My Daughter's Gnome Home!!!

For the most part this is a sewing blog, however, my sister was in town and we made SO many fun wooden toys for my daughter that I have to share a few!  Today I will share pictures of my daughter's fancy new Gnome Home for her upcoming 3rd birthday!

 My Sister Leila & Me (Tayva)

 

My daughter loves all things little and is naturally drawn to her wooden toys, so I wanted to make her a set of peg-people gnomes for her birthday.   Then came Pinterest, ahem, and I pinned so many cute Gnomes and Gnome Homes that when my sister said she was coming to visit us this summer I told her I wanted to make a Gnome Home and needed her help.  My sister is a super fancy artist, and at the first mention of this project she was in!

"Normal" people pack clothes in their suitcases when they go on vacation, am I right!?!  In my family we pack paint brushes and tools, I LOVE my family!  My sister brought her fancy scroll saw, drill, a big box of brushes and two power sanders.  To top it all off, she pulled out two big chunks of grape vine!  She had clothes in there too, but watching her pull tool after tool out, very impressive!  Again, my sister rocks!

We went to home depot to buy wood for the platforms and base, then we came home and my sister started drawing all over it with pencils.  She cut the pieces all out with her scroll saw, then she started to play with the pieces to find the perfect balance and combination.

Each piece of the Gnome Home was secured with heavy duty screws and the finished product is so sturdy my daughter could climb on it because my sister is very impressive like that, and she has 4 boys!  We wet down each piece of wood, watered down our paints, and we painted the pieces to achieve a color-wash effect.  After everything dried we hot glued moss around the edges and in various places to cover up the screws.

I made one quick set of peg-people Gnomes to go with this Gnome Home and look forward to making some really fancy Gnomes in the near future.  Please leave a comment to any links (or your own Pinterest pages) if you have other fancy Gnome ideas, I am always looking for more!  Whenever there is a choice between shiny plastic toys that light up and entertain or wooden toys my daughter ALWAYS chooses her wooden toys!  These colorful little Gnomes have been an even bigger hit than I expected...and I still can't find two of them!  Smart little girl, she knows they aren't for her to play with just yet so she has hidden them safely out of my sight!  Wise beyond her three little years!  Now the biggest trick is to store her fancy Gnome Home out of sight until her birthday, wish me luck!

My sister and I made individual name puzzles (Hanukkah & Christmas presents for Ziva's friends), rainbow wood blocks, wooden elements (water, fire etc.), and cut out a lot of wooden trees for future gnome projects!  I will be posting pictures of our other creations in the near future!!!  For now, here are more pictures of different angles of my daughter's birthday Gnome Home, enjoy!!!

Ziva's 3rd Birthday Present

 The Top Forest Platform

 Stairs & Swing on the Middle Platform

 The Bottom Platform has 2 Fun Doorways...

 ...and a Fun Little Bridge over the Stream!

 Birds Nest...now I need little Gnome Birdies!

 We used Liquid Nails to secure the two Grape Vines together, then covered it up with moss!

 Designed for 360 Degrees of Playtime

Making this Gnome Home has been one of the most fun projects in recent years, highly recommend!  Please feel free to check out my Pinterest boards and/or leave comments on this post if you have links to other fun ideas, I'm always collecting them!  I will post pictures of the other wooden toys my sister helped me make very soon...first I need to list new fabric in my shop!

On another very happy note, my sister Leila who was the design and engineering genius of this project is opening her own doll company in a few weeks!!!  She made my daughter a special one-of-a-kind doll and it is killing me to not post a picture of it right this second, but I am waiting until her official opening!  As soon as her shop is up and open (later this month!!!) I will post a feature on this blog and on my Facebook page with some FABULOUS and happy bonuses for all of you, time to get excited, trust me!!!  If you have a little in your life ages 0-8 be sure to follow this blog and keep checking!  Can you tell I'm just a little bit excited!?!

I SPY QUILTS & KITS COMING SOON!!!