Help Unlimited. With 2 artists and an assistant, the event ran smoothly and everybody got at least one henna design. A few guests kept coming back in between line dancing lessons, mechanical bull rides, and competitive bingo! The weather was lovely and the glitter was flying. The next day, I went to a close friend’s Birthday party! She designed a rally race and we spent all afternoon zipping around town in what turned out to be the most competitive and hilarious scavenger hunt I’ve ever been in! After a long day of u-turns, T intersections, and getting horribly, miserably lost, we finally ended up at her house for BBQ and cake. What a fantastic surprise when I looked in the back of my car and saw some cones from my event the day before! Hurrah!
She had asked me many times before if I could do henna for her, but I always forgot to save a cone after my busy weekends and after prom parties. Finally! Now! She’ll get henna!

I grabbed the cone and traipsed inside, thinking about what kind of design I’d make for her. Would she want flowers? North African geometric? Indian Fusion? Gulf style? Imagine my delight when she said “Birds! Flowers! i don’t care!” with a big grin on her face.

We sat down next to a warm fire with a glass of red wine and started the birthday henna.  I get so excited with peacocks, their tales just go everywhere! I tried some new fill-ups, and just had fun with it.

She loved her design and I stuck around a while and dabbed her henna with lemon and sugar from her kitchen. I only took one picture with my phone, so its pretty blurry, but I can’t wait to get more pictures of the stain and try more peacocks!
Carissa

A henna artist shared photos of her recent order. Her pet ferrets helped unpack her box of henna supplies and LOVED the aftercare balms!
Looks like she may have to fight those fluffy little guys for the aftercare balms!

Dyp Sajne is a great henna friend who we’ve had the pleasure to meet in person at conferences and stalk online. check out her blog at she is always up to something fun and unique with her henna.

Today we shipped our 6,000th online order! Ding! Ding! Ding!

I’m so lucky to have met and chatted in person with so many of our talented customers. Thank you so much for all your support and excellent feedback. I am excited to be off to an incredibly busy year and it’s just beginning!

We’ve got lots of new projects and ideas to share this year  - I can’t wait to get our new product line up and running. We have a new line of deluxe kits, 25 colors of glitter, and we’re getting geared up for spring festivals.

I’ve been talking with and filling lots of orders for other artists out there that are getting stocked for the spring season. I hope this is a sign that our little niche isn’t being too impacted by the declining economy, but that people consider henna an affordable luxury and are willing to splurge on a bit of henna to add a bit of happiness to their day. That’s great news for our entire community and makes me hopeful for a successful year for all of us henna-holics!

I’m excited to finally start a blog and be able to share more about what Henna Caravan and I are up to on a more personal and intimate note.

2008 was a whirlwind year for us with lots of growth, two new henna artists,  lots of great new henna products and Henna Caravan hosted their first annual 3 day conference with over 40 attendees.

I’ve been busy trying to keep up with our private henna events and festivals and maintain and manage our online Henna Store. We’ve added a lot of new products over the past year and plan on continuing with the new product search and plans to serve the entire community for 2009!

We have some great things in store for 2009! Including adding indigo, amla and cassia  for great natural hair care and we’re currently scheduled to attend and teach at three henna conferences. Hopefully we’ll be seeing many of you soon!

Jessica