There are so many cheap looking plastic baby toys around. So plastic-y. So many primary colours. I wanted something from real wood so I got the jigsaw out and made a plywood baby gym (yes, google tells me that is a thing). Apparently babies can only see in black and white for the first few months (don’t quote me on that): black and white it was. It wasn’t too hard to make – designing the main structure so it locked together was the tricky bit. For the rest I drew the shapes, cut them out, sanded, primed and painted them. I used a drill to make the holes in the shapes to thread the string. Encouraged by this first foray into the handmade toy business I ended up making a few more little things–see the plywood mobile and mountain peak bunting.

              cost: plywood $16