Gnome Palooza

A gathering of gnomes or is it a Jerry Garcia look-alike contest?

For years I have wondered what to do with all my little scraps of hand spun, hand woven wool fabric off cut from larger projects that I just can’t bring myself to throw away, then I started making these little dudes and I need wonder no more! Best part is they are a delightfully quick project so all my loved ones get a cheery fulled wool Holiday ornament gift. I have an abundance of supplies on hand to make them and bonus- I also get to utilize all those heel & toe blown colorful knit socks (that I just can’t bring myself to darn one last time)- for gnome hats- win-win, grateful!

It all starts at the bottom, a circle about 2.5″ in diameter

Sewn to a small verticle tube
The resulting gnome bodies are then loaded with a Tablespoon or so of dry white rice (for balast) and then stuffed with wool- (a great way to use up your flocks’ less than spinnable neck and belly wool)

I then use a running stitch in a co-ordiating thread, use a strong yarn or rug warp as this will eventually be pulled through the top of the hat for an ornament hanger . . .

Pull tightly shut and then stitch nose in place, using the tube seam as the gnome center back
Looks like someting I saw on an episode of Dr. Who once upon a time!
Gnome noses are made from an old nylon stocking stuffed with loose white wool and pinched and tied with sewing thread, I leave tails for stitching to the gnome body-

Hats are made using scraps from commercial and/or handmade socks (that are way past being darned for the last time) I use a serger for stitching each sock into many little hats, but a regular sewing machine or even hand stitching would work too . . .

Each sock will produce many various sized, delightfully wonky gnome hats, stuff each hat with wool, then. . .

Gnome Palooza indeed! I wound up with about 70 of these little guys
They don’t hang around for very long though- Happy Holidays!