We had a blast with Miss E's fourth birthday this year. It took more time and effort, but cost less and was definitely a hit with the kids and adults alike. I don't really know how it all got started, but one afternoon, I was brainstorming and we came up with the idea of gnomes as a party favor and it took off from there. I studied the Waldorf gnomes I found on the web, and looked at a couple tutorials, then ordered a ton of people turnings from Casey's Wood Products in Maine. Worked perfectly! I did them in batches and I would estimate that they took about 5-10 minutes apiece.
The next fun idea that came out of brainstorming with the family was to make gnome homes as a craft project, at the party. That way, the children would adopt a gnome, then build a home for him or her, and take both to their home. It was a blast! My husband sliced up a bunch of cardboard that we had in the garage, making nice little 5x7 inch bases (or roofs, you choose!). I bought a bunch of cheap craft sticks in two sizes and 10 bottles of craft glue. The rest, we collected. We took bags, boxes and egg cartons full of sticks, bark, acorns, grass trimmings, pine cones, snail shells and more. The imaginations ran wild, and we saw all kinds of beautiful gnome homes. I'll include a few images as examples, but every single one was awesome.
To top it off, we had chocolate cupcakes decorated with snails (of course), and hot pink toadstool cupcakes that were strawberry. How the heck do we top this next year?
2 comments:
the gnome homes as craft / favours is excellent. i love how unique the designs were. looking at your row of guests it must have been a large party.
Thanks, Kristine! We really did have a blast making them. I still need to sit down and build one of my own.
It was a large party, but the cool part was that so many friends and their children were there just to build those homes!
If you have questions on what to do to build them, feel free to email me at plushalicious@gmail.com!
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