If the beard was affected by the wind, I guess the tip of the beard would be affected most.
I see you have reduced the opposite bend in the hat, which in my opinion doesn't make the wind theory more correct at all.
I think I liked the first brown bundle best, without the stick. When you colored it red, my first thought would have been that it is a bloody heart.
In my eyes, the main problem is the stick.
I might suggest making the stick thinner and curved with the weight, making it look weaker, more like a straw than like a comparable weapon to the dagger (don't mind the rest, I got carried away, it looks more like "wolves, beware"):
Also, Do you really want the right hand elbow to be this sharp, or is it a sketching accident?
And to me the hands color does not look like a problem.
Another question is, the pose is extremely idle, why? Does the gnome have nothing to do? Maybe the head could be looking in a different direction than the body, like looking if there are wolves around, making it more dynamic, like this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Rembrandt_Harmensz._van_Rijn_035.jpg
For purists, the beard shape would probably also make more sense now, following the head looking left and right.
Edit: looked at some earlier post, where you mentioned animating it and maybe the previous suggestion was all wrong, so also did this pose for fun (based on a photograph of statue of Bruce Lee):
