Embroidery hoop art with button flowers

I wrote recently about my embroidery hoop art house picture, and I'm finding it an addictive new craft form. I decided I'd like to try a smaller framed version, so I bought a couple of frames which measure 10 cm in diameter, quite a sweet size which fits nicely in the palm of the hand.

I've got an enormous collection of buttons and I've been looking for a craft to use them, so I decided to make some button flowers, very simple with some felt and embroidery. I used some off-white cotton cloth for the background and fixed it firmly inside the hoop, leaving some hanging around the edges. I cut out a circle of felt for each flower and stitched it to the background. When I'm working with felt I always use contrasting colours of thread and quite large stitches because that's the look I like. Then I sewed a button into the centre of each circle, again with thread in a contrasting colour.

When it was finished I made sure that the fabric was pulled across tightly and then I trimmed it around the edges. I glued the edges to the frame and secured it with some tape, then added a circle of felt glued on the back to keep it all tidy. It's not really necessary if the embroidery hoop is going to be hung on the wall, but I like it to be neat!

When I made these I was toying with the idea of building up an Etsy shop. I love the idea of making things to sell, but the cost of the materials and postage means that you need to charge quite a lot to make it all worth it. You also need to build up quite a collection of stock in order to get noticed, which of course means financial investment, and I'm not sure that I've got the time, money or energy to invest in it all right now. It's definitely something that I'd like to think about for the future though!