It is simple enough to make Christmas cards: a little bit of glitter, some brightly coloured pictures and attention to detail can brighten up anyone’s festive mail. The proliferation of online outlets selling Christmas card craft materials makes it an easy hobby to take up: not only does it say more than a mass produced card, it is a fascinating past-time for children and adults alike.

Best remembered as an essential part of the primary school curriculum in the late winter term, Christmas crafts range from making Christmas cards through to complicated gift projects. With a little imagination, and common household products, a house can easily be decorated at low cost. A brown paper bag becomes a beautiful stocking for the end of the bed: paper plates are transformed into angels, place-settings and table ornaments. And with complete creative control over the colours and concepts, the hobbyist can tailor their projects to their own tastes. It is possible to adapt these craft projects to different themes, and include family details that could never be found on commercially produced decorations.

Not only are Christmas crafts cheap, they are environmentally friendly. It is easy to make Christmas cards from last year’s cards, jazzing them up with ink and glitter. Discarded cardboard tubes, wrapping paper, even washing-liquid bottles all find a second life in decorations or gifts.  Cotton wool comes into its own, as snow for Christmas scenes or as the body of a home-made snowman who won’t melt over the fireplace. And unlike a trip to buy the same items, making these pieces can bring together parents and children in a shared project.

Christmas card crafts are the way to make a greeting stand out from the pack, and bring an individual flavour to the celebrations. They are thrifty, more welcome than yet another predictable scene of hollies and robins, and bring an intimate touch to a season that is often accused of too much commercialism.