I have started making our Christmas cards, our new roof and helping my husband make shelves

Not much making of anything from me these past few weeks.  I did find another couple of machine knitting swatches that I turned into hats for the 18" dolls.  I have one for Peggy now and put one in with the clothes I knitted for our grand daughter's Christmas gift.

This is Peggy's hat and the other one is very similar. A great way to use up test swatches!

We have had the rest of our roof replaced this last week thankfully now we will be nice and dry for years to come.  Our house which has multiple roof areas is now all done with metal roofing.  The original part of the house and the sunroom already had metal roofing.  The addition had shingles, they covered the outside porch, the kitchen, the new downstairs room and the large screen porch on the rear, so quite a large area. Then there is a separate roof on the upstairs extension. Now we have copper coloured roofing and it looks wonderful.

This is the addition, the front lower roof was done a couple of years ago, this past week the corresponding lower level on the back was done and all of the upper level.  All the woodwork needs re-staining and sealing but that is beyond our means both physically or financially right now.

I have been helping my husband in the workshop with a project he is making for his office, some shelving for under his desk so he can have all his computers on one desk. We did get two of our computers repaired this past week so that was a bonus.  I haven't really been much more than moral support for him but he appreciates my humble efforts.

As for the Christmas cards, I have made a start.  I got the blank cards and envelopes and blank address labels.  The cards are white this year but I think I prefer the beige colour I used last year.  I had to re do all my labels because I lost the originals when my computer crashed.

This is my second year of making cards.  It takes a long time but I really enjoy doing them.  I recycle old Christmas cards.  I cut out verses and pictures to re-use using fancy edge scissors.  I cut out "Merry Christmases" using a die on the Sizzix Big Shot machine. (This machine was a Christmas gift a couple of years ago, a tad frivolous but a lot of fun and I buy the dies and embossing folders when they have their 80% off sales).  Each one takes awhile as they have to be pressed out and they are very fiddly.  It is not like just cutting out a star or a tree.  I have also cut out some different fabric items like snowmen, Christmas trees and snow globes etc. from Christmas fabric. I used pinking shears for that.  I will emboss the front of the cards with Christmas designs as I think that gives them a nice look.

It does seem like a lot of time and effort but I will continue to make them until it isn't fun anymore. I will take some pictures when I have made some more progress on them.

Oh, and one more thing, it makes a heck of a mess, little pieces of card and fabric everywhere!