Our fresh tomatillos

Our fresh tomatillos
Originally uploaded by redmag

We planted these for the first time this year - having never done it before this is proving to be a journey into the unknown.

I have to say - I love them!!!!!!!!!
......well I love watching them grow. They are much more beautiful than the tomatoes, zucchinis and cucumbers we planted. They're tall and elegent and the tomatillos grow inside these georgeous little lantern looking sacks. I cant wait to pick the first one!

We've been exploring mexican cooking lately, which is actually why we decided to grow these ourselves - we'd had trouble buying the canned tomotillos. My experience of Mexican food had been limited to tacos anf burritos and i had been underwhelmed.

But then we bought a great book, "1,000 Mexican recipes" by Marge Poore... and everything has proven to be a winner - so much so we've had to start growing our own produce!!

The Koala

Koala - A candid shot
Originally uploaded by redmag

I finally finished a design for an Australian animal. I'm not sure why it was important for me to do one - I think it has something to do with wanting to create things for my son which he might actually see one day.

Over Christmas went hired a holiday house and an Echidna made an appearance on Xmas eve. I was clearly more excited than him but it got me thinking that maybe I should leave the softie versions of reindeer and polar bears to those up North and concentrate on things I know. So I did.

For those of you who have looked through my flickr pages you might remember my legless first attempt at a Koala - with his garish recycled curtain body and ears.

This little guy was actually started out completely independent of that one. I'd made a lion based on my cat design and decided that it might look better with a proper body - with big paws. That attempt merged into this one - although this one has a larger bottom as a Koala is slightly more sedentary than a Lion. I think he's pretty cute - He's also a nice size and shape for hugging.

I'm also experimenting with faces - Its subtle but you'll notice his eyes have little white pupils which make him look cheeky rather than the robot-like blank eyes of my previous toys (which is ok coz most of them are robots) I've been perusing old children’s books for ideas.

His name is Casey and is in the shop. I think I might make him some friends...next time I'm going to use more than two different fabrics. Maybe a mother and baby Koala?

But that can wait because we've all been sick in quick succession for the past week and a half and I'm a bit over it....so while I had grand plans for making a load of toys over the long weekend this is all I managed.