Button, Button

Happy Spring!! Finally, the first day of spring is here. I am soooooooooooooooooooo ready for it. We actually hit 70F on Friday and were enjoying some fabulous spring weather, but it has cooled off since then. But that's OK. I know there's more where that came from!

This week's Tuesday Trigger in the Moxie Fab World features vintage buttons cards. Lots of stamp companies (including Stampin' Up! and Papertrey Ink) have been bringing very cool vintage button card stamp sets to market recently. They are oh, so tempting but not in my budget. When I inherited my gramma's sewing basket over a decade ago, her collection of buttons came with it. Not only was there a treasure trove of vintage buttons, there was a nice selection of button cards as well. I do love my buttons, so I was thrilled to receive these! And they immediately jumped to mind when I saw the Tuesday Trigger photo inspiration:
I fished around in my button collection to see if I could find an actual vintage button card to use in my TT project. I found several that were promising. Not wanting to immediately use up this precious vintage resource, I decided to try scanning one (then printing it out on Neenah natural white card stock and cutting it out) and had fabulous results. Here's the card I came up with:
I sewed on an assortment of "fashionable" vintage buttons in neutral colors from my stash and mimicked the ribbon treatment seen in the inspiration photo. (BTW, you know those sometimes annoying ribbon loops sewn into the shoulder seams of tops and blouses? A new shirt of mine had those--and the first time I wore it, the loops kept sliding out of the armholes for all the world to see. Annoying! While folding laundry yesterday, I decided to make them annoying no more and clipped them out. Fixed! And as I did so, I realized that the ribbons were the perfect color for the scheme I had planned for this card. And that's where my ribbons came from! I love repurposing.)

Do you like the look of vintage button cards but have no source of your own? I'm happy to share the one I used on this card. First, click on the image below (to see it full size) and then right click on that image to save a copy to your computer's hard drive. Feel free to resize as needed and print out for your own projects!

I wrapped a few other challenges into this card, including

• Unity Stamp Co. Challenge #2: Fashion Forward. My fashion angle is my "Fashionable Buttons" card. All the stamps I used are Unity: the hearts on my pennants are from Little Me and the sentiment is from {ippity} Just Wanted to Say.
  
• Waltzingmouse Sketch Challenge:
• Flourishes' Bring Back Beautiful Challenge: to use neutral colors in your creation.
• Papertake Weekly: to use 3 of something (I used three paper flowers.)
  
• Clear It Out Challenge: to use buttons

OK, now that you've made it through the description of one of my projects for this weekend (another post will be coming your way soon with the other one I tackled), here's a little family update. Today our second-grade son celebrated his First Communion at church. He was so excited and did a wonderful job. We're so proud of him! And our sixth-grade daughter wrapped up a big project for science. They have been studying a unit called "Building Big," all about the science and engineering of constructing buildings. Their project was to use the building principles they'd learned to design their own building and then make a model of the building framework. With guidance from dad (which was allowed as long as it was in the form of teaching and side-by-side working), she built this awesome model. My dear hubby did a fantastic job of teaching her how a real house is built--that the walls are built in sections on the floor/ground and then stood up in place as you go. He helped her figure out what size to make the wall sections, etc., and then she built all the walls. He taught her how windows are braced, how loads are carried, about floor joists, roof rafters, laminated beams, and more, plus how all of these things could be translated into the miniature. And then she went to town and built the pieces she needed. Today, the two of them worked together to assemble all the parts into this beautiful DD-designed house. It's been a wonderful experience for both of them; a valuable learn-by-doing experience for our daughter and memorable teaching opportunity for my husband, one that neither of them will soon forget. :)

All right, let's wrap up this long post now. Thanks for stopping by to check out my little slice of bliss for today! Have a great week this week--and I hope to see you back again soon. :)

PS Oh, one last thing!! (Sorry!!) I just realized that this is my 199th blog post. I can't believe it! Anyway, I've decided that with my next blog post (yup, that will be #200!), I'll be offering some blog candy to celebrate this milestone. Be sure to come back to check it out!!

Card Recipe:
Stamps: Unity Little Me and {ippity} Just Wanted to Say
Paper: SU not quite navy CS, MFP kraft CS, Neenah natural white CS, The Girls' Paperie On Holiday DP
Ink: Palette burnt umber, Ranger tea dye distress ink
Accessories: SU small oval punch, foam tape,sponge dauber,salvaged satin ribbon, needle and thread, vintage buttons from my stash, sewing machine, mulberry paper flowers, hemp twine, scissors
Techniques: hand stitching, machine stitching, ink distressing