The Handicrafter

Buttons are easy to collect.  Our house always has a big pickle jar full of the most fascinating buttons. When clothes wore out both my mother and grandmother would cut off the buttons and drop them in the jar. They are a great crafting resource.

If you place a jar in the laundry room you’ll be surprised at how quickly and how many you can collect each year.  Buttons come attached to new clothes which eventually wear out. They often show up in the strangest of places.  Sometimes you can even buy bags of assorted buttons.

So what can you do with all of those buttons?  Make great projects with your children!

Here are seven fun things your kids can make with all those extra buttons:

1. Button People.  Buttons with two holes make great faces.  A swatch of fabric glued onto cardboard can be cut to make the clothing, pipe cleaners or cord can be made into arms and legs and string can be cut and glued to make the hair.  Grab a flat backed pin, glue it to the cardboard and you have yourself an adorable button person who can be pinned to bags, shirts, or a long ribbon to hang.

2. Button Flowers.  Buttons have the perfect shape for the center of a flower.  Give your children several pieces of brightly coloured construction paper, glue, scissors and a few buttons and see what kinds of spring bouquets they can come up with.  To get really fancy, give them string to glue to the paper beneath the flowers as a stem. Use the flowers to make beautiful brooches.

3. Sock Puppets.  No sock puppet is complete without a pair of button eyes.  Grab an old sock, extra felt for mouths, arms and legs, yarn for hair, and your children have the tools to get creative and put on their very own puppet show.

4. Flower pots.  If you have a collection of like coloured or like sized buttons, grab a hot glue gun or craft glue and decorate pots to give them upbeat polka dotted flair.

5. Button tree.  Small holiday trees can be purchased at your local hobby or craft store for less than $.25.  Small buttons can be glued onto the tree to create a lovely wintertime or holiday table centerpiece.  The more unique the button, the more interesting the centerpiece you can create.

6. Cards. Buttons can be arranged to create an abstract design or an image and glued onto heavy cardstock.  For example a collection of buttons arranged to resemble a clutch of balloons might be the ideal card cover for you’re a child’s birthday card. Make miniature artist trading cards to swap.

7. Robot.  Wrap a few small boxes with tin foil and stack them to resemble a robot with the smallest box on the top for the head.  Attach paper towel tubes also wrapped in foil to the body.  Buttons can be glued on for eyes, technician’s panel or other robot-like decorations.  Grab a can of metallic paint to add a more technical feel to the buttons.

Button projects are a great way to keep your children happy and occupied on a rainy day.  They invigorate their imagination and provide a very good use for those growing button collections. 

Keep on crafting!