Jen goes to ICELAND! (3 times, so far)
Published June 17, 2011 | 
Lucky for me, as a female Tattoo Artist at Ybor City Tattoo Company, I have had amazing opportunities to travel to a lot of beautiful places in the world. But Iceland, is my favorite so far!
Iceland was not even on my list of places to go, until an old high school friend ,that also is a tattooer, suggested it. I met up with his friends from a tattoo shop in Reykjavik, named Reykjavik Ink. I visited the shop and fell in love with the place!
Iceland is absolutely gorgeous!!!! Ocean, mountains, rocks covered in moss, waterfalls, Hot Springs, Geysers, Volcanos, and Glaciers…this place has it all! The people are very friendly and most of them speak english, which definitely makes life easier, because Icelandic is a difficult language to learn! Here are some of the tattoos I did while visiting…
This was an add on to an existing tribal tattoo.
This is on my friend, the beautiful, Anna Magga. Funny story about this…I drew this for someone else, but Anna saw it and carried the tattoo design around with her all day. The original girl had to back out and Anna jumped on it! I think this tattoo was meant for her.
I had to take these tattoo pictures before I left and this tattoo was still healing, so it doesn’t look as good as it does in person. But, I couldn’t leave this out of this post! Here is why…I worked on Andy for 12 hours to get everything done is one tattoo session! Completely covered from the knee to the ankle, all the way around!
This was a cute feather tattoo on a cute girl…It was her first tattoo!
This anchor tattoo was for a German sailor.
This cross was challenging because of all the tattoo lettering requested. It worked out good by using banners and the cross for the date.
This person requested a traditional skull butterfly with darker colors.
This snake head was a tattoo image this man wanted for a long time…Life is short. You should go for anything to make yourself happy!
That said, I did do something in Iceland that made me very happy! I got married by a Viking to the best guy ever!
I just booked my next trip to Iceland this September. The dates will be posted soon!
Tattoos for Men | Death Before Dishonor
Published February 22, 2011 | 
Widely used in the military , a popular tattoo design for men is “Death Before Dishonor”. In the classic old school Americana style, the words “Death Before Dishonor” are pictured in some type of scroll that coils around a dagger. Other symbolism is often used within the design like skulls, anchors, globes, eagles, guns and hearts. Typically, the styling for this theme includes dark shading, bold colors and dark lines.
Check out this variation of a “Death Before Dishonor” design done by Tampa tattoo artist Esben.
Tattoo Ideas | Koi Fish
Published February 20, 2011 | 
Perseverance, strength, bravery, aspiration, strength of character. If you use any of those qualities to describe yourself or your life, a tattoo design featuring a Koi fish might be right up your alley.
Like many other tattoo themes, the Koi fish is deeply entrenched in Chinese and Japanese culture. Theory and/or mythology suggests that the Koi (Japanese for Carp) used to climb up waterfalls and bravely await the knife if they were caught.
So it makes a lot of sense that strength of character and bravery are qualities associated with this tattoo symbol. Both men and women have chosen this symbol as the basis for their tattoo, so if the meaning makes sense it could be a viable option for just about anyone.
