Better late than never!

Some months back my enthusiastic husband collected and dried the seeds from a capsicum while muttering loudly about the inflated prices and dubious freshness of what was available from our only supermarket.

Well, it has taken a while and we'd almost given them up as a waste of our tank water when suddenly we spotted this. It's currently as big as an egg, and there are many more smaller ones on their way too.

More experienced gardeners (ie-just about anyone!) tell us we should be able to collect the fruit until the first frost which will probably knock the plants about and put an end to our fun.

Last time we tried this experiment our chooks at the time got in and demolished the plants completely, but this time we have a better fence for the vegie patch and for the chooks!

Feeding the family

It's so very satisfiying (and economical) to feed your family from your own garden. This basket became a quiche. And later we used our lemons to make a mayonnaise. Oh yum.
And its nearly three monthe since our chooks arrived from the egg farm and its a relief to see them almost fully feathered again. Thanks for the eggs ladies, keep up the good work!

Boys Clothes and Toys Clothes

It seems like a long time since I've had any sewing to post about. This a collection of bits and pieces from the past couple of weeks. Nothing very significant, mostly just necessary! The weather was very warm on Saturday which highlighted the lack of shorts and t-shirts in DS wardrobe. Fortunately a couple of pairs of last summers shorts still fitted! The red and the blue shorts were from fabric in my stash, as was the stripey t-shirt. The Grey t-shirt and denim shorts are recycled cast-offs from our wardrobe! The little dolly is actually Mum's design but included because I made a dolly outfit using the clothes pattern for this doll's clothes. It was supposed to be quick and easy.... Guess it is when you've made lots of them. It was fiddly and annoying when I hadn't used this pattern for about 15 years. (At least the naked dolly from the Toy Library won't be cold now. Thats who the outfit was for!)
Also on the subject if dolls, I made a hat for this vogue pattern doll, to hide her bald head. My son has taken a shine to her and likes to carry her around giving her cuddles. Very sweet.
And it looks like our scrawy, half plucked chooks are keepers!

Half a dozen Chooks

Over the weekend we went to pick up our new chooks. They have been retired from an Egg Farm, because at 12 months old their egg production starts to slow down and they are replaced with a younger model!

Sadly being cramped up in an Egg farm means nothing to do all day but eat, lay and peck the cr*p out of each other, hence their half plucked appearance. This is 2 weeks regrowth, in another 4 weeks they should be looking a lot better.

They seem to be enjoying their new surrounds. We purposely hadn't weeded this area for ages and there was loads of bugs and greenery for them to scratch up.

We may have to put in a lower perch though. Most of them haven't got enough feathers to make it up on the perch for and are sleeping huddled on the ground overnight.

They are settling in well though. I forgot how much I enjoy having chooks in the yard!