tattooing with henna

I picked up The Creative Family by Amanda Blake Soule on Friday evening and finished it this morning. It’s well-suited for someone who is just dipping their toes into Waldorf/Steiner parenting approaches for the first time. The design and photographs of Amanda’s children are so sweet and make the book a pleasant visual journey. My only wish is for more inventive and indeed, creative, ideas and for them to be described in more detail. Some of her reviewers on Amazon say that the ideas and craft projects are commonly found in Waldorf/Steiner or Montessori resources, but as this was the first parenting book I have ever purchased, I didn’t think that criticism would apply for me. I did find many of the ideas and projects in the book blogged about online already on the blogs and websites of Waldorf/Steiner parents, which often include step-by-step photographs and have the added benefit of letting you interact the parent with questions about anything that wasn’t clear. The tutorials in The Creative Family were very brief and would mention making some knot or using some kind of stitch that I was not familiar with, while I needed a little more guidance. The book was published almost two years ago, so it’s to be expected that some of Amanda’s ideas can now be found in blogs, perhaps even as a result of reading about them in her book.

Overall, it was a light and enjoyable read, and I’ve definitely reached the back cover with a couple of inspiring projects to tackle. One of them is a recipe for henna.

You will need:

• Black tea in teabag
• 1 cup henna powder (look for fresh, fine powder like the consistency of baby powder, as these will give the best results)
• Freshly squeezed juice of a lemon
• 1 tsp of ground cloves (enhances the colour)
• Essential oil containing terpineols (e.g. eucalyptus, lavender)
• Sugar (optional)

What to do:

1. Boil about 5cm (2”) of water in a saucepan. Toss in the tea bag and cloves and leave to infuse for a few hours.
2. Stir in a few drops of essential oil, always use wooden utensils instead of metal.
3. Stir the tea brew through the powder, using a little at a time to ensure that your paste doesn’t become too thin. It should become the consistency of yoghurt. It’s alright if you don’t use all of your brew.
4. Add the lemon juice and stir the paste until it thickens more until it resembles more like toothpaste.
5. Once the henna paste is finished, let it sit for a while, preferably overnight.
6. The henna paste can be applied to the skin using icing bags with a fine tip, strong zip-lock bag with a tiny hole cut at a corner, paintbrush or other applicator, or special henna cones.
7. After the design is painted onto the skin, you can apply a mixture of equal parts lemon juice and sugar to the paste to keep it in place and apply some heat either by placing the hands (carefully!) near a candle or with a hairdryer. Avoid washing the hands during this time.
8. The paste will dry completely after approximately 4 hours. Scrape it off. Your hands can now be washed.

This is not the recipe in Amanda’s book (she doesn’t use the sugar-lemon mixture and lets her paste dry and fall off more quickly). It is very similar, but I adapted it with some other recipes I found online. One of my favourite drinks is chai, which can be easily made at home if you have a well-stocked pantry. I make my chai with black tea cooked over the stove which I make with equal parts water and milk, and then I add a stick of cinnamon, 4 cardamom pods, 4 whole cloves, and sugar to taste. I strain the tea and serve warm.
I think Amanda’s henna painting activity may be a fun activity to do in combination with teaching children a little more about Indian culture. I live a suburb away from a lively Indian neighbourhood and it would not be too difficult for me to sip chai with my buntens as we wait for our henna pastes to set while we watch a Bollywood film together. Or if that’s a little too inaccessible for them, I would love to honour Diwali with them. Here is a blog post from a Waldorf parent about how her child celebrated Diwali in their kindergarten class!

For more henna recipes, visit The Art of Mehndi.

For other chai recipes, visit Chai!