To dye or not to dye ...

That is the question I have been asking myself a lot lately, it has nothing to do with yarn, I am actually referring to my hair. For the last (who knows how many!) few years I have been colouring my hair, not to be trendy or anything but to cover my grey hair. Well, it's really more than that, my hair (the roots, especially at the front) is actually white. There! I said it, my hair is white, I'm getting old!

OK, everyone gets old, sooner or later. I used to think that I would grow old gracefully, and I would not force against nature. But that was when I was really young, in my twenties. But now twenty years on, I'm not so sure. Of course, there are plenty of women who look fabulous with grey/white hair.

There is Dame Judi Dench

And Helen Mirren (another Dame!)

And of course the wonderful Doris Chan

I admire these ladies who feel confident with their grey hair, and I want to be like them. But when it comes to making the decision it's not so easy. First of all, my husband is dead against it. He began to lose his hair in his thirties and I encouraged him to be bold and became bald, he took it head on (pardon the pangs) and never regretted it. But when it comes to my hair he is rather protective, or is it because he doesn't want a wife who looks older than himself? (I haven't asked that question, maybe I will). My boys on the other hand, don't really care, to them I am already old.

There is also the logistic of things to consider: as my natural hair colour is very dark and I've been colouring it dark brown, or chocolate as I like to call it, if I were to stop dying it how would I look? Imagine someone with dark hair and white roots growing out, the image of Mount Fuji springs to mind. As I have been thinking about going grey I started reading up on the subject, there are plenty of them around! But one thing in common in all the articles I read, is that for someone who has been dying their hair for some time the best way to go au naturale with grey hair is to get a pixie cut. Umm, I tried it once in my youth and it's definitely not for my hair type, my hair is really strong and if I had a pixie cut I'd look like a hedgehog, an albino hedgehog at that!

So, the question remains, to dye or not to dye ...