Casa Nichols: Matching Tattoos!

No secret that Zack and I love, like LOVE tattoos. In fact, we had barely even gone on a real date back in 2005 when I sat with him for a tattoo on his back. Poor thing, that's still the worst tattoo he has. Thank goodness we found a tattooer that we really like a lot. His name is Jacob and he's at Skinworx over in Pelham. One of his favorite bands is Flogging Molly too, so there was no doubt that he'd be doing our matching Claddagh tattoos. A Claddagh is an old Irish symbol of love (the heart), friendship (the hands), and loyalty (the crown). The first claddagh ring was forged many years ago in the tiny Claddagh Village in west Ireland, off the Corrib River in Galway. This village was loyal to its own monarchy (hence the crown) until the last king died in the 1950s. Sadly, the town of Galway destroyed where the tiny village and all its charm once stood for development purposes, but the Claddagh symbol is still a famous and traditional sign in Ireland, often used as engagement/wedding rings.

Zack bought be a claddagh ring on our trip back in 2010 in a tiny town called Kilfenora at small craft shop run by a sweet Irish lady (I'll never forget she told us to "mind the dressers!" when we walked into her little store). We wanted to get these tattooed on us in Dublin later that week at a place called Johnny Eagle, but we didn't have quite enough Euro for it!

So on January 28 we went in and talked to Jacob about it and made our appointment. Zack went in at 6 on February 2 and got his done in one session (almost 5 hours!), and I went back that Saturday to get mine. We didn't even start till almost midnight with it! But Jacob and I had a great time talking about all kinds of things, and we listened to Flogging Molly and Fiddler's Green the whole time. Here's some of the million pics I took those nights!

Jacob getting started! This was before Zack started really started hurting with all of the scrubbing necessary for all that gorgeous color. He said it wasn't too bad until he got to the upper part under his armpit. Lots of nerve endings. Lots of pain. But Zack is a pro tattoo sitter :)