Buttons: The Unsung Heroes in Your Wardrobe

The other day, I remembered back to the Wayland Farm Fiber Days, a beloved market held every winter here in Massachusetts. Vendors set up cheerful stalls of homegrown and hand-dyed yarn in the warm, expansive greenhouses of Russell's Garden Center that are themselves a delight to explore.

Around every corner of the Fiber Days is a surprise - a happy stand of monstera plants shades a needle felting table for kids and grown-ups alike. Geraniums wave you over to naturally dyed hat kits. A vendor sells local maple syrup next to a weaver's rainbow of scarves and blankets. You buy fresh pastries, tamales or steaming hot chowder to slurp on while you roam the aisles. You take your coat off, hug friends, shop and visit in the warmth of all those plants and wool. Sheep wait outside to say hello to you as you head back to your car. It's heavenly.

Wayland was the last fiber festival I attended in 2020 - unbeknownst to me, the final time to see fiber friends in-person for what would be a long while. But I missed out on one important thing when I was there: Favour Valley Woodworking's handcrafted wood buttons. Ooooh, I was tempted, as I walked by their display bursting with buttons in every gorgeous wood imaginable. But I didn't stop at the time, intent on chowder or maybe distracted by some yarn skeins overdyed with marigold, and never made it back to purchase them.

Since then, Favour Valley has relocated from New Hampshire to the West Coast. When I realized I'd never get a chance to see them at Wayland again, I knew how much I wanted to have these buttons in our shop - a chance to experience them again, but also, if I'm being honest, a way for my heart to hold onto that winter. That time-before-we-knew what would come, when my memories will always hold onto that last market day with a special fondness.

So I tracked Favour Valley down to their new home in Oregon, where they are still making wood buttons thoughtfully and sustainably, and it turned out that the owner Martha was happy to hear from me and to have her buttons in our shop. She put together such a great assortment of buttons for us - I was overwhelmed when I opened her package!

So here they are. Buttons for your handmade knits and sewn garments. The little details that matter. But also, a tribute to a memory of a time before - and hope for the time ahead. For friends. For fiber. For being together again.