little birdies

Several months ago, Jimmy bought me two huge baggies full of buttons at a garage sale. I sorted them a bit, even cleaned some, but didn't have any idea what to do with them. So I've been searching and searching for inspiration, and finally it hit me a few weeks ago - turn the buttons into birds. I got out my embroidery floss and started experimenting.

The first two (on blue) were my first attempts. I wanted to make sure I could get the legs and beak to look good enough that you could tell it was a bird. Then I decided to make one into a pin/brooch. I need to come up with a better way to secure the pin backing (it moves a bit, making it hard to pin on yourself), but the concept worked and I liked the results. I can see myself making lots of these, especially since I have a huge jar of these little black buttons.

The bird in the pin is my interpretation of the red-winged black bird. We have those all around our house in the farm and wetland areas, but I don't ever get them in my yard. They're quite beautiful, and the red and yellow on their wings really stands out against the green grass and foliage this time of year.

The pin is actually quite small, measuring only 1.25" square. Oh, and if you can't tell I used t-shirt material to sew the birds onto. The pin is backed with acrylic felt because that's what I had around the house. I might decide to go with something a little more sturdy in the future, but it would be difficult to find a non-fraying material with the same range of colors.