For the next hour and a half I don’t notice the cold wind because I’m busy painting folks. Most of the designs are small and simple, but I take my time anyhow, mindful of the fact that a henna artist at work is more interesting for others to stop and watch ... and then possibly buy a design as well. The crowd at the Faire is small:, very, very small. At the height of the festivities around 1 p.m. there looks to be about 100 people, including us vendors. The booth next to me is selling warm packs that heat up for camping and such, and I figure they’re doing good business until I hear them explain you have to heat it up with boiling water for the packs to work. So much for that. One of the clothing booth vendors is wandering around and her costume is complete with a dragon that sits on her shoulder, and she asks us if we’d like to pet her dragon. Of course, I say yes.

On the other side of our table there’s a face painting booth that no vendor is even at until about 2 p.m. when some of the young college kids working the event start painting faces for free. I’m not worried about losing business, by this point everyone who is at the Faire has either already been painted by me, or been by to see my booth. The face painters’ artwork is very simplistic, but I hear them laughing and having fun, and the littlest kids who want hearts on their cheeks aren’t going to have any fun with henna anyhow so it’s nice to see them get something that they will really enjoy.

There are a few young ones who do want a henna design and I am sure to ask their grownups about lemon juice and eucalyptus allergies before agreeing to paint their li’l ones. By and large, I will paint children as young as 4 years old if their parents think their kids can sit still long enough for the henna to dry. One young girl, who chooses a heart design, is absolutely precious. While sitting patiently waiting for her henna to dry, she takes it upon herself to start answering the questions other passersby are asking, like how long should the henna remain on the skin and how long does the design last. I am enchanted by my youngest spokesmodel and she patiently sits until long after her henna is dry, mostly because I think she liked being around us henna gypsies.

It’s mid-afternoon when Rebecca and I count the money during a long lull – we’re at $75. I’m thankful my booth fee has been now been covered, and wonder if I’m gonna paint anyone else all day long. The Faire is scheduled until 5:30, and earlier in the day they had a fencing exhibition to entertain folks, but there’s nothing going on now. We eat Power Bars and talk talk talk. Rebecca is a fabulous conversationalist and she tells me stories about her love life and I tell her stories about other craft shows I’ve worked, and we watch the younger boys beat the crap out of each other in the “fighting ring”, using padded sticks to simulate combat. I start taking pictures with the digital camera I brought, remembering I hadn’t done so all day yet and wanted to get some pictures in for this article.

The Gothic design girl walks by our booth again and I tell her I’ll give her a free design for her birthday, one for the good henna fairy. I’m dying to get back to work anyhow, and my plan works well as more folks are showing up again to watch me work, and then looking at books, and before I know it my next mini-rush of the day is in full swing. I paint for another hour or so, and the winds, while still blowing strongly, aren’t as cold now that it’s midday. I paint faces, I paint ankles, and I paint hands and I’m feeling happy to be working again.