Craft Stick Button Bracelet

By: Melony Bradley

You've seen homemade button bracelets, but it's safe to say you haven't seen a project like this. Grab some craft sticks and create colorful Craft Stick Button Bracelets from Melony Bradley. This project is sure to remind you of camp crafts from childhood.

Materials:

Craft sticks
Pot of boiling water
Glasses or plastic cups
Americana Acrylics by DecoArt (various colors)
Pattern paper
Buttons Galore and More Buttons
Pencil
collage pauge
foam brush
rhinestones
Aleene's Original Tacky Glue

Instructions:

First, bring a pot of water to a boil. Turn off the burner, Insert the craft sticks and let them soak for about 10-15 minutes. Put a few more in the water than you will think you need. I broke a few not being patient while trying to bend them.
Once the sticks are soaked. Grab some appropriate sized glasses or plastic cups and patiently work them into the glass. Work slowly if you don't want to end up with a lot of broken sticks like I did. It takes a little patience to get the hang of it.
These have to set up for 24 hours to completely dry. While they are drying, go ahead and grab some acrylic paints and pattern papers to coordinate with the buttons. I used Americana Acrylics by DecoArt and some older random simple printed patterned papers.
Here is another step you can do while waiting for the sticks to set up, On the wrong side of the patterned paper, use a pencil and a jumbo craft stick to trace it.
Use a pair of scissors to cut the paper out.
Once the bracelets have dried, gently remove them from the glasses.
Paint the bracelets in the colors of your choice.
Use a decoupage medium like Collage Pauge and a foam brush to apply the papers to the front of the bracelets. Allow the medium to dry and gently sand the edges of the papers even with the wood.
Now comes the fun part! Glue some rhinestones in the center of the stitched buttons using a tacky glue like Aleene's Original Tacky Glue.
Glue the buttons to the front of the bracelet and let dry.