Many years ago, my cousin asked me to write the place names for her wedding, I think there were about 150 guests but I could be wrong, there was a lot I know that. I agreed of course and the next thing I knew many many stones were delivered to my door. I still have mine and John's and they live on the front porch.
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Our place name stones are hidden at the base
of the silver birch Nisse |
This led me to think about Christmas place names this year and how could I put a Scandinavian spin on Emma's wedding place names and of course it was simple, I needed some Nisse*.
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| Our Christmas place names |
To make the Nisse I bought Fimo clay in red, white, black and pale orange.
I created two types of Nisse with slight variations on each. One had legs and the other just a body. Some had large noses with a hat others also included a beard. And some just a hat with no face. It was fun creating the little figures. And really rather quick. Below is a rough guide to how I made them but I'm not the most artistic, I'm sure you could come up with much better versions than mine. Once all were made I placed them on lined baking trays and baked them in a cool oven at about 140 degrees Celsius for about half an hour. I left them a day and then super glued them onto the cleaned stones that I dug up from the garden.
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Nisse made from Fimo as
place names for the Christmas table |
I also made some spare Nisse which I did not attach to stones but will dot around the house. In hindsight, I would have made a small hole through the Nisse hat and then I could have used them either as hanging ornaments or to decorate gifts with. I think that would have been superb. Next year...
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| A room full of Nisse |
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| Nisse with a body, beard, nose and hat |
Frustratingly I have lost the photographs I took at each stage of the process, so apologies as my notes will have to suffice. these Nisse are not hard...
To make the Nisse:
For the body with just legs:
Take a small ball of black Fimo and make into a sausage shape and then bend it in half, do not crack the Fimo so just give it a bend, so it will sit neatly under a hat.
For the body with no legs:
Take a small ball of black Fimo and make the body into a cylindrical shape.
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| Nisse with legs and a hat |
For the hats:
I took a small ball of red and began to shape it into a cone shape. I place my thumb under the base of the cone where a head would sit and push my thumb up into the base to create a little indent, this seemed to give the hat a bit more of a better shape. I then manipulated the hat to whatever fashion I fancied.
For the beard:Take a tiny piece of white Fimo and make it into a flat rectangular shape, cut out a shallow V shape
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| Make the beard marks with the end of a toothpick |
from the top of the rectangle, this would allow for the nose to be! Once you have gently placed it onto the Nisse body take a toothpick and scratch some beard marks onto it.
For the nose:
Using a small piece of the pale orange, shape into a ball and attach.
Using a combination of the above, you can create your own family of Nisse. If I find my instructions photos I will edit and add them in, it is so annoying!
Once you have baked them for 30 minutes in a cool oven and they have cooled completely, I super glued them onto the stones and then used chalk markers to write names on. For Emma's wedding, I used permanent white markers but for my place names, I have used washable markers, so they can be used again and again.
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| Nisse both on stones and stand-alone |
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| ♥How will you set your table this year?♥ |
