I have a thing for gnomes. It started when I was a little kid and my family used to go on vacation in Austria. We went for long walks in the forest and my mom told my sister and me whimsical stories about little people living under rocks or inside holes in the trees. Several years later, I laid eyes on Wil Huygen’s Gnomes and here they where: Mom’s little people.  Then, one day, looking for books about salt dough, I found the image of a tree house that reminded me of a gnome dwelling. By that time I had already adopted the more refined and durable cold porcelain (cornstarch dough) instead of the salt dough. It took me several months to finish the two tree houses, as I kept adding details until I decided it was time for the gnomes to come visiting.