Buttons can be made from many things.

These are bark chips that have tossed and turned in the ocean and been smoothed and rounded but not tamed:  I get tiny slivers from them even after a bit of sanding and oiling.

A  very old wooden baseball bat was sliced into buttons.  I had expected more of a – oh, I don't know – grain?  signs of age?  indication of wear? – and in an attempt to add some visual interest inked on the adage.  Maybe  "buy me some peanuts and crackerjacks"  would have been more appropriate. Oh well, there is a LOT of the bat left.

This is one of my favourite and already in use.

What appears to be a chip from a cedar stump on a chopping block appeared in the front garden – only one – and as soon as I picked up this rather mysterious item it felt like a button. 

A wash and an oil and four holes and it became a button.

What is doubly intriguing is that the wood is still green so a piece of the bark on the back has already come away as the wood dries and I like the fact of watching it evolve as it dries.

Crocheted around rings and drapery hooks with yarn and cotton and hemp,  these buttons are samples of what can be done – the top left is still in progress – and I like how exact to a vision a button(s) can get with such a process. 

I am not sure if these rounds were examples of wood for a classroom or manufacturer – the left one has cherry written on the back,  locust on the other,  or if they were meant as coasters, but they make beautiful buttons.

Scented buttons.  Knit in a yin yang pattern from cashmere,  sewn onto a leather backing and lightly stuffed with pot pourri from the garden,  the final touch a stem of Australian bushmint which is the most wonderfully fragrant plant both fresh and dried.

Felted by hand around plastic buttons using raw fleece in the bottom two and in the top two  my handspun that I dyed with kool aid in the microwave.

Again I am intrigued by how one could knit a garment and then use the same yarn to felt the buttons.