I recently completed a custom set of Biblical figures for our church.
No, it is *not* a Nativity scene! It is a grouping of people to be used to help animate the stories the children hear ~ to encourage them to play, hands on, with the characters and to act out the stories, any story. The mother and child could be Moses and his mother, Samuel and Hannah, Elizabeth and John or a woman in the crowd.
Children learn best when they can engage the stories through a variety of learning styles. These figures allow them to touch (and wool is warm and alive feeling, compared to plastic toys!), to move, to dramatize what they hear and see in Sunday School. It also lets them feel more connected to the Biblical people as people just like us that sit down to meals, or go to school, or have to clean up ~ all actions they can do with the figures in play.
The people stand from 3 - 6" tall and represent a variety of people one might find in Bible stories~ women, men, children~ various ages. Each person has a different skin tone. They all stand independently without wires or frames in order to keep them safe and soft for toddler hands.
I really enjoyed working on this set and developing the 'fishstick' shape for future projects. They tapped into both my artistic side and my professional Christian educator side! And yes, I am working on Nativity scenes, I am going to be making them by special order and a subscription will be available , contact me for more info.
Those are adorable! What a great learning tool for the children.