Aug 6, 2007

Buttons Buttons Everywhere!


A History of the Button
by Roy Earnshaw
Listen. Listen hard.

Something is trying to tell you something. Those little round discs, there on your shirt. Yes, yes, your buttons.

They're saying, "Let us tell you stories, of our former glories. Plain though now we be, once magnificent were we."

You can't hear them? Well, maybe not. Life is awfully loud these days. And fast. And huge. Hard to focus on a humble little button.

Guess it's up to us to tell you stories of their former glories."

I love buttons and have a good collection of them, in all shapes, sizes and colours.
I love running my hand through the boxes, wondering about their history, their stories and bringing back memories of when I was a child. Whenever I or one of my sisters were poorly, mum would give us her big old blue padded chocolate box filled with buttons to play with. It was the best medicine any child could want.

I thought it about time to sort them out and decided for now its best to sort according to colour. White was my choice, well shades of white.
Once I have all the "whites" together, (which will take some time to get through the bottles and boxes of buttons) I will then sort further into sizes.
I have just singled out a few, merely as their size fascinates me, and the ones on the right are very different to the touch. They are ice cold and quite weighty and have a well worn look in places. I wonder how old they are and what they are made of, its feels almost like some sort of shell?

4 comments:

sheila from life @ #17 said...

I love buttons too...but don't have nearly as many as you do :)

(I'm workin' on that...slowly, but workin' on it nonetheless :)

Scallywags Scribbles said...

Thank you Mrs G, somehow, and I really don't know how, I just collected and collected over the past 40 odd years. Every time I saw a bottle or tub of buttons for sale I had to buy and each time I have parted with any its been with a pang in my heart yet at the same time happy that I could help someone out with one or two that were JUST the button they needed.
Does that make sense LOL?

Rabbit Hill Creations said...

I love your button story, and I don't really see myself a button collector but, somehow I have managed to fill up a jar full of them!...I'm not sure how that happened.

Lana Manis said...

I too love buttons Lynda.. especially MOPs and glass buttons.

Lana