Customer Reviews

Quick & Easy Christmas Bazaar Crafts

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I have an addiction: I am a craftaholic. Also a confession: I don't do them, just read about them. My intentions are always good: to someday get organized enough to start Christmas presents six months in advance and dazzle everyone with homemade gifts. (These are particularly useful for gifts to co-workers when you want something different, but not too expensive.)

Most crafts books are disappointing, I find. They offer very similar items, all with that fake "country" look which I absolutely loathe, or they're caked with sequins and plastic jewels to the point where you could burn your retinas out just looking at the damned things. I will admit that some of the projects here fall into that category, but - and here is my point - many do not. This book has a huge variety of crafts. Looking through I saw at least half a dozen that I'd be delighted to try - and as you may have gathered earlier, I'm pretty picky. Some are simple, some more complex. There are crafts that involve sewing, knitting, crochet, needlepoint, decoupage, candles, Christmas ornaments... you get the idea. Anyone reading this book should be able to come away with several ideas for crafts projects.

The other nice thing about the book is that it gives many practical tips for selling the items once you've made them. Setup, scheduling, display techniques, how to tempt shoppers over to your table... again, many great ideas.

In short, I was very pleased by this book and would definitely recommend it to anyone looking for some good crafts ideas for the holidays (or even at other times; many of the crafts can be either seasonal or non-seasonal in design and color choices).

Maybe I have a plebeian mentality, but I expect "bazaar crafts" to be cheap and cheerful, something that could just as easily be a stocking stuffer as an item for sale. This book was dull. The projects are all done with expensive materials with footnotes on how to cheapen them up for sale. There was a great variety of crafts-sewing, beading, crewel work, but they all seemed to have that same 'stuffiness' about them. The only way I can find to conclude this review is by quoting my husband. He looked the book over and said "I don't care for it."