button madness

I wonder, am I only the only one who gets hit by buying frenzies?  I’ve been browsing for buttons on the internet, for my patchwork bag . . . posted 2 photos of possible buttons the other day on my blogs, and was contacted by a French lady who has a “shop” on the French equivalent of “My Little Market”.  She recently bought up a whole load of supplies from a crafts shop that had closed down, so she contacted me to say that I might find what I was looking for in her shop.  So “click” and off I went for a visit lol.

The link to her shop is HERE if you fancy a browse, although I imagine there are similar kinds of sellers on UK or US sites, where postal prices would probably work out cheaper for those not living in France.  Anyway . . . what I’m writing to say is that, I’ve come down with a bad case of button madness lol.  Loads of wonderful vintage buttons, the kind that you rarely see these days, and Emilie is selling them in “lots” . . . so sometimes there are just a few, sometimes there are as many as 29 . . . and for such ridiculously low prices, that I just went mad.

I  haven’t received my order yet, but have copied photos from Emilie’s shop to show you just a sample of what I bought. I don’t really know what I’m going to do with most of them although I’m wondering if either of the first two might work for my patchwork bag. Whatever, I’ve paid no more than 3 euros for each job-lot (anything from 5 to 29 buttons) so it’s a win-win situation when you consider the price of buttons these days!

patchwork bag – assembly part 1

Well, assembly of my patchwork bag has now officially begun ^^

I began yesterday afternoon at patchwork club, and continued in my armchair last night. So far I have four squares assembled to make the base, and then branches of 3 squares . . . so it looks something like a 4-legged spider at the moment.

Ladies had a good laugh (at my expense) yesterday . . . on the instruction sheet, it said 19 “square” and 16 “japanese” . . . so I dutifully made up 19 identical squares. I realise now that those two instructions were referring to the type of bag, and since I want to make the “japanese” style bag, I only need 16 squares lol.  Not to worry – I will use one of my extra squares to add as a pocket inside . . . and I’m toying with the idea of using the other two to make a little matching purse. Seems a shame to have made them and not use them.

Anyway – hubbie is going away for a few days at the beginning of next week, so I’m hoping to complete assembly and make my bag straps. Bag won’t be completely finished until I add buttons BUT I’m still not sure what size will be best, so I’m going to wait until bag is properly assembled before I decide and order.