Why is my stain uneven?

So, I've been doing henna for a little while now. The problem is, that if I do it on someone's hand, (mine included) the fingers stain nice and dark, but as you go up the hand onto the arm, it doesn't stain as dark! It's faded, and not prominant. Does anyone have this problem? It did this on my sister, my daughter and me. And I started on the arm and worked to the fingers. I don't understand! HELP!

Henna stains best on areas of the body with thicker skin layers - like hands, palms, feet. The arms, back etc have thinner layers of skin.

I am nearing the end of my first woodworking project: a bookcase for an inconspicuous location in the house. It is made of red oak plywood with solid red oak face framing, crown molding, and legs.
Today I appllied a coat of Bartley's (sp?) gel stain, wiping off as instructed, but because some of the parts of the cabinet were harder to reach when wiping, the finish is somewhat uneven: much too dark in spots. The finish looks more like paint than stain in a few corners.

How do I recover?

I was thinking I could apply a second coat and hope for a better result. I could also sand or buff using 000 steel wool to try to remove excess gel stain where it has accumulated.

Finally, since the gel stain is soluble in mineral spirits, I could wipe the whole thing down with a rag soaked in mineral spirits (just like I did after sanding).

In any case, my goal (I think) is to remove some of the thicker blotches of stain without removing it all.

I was just gaining confidence using my woodoworking tools when I ran into this whole other skill area. I am now slightly panicked. Please help.

Agnes15 wrote:I am nearing the end of my first woodworking project: a bookcase for an inconspicuous location in the house. It is made of red oak plywood with solid red oak face framing, crown molding, and legs.
Today I appllied a coat of Bartley's (sp?) gel stain, wiping off as instructed, but because some of the parts of the cabinet were harder to reach when wiping, the finish is somewhat uneven: much too dark in spots. The finish looks more like paint than stain in a few corners.

How do I recover?

I was thinking I could apply a second coat and hope for a better result. I could also sand or buff using 000 steel wool to try to remove excess gel stain where it has accumulated.

Finally, since the gel stain is soluble in mineral spirits, I could wipe the whole thing down with a rag soaked in mineral spirits (just like I did after sanding).

In any case, my goal (I think) is to remove some of the thicker blotches of stain without removing it all.

I was just gaining confidence using my woodoworking tools when I ran into this whole other skill area. I am now slightly panicked. Please help.

Boy, are you on the wrong forum.

What's with these random posts?

Yeah, there was one in the Swap Shop as well.

That's HILARIOUS!!!!!

LOL What aussiemarie said is exactly right. Henna stains your dead layers of skin. Henna only stains when it is wet/moist. Palms sweat, and palms and fingers have lots of skin to stain. Same as feet. As you get farther up towards the trunk of your body, the stain gets lighter as there is less heat, sweat, skin cells. If you are oily and did not clean the skin well, then if you think of the skin as little sponges...if the sponges are full of oil or not there....no stain. If clothing is repeatedly and harshly rubbing a spot, the henna will fade quicker. Chlorine strips the body of dead skin cells, good bacteria, bad bacteria, everything. Bye bye henna. Most skin moisturizers exfoliate the skin....this is one reason the skin feels soft......peel off the skin, no stain or stain goes away quicker. Younger skin ususally stains better, vintage skin sometimes does not darken well.
Faces do not stain nor should you really be putting henna there. For every rule, there is an exception because people are not 'average'. 'Average' time or window is a range rather than a set moment.

If you understand this logic, you will get where and why which parts of the body stain best! Hope that helps!

I am guessing when doing an event or party there has to be some sort of disclaimer stating the possibility of uneven staining due to x y z. I would think you would want to have something like this on hand so the customer doesn't come back to you claimin you did a less than satisfactory job.

I did a henna on the back of my left hand yesterday, basically covering from my wrist to the middle knuckles on my fingers. From the first knuckle joint to the middle knuckle stained beautifully nice rich reddish brown color. The portion from my knuckles back to my wrist is more of a darker orange. It actually now looks like 2 different designs done at different times.

I exfoliated and cleansed my skin before hand because I wanted to be sure I got an optimal stain. Go figure????

Using the same henna cone I did a gothic/tribal lookin cross on my daughter's arm and I incorporated her brother's name into it. I looked at it this morning and it was a gorgeous even all over stain. again go figure???

Two different bodies AND you need up to 2 full days to get your final result...sometimes even 3 days! And if you exfoliate too much just before, no skin cells, (please see above explanation)

I have aftercare info on the back of my biz card and in the pattern books I have 2 different 'how henna works' stain examples! This one is paste off and final result

But I also have one that has a visual progression of one pattern.
paste on, just off, 12 hours, 24 hours, 48 hours, 60 hours.
I always start out at a party with a little 20 second monologue... that goes over paste is wet, dries, falls off, is boring orange and you feel like you got ripped off but WAIT FOR IT! It oxidizes ...same process that turns an apple brown and rusts metal, but slower than the apple and faster than your lawn furniture (wait for giggle to stop) it can take up to 3 days to get your final color which will be between charming dark pumpkin and really dark black cherry. Where you put your design and your body chemistry and aftercare will decide where you fall on the spectrum now let's have some fun!!!!

End scene!!

LOL at Kim the Director extrodinaire. I just thought it weird that my knuckle area went straight to max color over night whilst the rest of the design is just kind of creeping along to get there.

Don't get me wrong at all I love henna and doing it. I just thought these are things I need to know to impart to the client to make them aware.