I’m so pleased to be one of the contributors to a fantastic new holiday ornament e-book, Crafty Tree Trimmings!

You can find it right here through December 31st, so be sure to order soon if you like it. The book is an instant PDF download with printable pages that includes directions and templates for making six pretty holiday ornaments, and 15% of all sales go directly to Project Linus. I designed a set of Bead and Button Sparkle Ornaments, which were a lot of fun to make.

You could do your own version with all buttons, or in any colors of your choice… this is a super adaptable project you can take in any direction. I mixed vintage beads, rhinestones, and buttons in a simple configuration, but I think this ornament would be darling covered with tiny antique pearl buttons… or with an ultra-symmetrical arrangement of larger and smaller buttons for a sleeker look.

Diane Gilleland and Patricia Zapata are the dynamic publishing duo behind the book, and the other contributors include Betz White, Linda Permann, and Kayte Terry. We each chose a fellow crafter’s ornament to make for fun this month, and I got to make Diane’s lovely Gossamer Thread Trees!

I made them as mantel decorations instead of hanging ornaments (lots more on that here), and added tiny button-star toppers to each one using some of my favorite things: glitter, felt, and vintage pearl buttons.

Here’s how to make your own star toppers to ornament these gossamer thread trees, if you’d like to try making a set too! You’ll need a small remnant of felt, scissors, glitter or Sparkle Mod Podge, two pearl buttons, a toothpick, and a hot glue gun for each star.

1. Follow Diane’s instructions on pages 15-18 of Crafty Tree Trimmings to make your gossamer trees. At step 7, when your first layer of wrapped thread is drying, cut one star out of felt for each tree. I cut mine freehand out of plain white craft felt — they were each about an inch across — but you can use a template or pattern if you’d rather.

2. Dip each star into the bowl of fabric stiffener you’ve been using for the thread so that they’re soaked through. Set them on acetate or another resistant surface they won’t stick to to dry.

3. When they’ve dried completely, brush on a coat of Sparkle Mod Podge (or sprinkle glitter on them while they’re still wet) to add a glittery effect.

4. Use a generous dab of hot glue to attach a toothpick to the back of each star. While that is cooling, add a pearl button to the front of each star with hot glue, then turn it over and add the second button over the toothpick on the back. Using a button on each side will make the topper balance nicely — it may tip forward if you only use a button on the front.

5. When you’ve finished making the tree (step 10), set one star onto the top of each cone. They should sit nicely and the toothpick will be completely hidden within the body of the tree.

6. Set the trees out on your mantel or a tabletop, or any other place you’d like to decorate for holidays!

I’ll be back tomorrow with more button holiday ornament and decorating ideas! I’m hoping to post every day this week — holiday crafting is one of my favorite things and of course any excuse to make things with buttons is a good one as far as I’m concerned…

I made my daughter Pearl a Yoda costume for Halloween — starting with a hat from Heather Mann’s fantastic and easy tutorial, and dipped into my stash to pick out a set of brown buttons for his eyes.

I actually made three versions of the hat, in baby, small toddler and big toddler sizes. So cute.

I also made my Yoda a companion snake, and got to use some favorite vintage white moonglows for that too!

The entire Yoda costume tutorial is here on the CRAFT: blog if you want to check it out.

Meanwhile, Craftster member thestamppit made this incredible Coraline “Other Mother” costume for Dragon*Con, covering her eyes with buttons. I wrote a bit more about it over at Geek Crafts, and the Craftster thread on ideas for the costume is over here.

If you used buttons on your Halloween costume, or spotted a good one someone else made, I’d love to hear about it!

The button hairclip video is already up from this morning’s episode of AM Northwest — just click “crafting with buttons” on their front page and you can check it out if you’d like. Wow, that was fast! They showed off a few of my book projects and then I made three hairclips — a solo blue one, a Blazers-inspired black-and-red layered one, and a spring-y pink sparkle and green one (a similar style to these three, which were some of my samples from last week at Powell’s).

photo by Lee

One thing that might be helpful from this little video, which isn’t mentioned in the book, is that it’s easier to keep your hairclips balanced and even while the glue is drying if you slide them onto a postcard or envelope or something else to hold them in place — otherwise they can tip to one side and the button can slide around a bit. I figured that one out at Powell’s last week when people were making hairclips and needed to take them home before the glue was completely dry, it works nicely for these guys.

And I’m super excited that Craftster is doing a button-themed craft challenge this month, with a copy of Button It Up as the prize!

This challenge calls for you to decorate an existing item in any room of your home with buttons.

You can use buttons from your stash, purchase new or vintage buttons, or even craft your own buttons! Glue, sew, resin, or use any method you want to attach the buttons. Your object could be something as small as a soap dish in your bathroom or even as big as a piece of furniture in your living room. Just choose an object and make sure the end result is adorned with buttons.

You can find all the details on this thread, and you’ll need to post your entries between April 1 and April 5 to enter. I can’t wait to see the projects…

A huge thank-you to Leah Kramer (who made the lovely Buttons and Beads necklace, which you can see more of on the project extras page and pictured on page 57 in the book) and Craftster for including the book as part of their fantastic contest. Good luck!

I had such a great time at Bolt on Saturday afternoon! Thank you so much to everyone who came by to hang out and talk buttons, make magnets, and eat lavender shortbread cookies.

This one is blurry but happy — it was so nice to get to talk about buttons with people who love them too.

Thanks to Chelsea’s wonderful article about her family button collection, some folks brought their own canisters and jars of treasured buttons to show us…

…it was lovely to see them all.

A huge thank-you to Lee for taking these photos of the heirloom buttons, that was an incredible gift.

This amber color was so fresh and gorgeous — like it was brand-new instead of decades old.

This one was so exquisite in person, the details and faceting were spectacular.

Just lovely.

So, thank you so much to Gina, Amy and Julia for having me, to Lee for the spectacular pictures, to Andrew for wrangling our little pearl button so we could all hang out in the shop together, and of course to everyone who came by, it was such a treat to spend the afternoon with so many button enthusiasts!

Two more bits of button-project news:

My CraftStylish post this week is how to throw a button party, with how-tos for making button cookies and cupcake toppers. I loved making these and maybe you can use some of the ideas for a crafty party of your own!

And I will be on the AM Northwest show tomorrow, Tuesday 3/31 (on KATU 2 here in Portland from 9-10 am), showing how to make button hairclips from my book, and talking about the upcoming Handmade Nation premiere. You can see it live tomorrow morning (I think about 9:20, though that could change) and then the video will be on their website by Wednesday. So if you couldn’t make it to Powell’s and you’d like to make some hairclips, now is your chance!

On Sunday, Chelsea Cain wrote a lovely feature for the Oregonian about her family button collection, and how it connects her with her mother and now with her own daughter — something that is especially meaningful to me now that I have my own pearl button to share my treasures with.

She was kind enough to invite me over to their house to make button crafts with them and wrote about her childhood memories, my book, and our afternoon “great button geek-out” of gluing, sorting, arranging, and rearranging. It’s not online (yet?) so I snapped some quick photos of the page and put them here if you want to read along. Thank you, Chelsea!

And if you’re as eager for spring as I am, you might want to try this simple little pick-me-up project I just did for CraftStylish: making button and felt embellishments for a plain pair of shoes.