A wreath

We have a new wreath! After many years of gathering greenery and twisting it into the semblance of a circle and then watching it quickly fade to brown in the late Californian sunshine on our south facing front door, I decided on a different approach.  A ball of yarn and some felt balls, which should survive the sunshine and since there's a porch, won't have to brave the rain. It is a hash-up of some fun wreaths I saw while idling online. Oli was the chief architect, picking out the wool and helping me with the balls.

Felt balls are funny little things; fairly pointless but still fun to make.  I'm reminded of an article by the talented Catherine Newman where she made some disparaging comments about felt balls, or perhaps the makers of felt balls - didn't they have anything better to do? (I can't for the life of me remember where I read the piece - possibly Brain Child - but you can read more of her stuff here.)  What then, am I doing, finding time to make felt balls? The fact is, it's a gentle innocuous activity at this time of year with a three year old. We made them in the sunshine with a bowl of soapy hot water. Jack, on the other hand, went off-script and tried several times to baptize himself, at one point even trying a reverse-tip-back technique - he is nothing if not determined! It kept us all entertained for a sunny half hour.