I started with Sky Blue, spraying one end of the canvas. Then I overlapped a bit with Robin's Egg Blue, then some Hyacinth. I sprayed the other end with Perfect Pink, then over-sprayed with Aspen Yellow.
Then I just willy nilly sprayed some blue here, yellow there, purple here, until I liked the way it looked. I allowed the canvas to dry for about an hour.
I drew a simple tree trunk onto the canvas, sketching lightly with a pencil. I drew 5 main branches, then added smaller branches off of those. When I was happy with it I used a brown metallic finish paint to fill in the tree. I used a liner brush on the smaller branches.
This is where I had a little fun with the dimensional paints! I chose the colors Black, Brass, Bright Copper and Gold Pearl. These paints come out in a nice steady stream and looked beautiful, adding a really nice dimension to the canvas.
Next I chose some of the largest buttons in each of the button collections. I was using Rustic Coconut Shell (my favorites!), Sea Glass, Earthly, Vacation and Rose Garden. I placed them in various places on the canvas.
Once I was happy with their placement, I attached them with E6000 adhesive. It took a little while, but I just kept adding different sized and colored buttons everywhere, saving the tiniest buttons for the outer edges.
That's it! A little spray paint for background effect, a simple tree drawing filled in with paint, some shimmering three dimensional paint, lots of beautiful colored buttons and some glue and you have a button tree.
Expert Tips & FAQs
These paints are sold at Michaels. Here's what they look like. Other brands will work too, whatever you prefer.Tip: Michaels and Hobby Lobby both have a huge selection of canvases and quite often have them on sale. Or if you visit the stores often, you can use your 40% off coupon.