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Friday, January 27, 2012

Needle Felted Tomten and the Fox

On a recent trip to the library, we found two books that are wonderful for the winter season: The Tomten and The Tomten and the Fox by Astrid Lindgren of Sweden, and also the author of the popular Pipi Longstocking. The Tomten books are delightfully illustrated and tell of the Tomten, a spirit-being in the folklore of Sweden, adding a new wonder and delight to our seasonal reading.










Unlike the Gnomes of England who live in the forest, Tomten live on farms in barns or cellars. In these books, the farmer's children leave food for the Tomten each night. As the moon rises, he walks silently, never seen by people, in the snow to make his rounds checking on the farm animals and even giving a mischievous hungry fox some of his tasty porridge. When they wake, the children see the Tomten's footprints in the snow. (The tile below has set in our home for years. Little did we know we had a Tomten in our midst.)




Last night, I made a peg Tomten and needle felted a fox who now stand on our ever-played with nature table.




Our home is surrounded by Amish and Mennonite farms, so barns, cows, chickens and crops are a common sight. Surely Tomten are there. Perhaps after the next snowfall we will go on a search for little Tomten footprints.
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10 comments:

  1. April's HomemakingJanuary 27, 2012 at 1:28 PM

    Oh, I love your little Tomten and the needle felted fox! Very cute! I love these stories, and really enjoyed reading them to my children when they were younger. :)

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  2. softearthartJanuary 27, 2012 at 3:07 PM

    Oh wonderful, cheers Marie

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  3. Happy Whimsical HeartsJanuary 27, 2012 at 4:36 PM

    Your needle felted Tomten and fox are so lovely!

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    Replies
    1. KellyJanuary 27, 2012 at 6:58 PM

      For some reason I have trouble commenting with the new format so my apologies for commenting in the reply section. We love the Tomten books too and your Tomten and fox are fantastic. The fox particularly has so much character - he's excellent!

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  4. CarrieJanuary 27, 2012 at 4:54 PM

    Adorable!! I would love it if you would share at our sharing party tomorrow at http://craftymomsshare.blogspot.com. Thank you!

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  5. Kelly @ The Homeschool Co-opJanuary 27, 2012 at 10:24 PM

    Those are gorgeous. I absolutely love foxes.

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  6. EviJanuary 27, 2012 at 11:50 PM

    Oh, very cute! Your fox turned out so well and the Tomten must be tiny!

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  7. MiaBJanuary 30, 2012 at 10:20 PM

    Super cute :) Thanks so much for sharing this with us at Sharing Saturday. Hope you have a great week.

    ~MiaB
    www.mamamiasheart2heart.com

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  8. oldmomFebruary 19, 2012 at 5:04 PM

    I loved watching your little fox come to life. He has so much more personalty in person than in the photo. Now I look forward to spring and more little critters

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  9. AnonymousFebruary 28, 2012 at 2:32 AM

    We love these books! A firm favourite every christmas, and every winter.

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