We discovered Swedish Gnomes a couple of years ago, they are so cute. We have a terrible dislike of the usual garden gnome that people put in their yard, those things are scary. But Swedish gnomes are just adorable. We have also discovered that they make great gifts and can be customized to the specific gift receiver. Everyone has something that they like to collect, admit it, most of us have more than one kind of thing in our collections. The best part of the Swedish gnome is that they are so versatile, they can be made to fit any theme for any collector. Swedish gnomes are very easy to make and customize. There are several different ways you can make your Swedish gnome, with sewing, hot glue, or just tying them up. Whichever way you want to use it, it only takes minutes to make a gnome and have them ready to go.

You will, of course, need to know what kind of gnome you are wanting to make. Are you going for tall and thin, short and plump, or something in between?

You will need to get your materials together. Here is where things can get interesting. You can use any combination of materials to make your gnome. You can use the old sock, the piece of leftover fabric, the torn tee shirt, or any other fabric you want to use.

Then you customize your accents. Choose what kind of material you want for your gnomes hair and beard. Hair and beards can be made with so many different materials and in any color or colors you want. Is your gnome a redhead, blond, or brunette? Will your gnome have braids, dreads, or bedhead?

You will want to choose a nose for your gnome. Will you use buttons, rocks, or beads? Or will you make your gnome a nose? Using baking clay, you can make any shape, size, and color nose you want your gnome to have. The kids like making noses from clay, that way they can make all kinds of weird, fun, and wacky shapes. You can paint your clay nose or leave it the off white color it will be after the clay is baked. Again, here you can go with any color, shape, and theme you like. If you have a specific theme or color scheme in mind, you can match all your materials to that theme.

Now, comes the real fun, or more fun. Add the theme details to your gnome. Will your gnome be a cowboy with boots and spurs? Will your gnome be a sports fan, a horse rider, a doctor, or anything else you want him to be. It seems that Swedish gnomes are very diverse in their jobs and likes. You can add hats, shoes, glasses, a pipe, or any other number of things you have to make your gnome the exact theme you are going for.

Once you have chosen your body material, hair, beard, nose, and accent details, you can put your gnome together. It literally takes only a few minutes to assemble your Swedish gnome.

1. body (sock, tee, old shirt or sweater, whatever you have)

2. sand, pebbles, marbles for the bottom layer to help hold it up

3. poly-fil for the body to make him fluffy

4. close your the gnome body (sew it up, glue it up, tie it up)

5. make the hat with the same material as the body, a different material, or even a real, small-sized hat.

6. attach beard and/or head hair (sew or glue)

7. add the nose (hot glue is usually fastest but buttons can be sewn on with ease)

8. add your accent pieces ( hat, glasses, team colors, etc.)

There is your Swedish Gnome.

For our gnome, we used an old flannel shirt for the body and hat. We just used thread to tie the bottom of the shirt sleeve and then turn inside out for a flattish bottom.

Fill the now tube sleeve about 1/4 full with the pebbles.

Fill the rest of the tube sleeve with poly-fil and tie the top closed. That is the body.

We kept the shirt cuff and used that to make the hat. We tied up the top with yarn and left the cuff as is. We put a small piece of Eucalyptus in the hat.

We then hot glued the head to the body and the hat to the top of the body.  We then hot glued the beard to the front of the body, making sure to snuggle it up under the hat.  The hot glued the eucalyptus to the hat. Make sure you are very careful with the hot glue gun, it is very hot. Speaking from much experience, the hot glue will stick to you just as fast as to anything else and it is also very hot.

We used a small, smooth, pebble, the kids picked up in the yard, as the nose. Hot glue your nose in place.

As I said, it is a fairly quick and easy process, it took about 10 minutes to assemble. If there is more than one kid offering advice, it may take longer to decide on what materials to use. But you can always let everyone make their own Swedish gnome with the materials that they want to use. Follow the steps and you can make your own Swedish gnome. Another great thing about Swedish gnomes is that it does not really matter what shape you come out with. They are cute no matter if they are tall, short, thin, fat, or lumpy. You can dress them up in any style you want. You can add any amount of accent pieces and color themes. You can go traditional or steampunk, it is all up to you and they will still be cute no matter what. You can see from the pics, we have made many different Swedish gnomes and all are different but all are still just adorable. Use your imagination and have fun making Swedish gnomes. Swedish gnomes make great gifts. You can make a gnome for birthdays, graduations, and sports events. If you make a Swedish gnome couple, that would be a great anniversary gift. Whatever event or occasion you can think of, you can make a Swedish gnome to match. We hope you have enjoyed our troup of homemade, Swedish gnomes and hope you will try making some for yourself.  As you can see, everyone of our Swedish gnomes is different.  They are made of different materials, have different colors, hair, beards, noses, hats and accents.

If you find yourself attached to any of the Swedish gnomes in this post, you can go to the Raven’s Nest Facebook page and buy the one you want. The FaceBook page offers for purchase our handmade crafts and one-of-a-kind, handmade jewelry.  Please do note, all of our items are one-of-a-kind, so there is only one to be hade.

Thank you for visiting and please come again for another edition of Out Standing in the Field.