Pocketful of buttons

I like collections. I used to collect cardboard. Yeah, I know… I don’t understand either. Although that cardboard collection could have come in handy when I was making books. But I also collect rocks, buttons, and shells.

I collect mostly for aesthetic reasons — something looks pretty or is visually pleasing and I want keep it. I don’t know anything about gems/rocks/minerals. The names of most of the items in my rock collection are a mystery to me. But they look nice. So I collect them.

An object doesn’t have to be shiny for me to collect it. Honestly, I’m not entirely sure why I keep some things. I have a button collection. I think I started collecting buttons with the intention of using them for bookbinding. No one ever uses those extra buttons that come with your clothes. They just sit around or get thrown out. But they’d look good as embellishments on a handmade book.

Another thing I collect is shells. I live in Florida about an hour or so to the beaches on either coast. And what do you do when you go the beach? Pick up shells. We had a big bag of them sitting in the garage. I kept the best ones. (Is this a Floridian requirement? Do other Floridians do this?)

I enjoy laying out my collections and looking at them. There’s just something about an organized group of objects that is so visually appealing. I love the blog Things Organized Neatly. It appeals to the analytical part of my brain. I don’t have the space to keep my collections on display though. Maybe one day.

I enjoy each item in my collections individually. But they’re exponentially better when surrounded by like objects.

What do you collect? Let me know in the comments.