When I was a child my mom sewed a lot. She was also frugal, so she reused buttons. I always remembered a large jar of buttons in the linen/sewing closet in the hallway connecting our bedrooms with the bathroom. That large jar came home with me after my mother died.

When mom sewed I sometimes played with the jar of buttons. I had my favorites — my very favorite was a translucent pink, round, concave button that always tempted me to put it in my mouth because it looked like a delicious piece of candy. Okay, most of the time I did put it in my mouth. I can remember the smooth taste of nothing. I wasn’t disappointed it didn’t taste like candy because I knew it was a button, but, if I had that button now I would definitely put it in my mouth.

I just dumped out the entire jar of buttons looking for the lozenge-like button, but mom must have used it for something because it’s not there. However, some other buttons I remember were there. The pink buttons have four glass diamonds on the front — I should have made sure to take a photo of the fronts! The long black one was from an old p-coat. The round black one was from my dad’s navy dress clothes or coat. I think the dome-shaped silver button was from one of my winter coats. I am pretty sure I put that in my mouth more than once too. The big round red button was from my mom’s coat, I think. The others I just remember, but don’t know where they came from.