Gnomes, oh and Polka Dot Trees

To say that I go to Tai Pan a bit is a plain lie.  I go there plenty.  Doesn't help that it is only about 2 miles from my house.  Actually it does help.  I like it there.  My pocketbook, not so much.  (I digressssss.) They have amazing Christmas tree displays and I fell in love with a red bristle tree...but not the price.  So I decided that I would change my main tree colors to red and white this year.  I bought a couple of elves and had a great time picking up red ornaments along the way as I have shopped different places.  At Tai Pan they had these red/white cone trees and I ( as predicted) decided that I would make mine.
I began by buying green mercury glass bases for the dowel to sit in.  I poured plaster of paris over a bunch of packing peanuts and stablized the wooden dowel.
I picked up some very nice large sheets of medium weight cardboard from HObby Lobby and twisted them into cones and hot glued them shut.  On the base of the tree, I put a round of heavy cardboard for the cone to be glued to.

I glued it with gorilla glue so it would stay...Then I wrapped the red 

felt around it and hot glued it on.  The most fun part?  Attaching the pom poms.  Well and of course setting them near the fire place...

So then I saw that Gnomes are very in this Christmas and I wanted to make a few for my mantle.

I got out my remnants of red felt and then dug into my Thrift store box of sweaters and 

starting snipping away.  I made this little pair for one of Alicia's friends in KS and their bodies are made of toilet paper rolls. Ha, reuse -recycle!

I was way too cheap to buy styrofoam balls at 3 or 4 bucks a piece when they are TOTALLY underneath the hat...so I came upon my own devices.

 how about tin foil rolled up into a ball and smashed against the table?  Works like a charm.  Then I glued a bit of fleece to smooth it out.  Then I hot glued a piece of flesh colored felt on the outside, smoothing it out to make a face spot.

 I cut out the body of sweater to fit the body, which I made in various sizes from rolling cardboard in  lengths and widths to form a tube.  Then I glued on the sweater.  I rolled little tubes of sweater for the sleeves and glued them to the middle of each side with the raw edges folding over inside the tube. I then selected the beard from my plethora of furs and woolies.

I made the hat in a similar fashion to the cone trees.  Rolled up a piece of card stock to make a cone and fit it on the head -then covered it in sweater or felt.

I glued it all together and then added a wooden bead for the nose and black beads for the eyes.

A little rouge for the cheeks and they are done.....Gnomeville!  And here is a shot of them on the mantle and my Christmas reading bench....Gnomey.