Long before humans ever heard the word “Whatnot,” a handful of unusual gnomes wandered the winding paths of Gnomewood Forest — each brilliant, each eccentric, and each, in their own way, a menace to the peace and quiet of their neighbors.
They were gifted.
They were passionate.
They were, according to every other creature in the forest, not to be left unsupervised.
They built strange contraptions that made very loud noises, flashed bright lights, scuttled off into the underbrush, and occasionally — through no fault of their own, they insist — caught the forest mildly on fire.
The Problem That Brought Them Together
At first, these gnomes lived in scattered burrows throughout Gnomewood. But one summer, the Great Forest Council issued a politely urgent decree:
“To the various gnomes of boundless enthusiasm:
Please stop inventing things in the open woods.
You’re scaring the owls.”
It wasn’t that the council disliked invention. They simply disliked:
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flying debris,
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sudden explosions,
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midnight humming, buzzing, and ticking,
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unplanned holes in the ground,
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and the occasional self-mobile device wandering into traffic (forest traffic, but still).
So the council made a proposal:
>> A single place where the eccentric gnomes could build, tinker, experiment, argue, collaborate, and occasionally explode things without alarming the wildlife.
>> A place where their talents could mix and multiply.
>> A place where creation was encouraged — and where the trees were safely out of range.
The Making of the Workshop
Deep in a clearing protected by ringed stones, the gnomes came together and built a structure unlike anything Gnomewood had ever seen:
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Windows shaped for maximum daylight
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Walls reinforced with fire-resistant bark
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Ventilation chimneys engineered for “unexpected smoke”
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Tables, pulleys, shelves, tools, and contraptions of questionable purpose
And one very large sign reading:
“THE WORKSHOP OF ODD INVENTIONS — APPROACH WITH CAUTION”
For the first time, the gnomes worked side by side.
Not competing.
Not colliding.
But collaborating.
And remarkably… things got better.
Less chaotic.
More inspired.
What Sparked the Whatnots?
In time, they noticed something:
Every time they finished an experiment, they found a miniature version of it lying on a shelf — some mechanical curiosity, a prototype tool, a sculptural oddity, or an unexpected little thing that didn’t quite fit any known category.
A whatnot.
They realized their workshop wasn’t just a place to build inventions.
It was a birthplace for hundreds of small wonders.
So they named their collective craft:
Gnobby Gnome Whatnots™ — A Workshop of Tiny Marvels.
Why They Create
Some say they do it to improve the forest.
Others say they do it to impress the owls.
Still others believe they’re secretly trying to out-create one another.
But the gnomes themselves will tell you the truth:
“Because building little wonders keeps the world curious.”
And so the Gnomewood Workshop still stands — buzzing, humming, clinking, sketching, trimming, balancing, brewing, sculpting, testing, laughing, and occasionally exploding — where every Whatnot begins its journey from gnome hands to human homes.