Tuesday 11 June 2013

Tuesday Technique - the Button Garden and how to make Button Flowers

First of all, I want to share my good news with you. I won the Craft Stamper magazine challenge 2 with my "Feather Your Nest" card, and one of the prizes is for the winning entry to be published in the magazine - woohoo!! Luckily, I kept the card lol!

Second, my dear other half has entered a photo in the Raspberry Pi competition and you can see me crafting away in the background! No, I'm not naked, it's just a skimpy summer top :-)) I really like the little Cartman peeping over his keyboard.


"The Button Garden Book Card"

OK, on to today's project. This week, Simon Says Stamp and Show...buttons! Oh, I love buttons!! I inherited the button boxes in my family, and save buttons from every old garment before it gets thrown away, but do I have enough buttons? Oh no, I still have to buy more. So this time last year, I was wandering around a craft shop and came across a packet of gorgeous mother of pearl buttons in the shape of flowers and there they have been in my button box, looking at me ever since. So when I saw the challenge was buttons, I decided to put them to use and came up with an idea to make a button garden. Of course, I also had to make a book card to house it.

"Left Inside Panel"

The sentiment stamp is from a set that came free with a magazine. They were meant to be used with card candi, but I think they work well with buttons too. The background for both inside panels was made using my new pan pastels with versamark + pan pastel stamping and a little masking (for the sun and horizon). I wanted the edges to be hazy, so smudged them all slightly after lifting the masks.

"The Button Garden"

The button garden is built into the aperture by gluing each of the button flowers in place between folds using glossy accents.

"Button flowers and leaves"

Each of the flowers and leaves in the garden is a button. Some of the buttons, like the flower-shaped mother-of-pearl buttons, are as they were bought, and others have been decorated using various techniques that I shared in an earlier tutorial. The "leaf" buttons have been decorated with scraps of patterned paper from Kaisercraft and Graphic45. The blue centres of the organza flowers started out life as cheap, plastic black buttons and have been decorated by dabbing with silver and blue alcohol inks.

"Cover of Book Card"

With such an intricate inside, I prefer my book cards to have fairly clean & simple covers. This one has a flower and sentiment stamped & heat-embossed in gold. I cheated a little since the stalk and leaves are from a different stamp set, I just covered up the flower that was originally on the stamp. A small mother-of-pearl button is added to the centre of the flower with a dab of Pinflair. The closure is made from a good length of lace coloured with pan pastels in sections to match the inside of the card.

Ingredients:
Artemio stamp sets: Hedgerow Plants, Silhouette Foliage
Candi stamp set, free with Simply Cards and Papercraft magazine
buttons!!
pan pastels & sofft tools
versamark ink pad
stampendous embossing powder, Pirate Gold
florist wire
paper-covered wire
distressinks: Victorian velvet, Bundled Sage
Tim Holtz paper stash: Vintage Shabby
Cardstock: white 160gsm & 220gsm, brown 300gsm
lace

Entered for the following challenge:
Simon Says Stamp and Show... Buttons!

Tuesday Technique - How To Make Button Flowers


1. Start off with a flower button (here I've used an organza flower with a button centre), a leaf button (anything green will do!), and a length of florist wire.

 
2. Poke the wire through the button from back to front and bend it to form a loop.


3. Poke the end of the wire back through the opposite button hole from front to back


4. Pull the wire through until tight against the front of the button.


5. Turn the button over and twist the wire around itself to lock in place at the back of the button.


6. Trim the end of the short length of wire flush with the stem using a pair of wire cutters.


7. Poke the other end of the wire through the leaf button from back to front, bend as before and poke back through the opposite button hole from front to back.


8. Tighten the wire against the front of the button as in step 4, then bend the wire into a loop and attach the end to the stem to make a leaf shape.


9. Here's some I made earlier :-) The mother-of-pearl buttons had fairly large button holes, so instead of florist wire I used paper-covered wire coloured with Bundled Sage distress ink. You can add more than one leaf to a stem as in the flower at the top right, and bend the leaves in either direction away from the stem for a little variety.





22 comments:

  1. Yippeeeeeeeeeee! Your a winner and published all in one day! Fantastic news Maddy. Your "Feather your nest" certainly deserved to win. It was simply fabulous. Brilliant wee buttons flowers too. Love the tutorial. Lee xx

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  2. BIG congratulations Maddy on your well deserved win, I'm really pleased for you.
    I love your button garden, such a wonderful unique design the flower-shaped mother-of-pearl buttons looks so beautiful.
    Thank you for another fabulous tutorial.
    hugs Sue xx

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  3. Wow, a gorgeous piece of art, fantastic details. Love your flowers. Congrats to your win.

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  4. Maddy....you are so creative!! This is another of your fabulous book cards! You're the queen of these! This little card book is such a wonderful use of buttons! Love your little flowers. Those are so stinkin' cute and the tutorial was good too. Congrats on your win with Craft Stamper Magazine! Well deserved! Thanks for sharing your always wonderful card book with us at Simon Says Stamp and Show. <3 Candy

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  5. Oh well done to you Maddy, well deserved as well.

    And what a fabulous creation this one is, you do dimensional work so beautifully.

    B x

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  6. Holy creative cow!!!! This is a buttonful of wonderfulness!!! I love your project, and the tut too! The flowers are amazing, and the sentiment, and the soft pan pastel scene! All perfectly summery! This makes a fantastic gift! Gorgeous work!!!! Thanks for buttoning up with us this week here at Simon Says Stamp & Show!!!

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  8. Well done to you. Lovely project. Love Alison xx

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  9. Fantastic project, Mandy. Love your button flower garden inside the book card. So clever idea. Thank you for tutorial.
    Hugs
    Eret

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  10. A beautiful project. And such a clever idea for creating flowers.
    Heike xx

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  11. congratulations - looking forward to seeing you in print!

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  12. I saw and what a wonderful card-you truly deserved to win! :-) What a fabulous project and great tutorial Maddy, love it :-) Elaine-xxx-

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  13. just blog hopping from dc...wow!!!! just stunning!!!!! x

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  14. What a lovely card and a deserved win. I love how you have shown how you have made it as well.

    Hopping on over from DC

    Kelly x

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  15. hi izzwizz what a super little project how very clever of you and well done on your win ... well deserved ... just wanted to say thank you so much for visiting my blog ... have a great week ... happy crafting and love sandy xx

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  16. Just fabulous, love everything about it, you have such a creative talent. Well done on the win, it is well deserved.

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  17. Gorgeous card - love the flower buttons
    Linda x

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  18. More marvellous Maddy makes! Thanks for such a great tutorial.

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  19. Those button flowers are awesome! What a great idea! Thank you so much for sharing your button ideas with us at Simon Says Stamp and Show!

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  20. Such a clever idea and I do like how you did the flowers

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  21. congratulations and love how you made the flowers
    carol x

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Thanks for leaving a comment, it's nice to know I'm not just talking to myself :)