s3rndpt

A friend who just got one of those black tree landscapes on his arm starting at his left wrist is going to be very irritated soon, since he's an early-adopter Apply fanboy.

It was mostly the spots right on my collarbone that got me--specifically right at the base of my neck. Was very similar to the inside of my wrist, though--so if you lived through that, you should be okay with your collarbone too :)

Yep :) You too? I love Amy---we spend the entire time babbling about geeky things like Star Wars and Daredevil and Comic Con. She's great to work with too!

I haven't, but mostly because this forum tends to favor more traditional stuff, so I didn't want to get yelled at ;) . But, my artist posted some instagram pictures here: https://instagram.com/p/19SHHPDgG2/?taken-by=amyblacktattoos and here: https://instagram.com/p/1-1bZbjgEo/?taken-by=amyblacktattoos Sleeve is not done, obviously...but hopefully by the end of the summer. When done it'll all look more cohesive, I swear :)

Not that I have extensive experience, but so far, the inside of my wrist, the ditch of my elbow, and then my collarbone and part of my upper back about made me cry. My collarbone was the only spot that almost made me quit, it hurt so much. My deltoid hurt the least. I could have sat there all day for that.

So as soon as I finish healing from one, I went back in for work on my sleeve, and now I feel like someone has burned the inside of my arm. Sleeping was fun last night since we did color on the inside of my arm, and outlines on the outside of my arm, so finding a way to sleep so that nothing new was in contact with the sheets was damn near impossible. Oh well. Looks awesome.

Oops, guess I'm trendy, now---does it count it if wasn't on purpose?! I found an artist whose stuff I loved (she does a lot of geometric mandala-ish work), and had her create shoulder caps for me--I wanted them to be symmetric, and reminiscent of Egyptian Revival jewelry. I *guess* they look kinda like mandalas...(?) Personally, I think they are kinda badass, but that might just be me. In all seriousness, I find some of the more popular stuff, like black tree skylines, flocks of black birds, feathers, cartoony stuff, tiny finger tattoos, mustache tattoos, etc., not to my liking. But I'm not the one wearing those for the rest of my life, so if it makes a person happy, great. If someone chooses to think I'm being somehow trendy, oh well. Guess I'll live with it. I'm old enough I really just don't care if someone thinks I'm cool, or a poser, or whatever.

My daughters (9 & 5) love mine---I now have a very stylized triskele on my inner forearm, made of vines with roses and thistles. It kinda symbolizes myself and my two girls--and they love looking at it and picking out which flower they "are." My left arm is covered in large Art Nouveau peonies, in their favorite colors (purple and pink, and soon to be blue), and I have Egyptian Revival shoulder caps-- scarabs on one side and a lotus on the other, both of which they think are "pretty." To them, Mommy is just getting fancy things to wear on herself--they don't really see it as anything other than normal. And that's exactly the way I want it. Neither has made any noise about wanting any of their own, but I'm sure they will eventually.

Apparently, tattoos seem to rub off in my relationship...since I started getting more, my husband has decided he wants some now, and has been going through laser hair removal on his back and upper arms (because he thought people would laugh at him if he was fuzzy and had tattoos??) in preparation to what is looking more and more like a trip to Copenhagen in December to an artist whose work he loves.

They're not pulling off anything that isn't about to fall off on its own. I'd never let them sit there and actually pick at me---I didn't fly cross country and spend all that money to let my kids ruin my new art! :)

I can finally wear a bra again without my shoulders feeling like they're on fire. yay! Also, my children have a new (gross) game....peeling the colored flakes off my shoulders. My 5-year-old was thrilled when one of the dots (one of my new pieces is a large mandala lotus) came off in one piece. She was pretty miffed when she accidentally dropped it and lost it in the bathroom.

I picked one with a nice tree design down the side, so that helps, lol. Hopefully everyone's looking at the tree instead.

Damn. Wish I had seen this thread on Friday. I could have used some extra support about 4 hours in---for some reason the back of one of my shoulders felt like it was being stabbed with hot razors for about 45 minutes during my session and I was trying everything I could to pay attention to anything else.

You've already been given some great pointers towards helpful threads, but as someone who has been working out 5-6 days a week recently, after getting tattooed I usually take the day off, and then avoid anything that is going to put the new tattoo in contact with mats/machines/equipment for a week or so. Re: the bra issue--- I flew to San Diego on Thursday, and spent all day Friday getting my shoulders tattooed. Being the clueless dummy that I am, I almost carried two totebags instead of my rolling suitcase (don't know what I was thinking--my husband convinced me to take my suitcase), and barely remembered to pack my loose bandeau bra for afterwards. Thank god I did, because I haven't been able to tolerate anything else aside from very loose, light shirts since then. Probably not the best look for me since I'm already top-heavy, but what are you going to do. I'll just wear a loose, shapeless shirt tomorrow at work and hopefully no one will be the wiser.

Had some work done Thursday, and woke up yesterday to giant flakes of purple and green skin everywhere. Oh well. This session doesn't itch the way the last session did, so I'll count my blessings and deal. I thought I was going to have to rip my arm off after the one in January.

I am so excited that it's coming to the vmfa... When they announced it I was honestly surprised considering most things that come to here. Maybe it's time to renew my museum membership again.

I am smack in the middle of what is turning into a full sleeve from Amy Black here in Richmond. Outlined a bunch of peonies yesterday, in fact. In early April, I'm heading to San Diego to get shoulder caps from Briana Sargent at Buju Tattoo. Glad I booked that one when I did...discovered the other day she is so busy she's not taking any more bookings, except on a case-by-case basis. Also finding that I need to NOT visit/lurk here so much because it makes me want more and more tattoos. Which is not bad, but I'm going to go broke!

Not that I have a ton of experience, but the inside of my arm near the top of my wrist, and the ditch of my elbow about had my jumping off the table. The rest of my arm was fine, but something about those spots were just awful.

It kinda looks Neil Gaiman-ish. Which I like as illustrations, but it's not something I'd go for in a tattoo. But to each his own.

I am trying SO hard not to pick the flakes off right now. All the larger areas of color are just peeling in big sheets. At least it's not itching. The light layer of Aquaphor I put on this morning seems to be doing its job. And I finally don't feel like I got punched in the arm any more (tattoo was finished on Saturday).

I'm in the process of changing careers, and as long as it works out (archaeology isn't the easiest area to get into grad school for, let alone find work in), I'm saving my right arm for classical archaeology related tattoos. And I'll probably go ahead and throw some stuff on there anyway, because I love it so much, but it would be nice if it did actually match what I want to eventually do.

Not the greatest picture, but here's some recent work on my newest tattoo. Only 2 hours in, so we just have most of the outline done. This is by Amy Black at Amy Black Tattoos in Richmond.

Darn...I looked at Amazon, but was only looking for shirts so I missed those. Love that hoodie---I think I may pick one up for later. Too late for this trip, but we're heading to San Diego for Comic Con in July, and it could come in handy then. I just finished a session on Wednesday, and we leave tomorrow....hoping it will be healed enough by the middle of next week that I can use sunscreen on it too. Otherwise, I'll be the mom hiding in the shade under an umbrella wearing 3 layers of shirts while my kids run wild.