So the big event is over and we had a lovely and very quiet time. Having spent most of the last 10 Christmases in Australia, we enjoy the day and have a nice meal, but leave any major festive celebrations to others. I find the food, tinsel, lights and madness slightly bemusing to be honest. We exchange presents with a limit £20 on the day and speak to each of our girls. We definitely are not ‘revelers’ It’s a strange word, reveling. It is really only used by news outlets to refer to people who are still out in the early hours of the morning – ‘late night revelers’.  I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone suggest that we might go out for a revel, or even a bit of reveling.  What Christmas does mean for us is a chance to unwind, spend lots of time sitting reading and of course from Boxing Day onward, the Test Match on the TV.

I spent much of Christmas Day dyeing some double knit merino wool using red cabbage dye.  I’m quite happy with the outcome.  They are just drying now.  I’ve mentioned before that the dye from red cabbage is like a pH indicator and naturally returns a pale purple colour that turns blue if you add some alkali, in this case bicarbonate of soda. I’m not so sure cooking two whole red cabbages was such a good idea on Christmas eve. 

The smell is nowhere near as pleasant as their colour.  I do like a little bit of variation with the yarn so held each skein out of the dye pot by looping it over a wooden spoon. I know that this dye is not particularly fast, so will need to use it for something that won’t need a lot of washing.  As usual I have far more plans than I can practically bring to fruition so no doubt the wool, the colour and the ideas will eventually combine into a whole plan.

Meanwhile my work in progress is the avocado dyed alpaca 4ply.  What started out essentially looking like a dish cloth, has developed with time into what I hope will be a nice and easy to follow wrap.