Today, I’m making my way home from the All Things Silhouette Conference. One of my favorite activities at the conferences is the swap! If you aren’t familiar, it’s an optional event where attendees make a small project at home and bring it to trade with other attendees. Today, I’m sharing why I chose buttons – and how I made them.
Why Did I Choose Buttons for the Conference Swap?
Of all the projects I could have done for the swap, why did I choose buttons? Well, buttons are fast to make, and great for small businesses. I chose buttons so I could give you ideas on how to use them in your own small business.
Ways to Use Buttons in your Silhouette or Cricut Business
- Great inexpensive impulse items at craft shows and fairs.
- Perfect for kids. Imagine this – you have a basket of assorted buttons at your table at a craft show. A mother is trying to have a conversation with you as her child is at her side. She can hand him/her the basket of buttons to dig through and you can finish the conversation quietly. (She will likely buy one as well!)
- Branded buttons make great giveaways to put in orders because they are cheap to make.
- While not directly business related, buttons make for great fundraisers for kids. My eldest recently had to make and sell goods at school – and buttons were our go to.
Button Tutorial
You’ll need:
- Plain copy paper – I used inexpensive paper from my printer.
- Button maker and buttons. I picked up this one from Amazon.
- Silhouette Cameo or Cricut Explore
- Using Print and Cut (Silhouette) or Print then Cut (Cricut), create your button designs and print them on copy paper.
- Cut them with the Silhouette or Cricut.
- Remove the excess paper.
- Now, use the button maker to quickly put them together. My button maker has two steps. Quickly, here is how it works. Take the flat metal portion, the circle paper, and the mylar film and place them in that order into the first hole in the button maker. Then, pull the lever down.
- Place the button back in the second space, and pull the lever down.
See, easy as can be! Of course, you could use scissors with your button maker – but honestly it would take forever. In less than an hour, I cut and assembled 120 buttons.
Oh! If you wanted, you could remove the pin from the backing and glue a magnet instead.
Love this tutorial? Save it to Pinterest:
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Thank you so much. I have been thinking about making some buttons for my business and just haven’t jumped in yet.
Always happy to share, Teresa!
I saw these at the swap and loved them! I want to try making some myself. Thanks for the tutorial.
My pleasure!
Wow! I didn’t see your buttons at the swap, but I made my own that said “help me get my Curio out of the box”. I had no idea how to use ANY software to make the buttons as I bought the machine on a whim so that my fellow football moms could make their own buttons with our player’s numbers on them. After the Conference, I was sure that I could use my machine in a totally new way – and you have made it so much easier!
Another idea that I totally stole from another blogger is to make blank template circles to have on hand at craft fairs for kids to draw on, and then for a small (child affordable) fee, make a button out of their own drawing! This would also be a win at school festivals.
Great idea, Lisa!
you are such a genius!! I’m so glad I found your blog!!
Aww thanks, glad to have you as a new reader!
What program did you use to create the design? The buttons came out great! I have to make about 125 pins for my daughters big golf tournament and am looking for ideas. TIY!
Silhouette Studio.