The Metal Buttons and a Rocket Man

A few fun finds from the past week.  The metal trash can will be staying with me for storage, at least for a while. I am switching it out with one that has a retro wine theme.  I prefer the floral, imagine that.  I have been working on a little reorganizing in the art room to fit in the vintage toy box I showed you in this post and you know how one thing leads to another once you start moving things around.

This train case is more square than the typical rectangle.  The inside is going to be a challenge but I think I can rescue it to live another day.

This quilt was my favorite find.  The roses and colors are perfect in my world and it will be staying with me.

I don't know enough about quilting to tell the difference between the real deal and one made off-shore to look old.  If you click this one bigger you can see the hand stitching, which looks sort of clumsy.  Either way, it washed up beautifully and is a perfect accent in my guest bedroom so it's a keeper.

I also found two hand-made flannel baby shirts.   As if these giraffe weren't cute enough....

A rocket man!!  This has to be the most unique design I have ever seen for a baby shirt.  I would love to find the embroidery transfers that this design came from!

The wood and metal keepers are the last of the button reveal from the big haul last month.  The two painted wooden buttons are pretty worn out but interesting enough to be keepers.

These three are my favorites from the metal buttons.  I don't know the material in the background of the one in the upper left but I suspect horn.  The other two have fabric backgrounds.

****UPDATE****

A reader named Carlene (no blog that I know of) educated me that those little animal charms in this post are celluloid and were attached to string bread ties as a premium. That explains what I described as tassels on two of them.  That is just what remains of the string they were tied on with.  Once I knew what to look for I was able to find out there are all kinds, including some that are hand painted. So much more fun than the plastic and wire ties we get today! 

Vintage Metal Button Collection

 I did get out last weekend for a tiny bit of junk shopping but I got home and put it all away before it occurred to me that I hadn't taken any pictures.  I'm blaming it on the mouth surgery.  That's my story and I'm sticking with it!
Since I don't have any new junk to show and I know that a lot of you share my love of buttons I thought I should start doing a button collection post every now so this the first in a series.  If I can remember.

 This wonderful old plastic jewelry box holds my favorite metal buttons plus some special vegetable ivory buttons.

 Click the pictures bigger so you can get a good look. Doesn't it remind you of a treasure chest?

 Look closely in the upper right compartment and you can see a couple of vegetable ivory whistles.  For those of you who aren't familiar with buttons, a "whistle" has one hole on the front and two holes on the back. There are all sorts of cut steels in the front compartments.  Cut steels are old Victorian buttons.

 The bottom is filled with a variety of larger buttons.  I don't collect according to any specific category or criteria.  I just keep the ones that look unusual to my eyes.

 I can't imagine how many thousands of buttons have passed through my hands in my lifetime, probably millions.  When eBay first launched, in the early 1990s, I was a button seller.  Gosh would I love to have some of THOSE buttons back!  I never hit the Mother Lode by finding something like a Gay 90s or anything like, but I've temporarily owned some pretty cool buttons.

 When I stopped selling them on eBay I started saving the ones I really liked and that has grown into several random collections like this one.  No matter how many times I have seen them, they still delight me every time I open the lid!

I am linking up for Show and Tell Friday over at My Romantic Home.  Cindy throws the best parties so be sure to stop by and mingle a little!