Mysterious 'gnome home' inspires community to make B.C. park magical
After four decades of living next to a dog park, Pat says what happened to the tree stump was a first.
“We wondered what happened,” she says.
All the people here this day were wondering who turned a stump into a 'gnome home.'
“Who knows?” one woman laughed. “Maybe it was a gnome.”
Perhaps. But it was definitely — all the dog walkers at the park today said — “a mystery.”
A mystery until now.
“I was thinking I got to do something with that stump,” Carmell Nesbitt recalls thinking.
She, and her husband Tony, could see the dying tree from her living room window, before it was cut to a stump, and remained untouched for months.
“It was kind of bothering me that it was there,” Carmell says more than half a dozen stumps had been left in the park.
“I just wanted to make something happy with it,” Carmell says. “And see what would happen.”
So she asked Tony if he could make a miniature roof and some tiny windows.
“It wasn’t something I wanted to do,” Tony says. “But I did it.”
He did it, because the couple credits 45 years of being happily married with always find fun things to do together.
“We try to make each other laugh every day,” Carmell smiles.
And perhaps — if they secretly constructed a gnome home in the park at night — they could have a coffee in their living room and see people smile from afar every morning.
And they did. Tony says dozens of people of all ages would congregate around their creation.
“And I thought, ‘Well, I guess it wasn’t such a bad idea,” Tony smiles.
Then Carmell came up with an even better idea — decorate the home for Halloween, Christmas, and now Valentine’s Day. She never imaged her gnome home would spark a gnome village.
“I think good deeds perpetuate themselves,” Alli Jones recalls being excited when she first saw the gnome home and then inspired.
She and her husband Jason Tucker made one of the sad stumps smile, by attaching eyes, nose and a grinning mouth to it.
Their neighbour's children, Norah and Laurel Whiteside, united for a magical makeover, adding bright decorations and whimsical characters to another stump.
Other members of the community added creative touches to more stumps, and now almost every tree that was chopped had been transformed with some sort of cheer.
“It puts a smile on your face,” a regular dog walker says.
“I think it’s really nice for the neighbourhood,” another smiles.
“It reminds me of my childhood,” a senior laughs. “[Happy] stories about elves and fairies!”
And now it’s no mystery, that Carmell’s reminded this community that no matter what happens, you can always find a way to make it feel like there’s no place like gnome.
CTVNews.ca Top Stories
House of Commons Speaker Greg Fergus survives vote calling for his ouster
Greg Fergus survived a vote to oust him as House of Commons Speaker on Tuesday, but with close to half of MPs expressing a loss of confidence in him, he faces a precarious path forward in maintaining order in Parliament.
'It was hell': Israeli mother held hostage with her children describes 51 days in captivity
Hagar Brodutch, her three children and four-year-old neighbour were kidnapped by Hamas-led militants from their home in Kfar Aza, Israel on Oct. 7 and held for 51 days. They were released in November, but Brodutch says her thoughts are never far from those still being held in Gaza.
'Unruly passenger' forces WestJet flight to make emergency landing in B.C.
A WestJet flight heading to Calgary had to make an emergency landing in northern B.C. Monday due to an incident involving an 'unruly passenger,' Mounties say.
P.E.I. kiteboarder 'lucky to be alive' after shark attack in Turks and Caicos
A professional kiteboarder from P.E.I. says he has been seriously injured in a shark attack that occurred while he was snorkelling in the Turks and Caicos Islands last week.
Teen dies after being hit by train in N.W. Calgary
A teenager has died after being hit by a train in northwest Calgary on Tuesday afternoon.
Black bear kebabs make family sick with parasitic worms
It was supposed to be a celebration, but one family’s unique meal of black bear meat sent several members to the hospital instead.
'It's his vacation too': Jimmy the baby goat joins 2-week road trip across Canada
After Jimmy the baby goat was shunned by his mother, a New Brunswick man took the kid on a two-week road trip across Canada.
The double-level airplane seat is back. This time, there’s a first-class version
It’s the airplane seat design that launched a thousand memes and kickstarted a media storm. And now the double-level seat is back – only this time, with a twist.
New COVID-19 subvariants become the dominant strains in Canada
More than four years after COVID-19 effectively shut down the world, two new variants of COVID-19 have become the dominant strains of the novel coronavirus in Canada.