My Grandmother’s Buttons


As a child I loved to venture into my grandparents’ bewildering dark cellar. A cellar filled with an amazing hodgepodge of whosits and whatsits, this and that, thingamabobs and every semi-reusable, recyclable item imaginable. 

(Something like this but crazier)


I remember my grandmother Norma saying to me, "When me and Grandpop are gone, you guys will have to figure out what to do with it all."



Little did she know that some of her collected treasures would bring great happiness to children all over the world. 

You see my grandmother saved every button she ever had. EVERY….single….button!


These buttons were passed down and around and somehow made a stop at each one of my international aid projects including a recent one in Sri Lanka. The girls I worked with at Herman's Girls Home enthusiastically created long strings of button necklaces from my grandmother’s buttons. 




Part of my work in Sri Lanka was teaching the kids about using and recycling anything they could.


My grandmother Norma was perhaps best at the re-using part, as she literally saved every single thing that could possibly be used for anything and I mean anything. Her basement was filled to the brim with every pizza box, shoe box, medicine bottle.....you get the idea.  

I'm not sure she could ever imagine where these small treasures, these small resources, would end up. Not only buttons but scraps of wool, cotton, sewing and knitting supplies saved by Norma accompanied me to projects in Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, South Africa and eventually Sri Lanka. Children all over the world have learned umpteen handicrafts from all her saving of this that and the other. But most of all, the children have also learned about how and why they should re-use what they can and how fun it can be to be creative and innovative with what they have.


As I watched the kids happily stringing each button, I was proud to carry on the legacy of my grandmother’s saving and reusing endeavors and passing on some useful skills to those who needed it.  



Five countries later there's still more buttons... buttons for everything.
Anyone want a button?


(For Grandma Norma Love Sunny)



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