I have used them in clusters in crazy quilting.

I used buttons as part of the quilting on an appliqued quilt. 168 buttons later - gosh I hated buttons..... lol

I use at least one button, and often many more than one, on every quilt I make. I did an applique carousel horse once and lost one of the tails so I did that one tail all in brown buttons. I put that tail up near the top and my daughter (then six) would rub her fingers across them until she fell asleep. She's eighteen now and still has that quilt though she has put it away now for her someday daughter.

On a seed packet quilt I placed tiny lady bug buttons in various places on the plant pictures.

On my daughters wedding quilt, instead of a quilt tag, I embroidered the information onto the backing fabric, white on white, and placed a small pearl button under the embroidery work so it would be easier to find the corner that's embroidered.

Well, you get my meaning by now...I would keep them, cherish them and use them!

Some old buttons are quite valuable...maybe check around and see if some of the ones you have are. There are books about button collecting - maybe look at one at a book store or library. There are some sites on the internet that are really helpful. Search antique button collecting.

Buttons and lace for embellishments. Also I've got a pair of darling earrings made of buttons! Many, many uses for them. Good luck.

My cq block with a button cluster.

Very pretty. I love the lace and buttons embellishments. Nicely done.

Thanks for the great ideas.

Thanks, it was part of a challenge. We had to use the teacup fabric and 2 others, 2 charms and a piece of lace. It is full of meaningful things to me. The buttons were DGM's, the lace glove was DGM-in law's, there are many other memories. I thought it was apt as I collect tea cups too.
I have some buttons well over 100 years old, they are on posterboard that I gridded out and have the buttons secured to it with dental floss, then put in archival page protectors to view.
http://vintagebuttons.net/educational.html
http://www.buttonimages.com/ and more reading:
http://www.ohgosh-buttons.com/ oops, one more:
http://www.thebuttonbower.com/

piney