Sorting buttons*
So I've been on a bit of a cleaning-out and organizing kick lately, and last week I took a few hours to go through my button stash and create some order out of chaos. Above is only a part of the button stash that needed to be organized and culled! My previous storage method was just not working anymore:
As you can see from this picture, my previous method could be succinctly describe as "shove everything in a ziplock to figure out later." Well, later finally came!
Inspired by this picture on the Berroco blog, I went out an procured a cork board off Craigslist ($5! score!) and hung it up above my desk, then sat down for some serious button-sorting time. I used black sewing thread to connect buttons by type:
And as I worked the messy pile grew smaller and smaller and the cute, grouped-by-type pile grew bigger and bigger.
It shouldn't have taken me so long to get these all done but I kept getting distracted by how cute some of the buttons are! I'd forgotten about maybe half of these, like those awesome metal squarish ones that were supposed to go on a jacket design . . . there I go again getting distracted. I literally stopped more than once to quickly sketch an idea to go with the buttons!
After a few hours of sorting and watching DVR'd episodes of How I Met Your Mother (I just discovered this show and LOVE IT, you should watch if you've never seen it!), I had finished the whole pile. The finishing touch was hanging each little loop up on the cork board:
Using neon pushpins is optional, but it certainly doesn't hurt!
Now every time I sit at my desk I can look up and admire my neat and organized button collection. Hopefully this is the start of many new designs featuring some of these buttons ;o)
-----
*Funny how "sorting buttons" would be the equivalent of "watching paint dry" for most people, but for us knitters/crafters, it's actually fun!
3 Responses
Mary Choberka
You have inspired me. It doesn’t sound like paint drying to me – although if the paint were a beautiful color I could do that too!
jocelyn grayson
Super cute idea!
Margaret
August 30, 2011
just wonderful! a very famous knitter I know once said “the visual is the most important thing” or something to that effect. If it’s in front of you, you’ll see it, and it will inspire you.