Tutorial: How to make cover buttons

I've had a few requests over the past couple of months for some tutorials and I've finally found the time to work on a few. One that I get asked the most for is how to make cover buttons, which is what I'm going to show you today. I've taken lots of photos to illustrate the instructions, but feel free to use the comments to ask any questions you may have. :)

1. First, get your materials. You'll need fabric, scissors, cover buttons, cover button tool and a fabric pen.

2. Okay, find a design on the fabric that you want to make into a button and take the top cover button piece. Draw a circle around it about 1.5cm from the edge as shown.

3. Repeat how many times you like and cut out the pieces. Word of advice, it is better to have a bit too much fabric around the design, than too less.

4. Right, again take the top piece of the cover button and one circle of fabric. Position the fabric so that the design is in the middle and hold tight. (Sorry there's no photo of this, it's a two hand job and taking a photo would prove difficult!) Keeping a tight hold of your fabric, you then need to push this into the cover button tool. If you flip the rubber bit over you can see how your fabric is positioned. As you can see, mine has stayed close to the centre.

5. The first picture shows what it should look like from the back. All you have to do is push all the excess fabric down into the button. If you have too much, just trim some of it off. (This is why it's good to have too much excess. Too little and you'll end up not covering the button properly!).

6. Next take the shank part of the button and position it on top of the folded over fabric.

7. Take the other part of the cover button tool and position it up with the shank. Press down hard (you'll need to do this on a hard surface and use a bit of force!). You should hear a soft click once it's in place.

8. And there you go, one button made! It takes a bit of practice but once you've got the hang of things (particularly when it comes to positioning your design) it becomes pretty easy to do.

9. Carry on with the other circles of fabric you cut out and tah dah - one complete set of quirky owl buttons!

Like I said at the start, if you have any questions, please do ask in the comments section. Hope you liked what is the first of many tutorials I have planned! :D