Crafting Eases Cash Crunch During Giving Season

Craft & Hobby Association offers tips for homemade gifts no matter what the
holiday

ELMWOOD PARK, N.J., Sept. 2 /PRNewswire/ -- With the tightening economy
and higher gas and food prices, the Craft & Hobby Association is reminding
families that it doesn't take a lot of money to show friends and family how
much you love them by providing tips from their Celebrate the Season annual
promotion.
Celebrate the Season is a month long celebration to get people thinking
about crafting during the busy holiday season, starting with Halloween and
going all the way through New Years! Retail craft stores around the country
hold special themed activities, events, workshops and demonstrations to get
customers geared up for the entire holiday season. Homemade gifts no longer
only mean glue and construction paper. With the growing popularity of this
trend, people are making and taking their ideas and creations beyond your
everyday crafts.
"Creating personalized, homemade gifts for friends and family members have
been emerging trends over the past few years," says Craft & Hobby Association
CEO Steve Berger. "Making gifts at home is a great method to save money and
the perfect way to give truly meaningful and unique gifts this holiday
season."
This year, the annual Celebrate the Season national promotion focuses on
Kids Crafting: Inspiring Creativity and Growth, reinforcing the idea that
creating a gift at home is an economical way to inspire creativity and evoke
that special holiday feeling in both children and parents alike.
Below are some tips from CHA to get started with your homemade gifts this
season.
-- Holiday heirloom: Create your own holiday heirloom by taking a bridal
gown or bridesmaid dress that has been in the family and turning it into a
Christmas tree skirt. You can pass it along from one generation to the next
and it will never go out of style!
-- Special moments: Create your own mementos and give your family
something to cherish by making a holiday memoir book. Sites such as
Scrapblog.com let users create and send beautiful scrapbooks online. You can
also print publishing-house quality books for much less than expected. It's
an easy way to capture memories from each day of Hanukkah.
-- Something old, something new: Update your old and tired holiday decor
with inexpensive and easy to customize chipboard embellishments. Repurpose
that old wool sweater and turn it into garland for Kwanzaa or transform cereal
boxes into a spooky message for Halloween.
-- Fit for a king: Remind your family Fido he's special. Pick up a new
bowl, a small wedge of carpet and a stamp set and give him a watering hole he
can lounge around for hours by stamping his name all over the carpet. CHA
members EK Success, Martha Stewart Crafts, and K&Company offer a variety of
stamps and templates.
To learn more about what is happening in your area during Celebrate the
Season, to locate the nearest craft store, or for additional project ideas,
visit http://www.craftplace.org.
About CHA:
The Craft & Hobby Association (CHA) is a not-for-profit organization
consisting of about 5,000 member companies engaged in the manufacture,
distribution and retail sales of products in the $31 billion U.S. craft and
hobby industry. The Association offers a broad range of member services
including market research, education and consumer branding initiatives, as
well as operates two annual trade show events, the CHA Winter Show and CHA
Summer Show, that attract industry professionals from all over the world. For
more information about CHA, log on to http://www.craftandhobby.org.
SOURCE Craft & Hobby Association

Victor Domine of Craft & Hobby Association, +1-201-835-1224,
VDomine@CraftandHobby.org; or Sushma Dwivedi of Fleishman-Hillard,
+1-212-453-2381, Sushma.Dwivedi@fleishman.com, for Craft & Hobby Association