Gnomes--A Granddaughter Project

Assisting with the nose assembly

Last December my friend, Gail G, crafted a gnome at her guild meeting. A guild member led the activity which included project kits. Gail thought it would be an activity that my grand children would like to do. She put aside a couple kits for me. Then COVID kept us in our homes for months. In May, Gail, Connie P and I got together for lunch and a catch up. The food was five star and the show and tell was amazing! I, however, digress!

Gail gave me kits for two gnomes and she lent me her gnome so the girls had an idea of what their project was going to resemble. The girls LOVED the project. They each read through the directions so they could identify the supplies and had an idea of the steps involved. Yes, I could have had the girls search and locate a similar online tutorial. (To prepare, I watched several videos.) In the end, I decided taking time to read the directions was a better use of our time because the granddaughters asked questions about what some of the directions meant!

The whole activity, including the direction discussion, took about 30 minutes. From the start, they wanted their gnomes more "plump." We used about two cups of rice each for their gnomes. They thought using a funnel was a smart way of getting the rice into the sock because there was no "spillage."

Finished gnomes posed for action

I should not have been surprised, but I was, when each granddaughter carefully trimmed her sock for the hat of the gnome as well as cut off the excess sock from the gnome body. They are fast with a pair of scissors in their hands! I applied the glue to the hat and the beard following their arrangement. They left their gnome hats non pointy because they wanted their gnomes different from the directions. 

At the end of the activity, they talked about how the gnomes could make an appearance at other holidays in addition to Christmas. For example the green hatted gnome could hang out on St. Patrick's Day and the orange hatted gnome could hang out on Halloween AND Thanksgiving. Gail's red hatted gnome could hang out at Christmas, Valentine's Day and 4th of July. They decided all of the gnomes could hang out on Easter.

Thanks again Gail G for the kits. You were right about the fun factor! Their holiday discussion was priceless!