Free shipping on all holiday cloth diapers...

is extended until the end of December.





Happy holidays!

Hungry girl typing....

Feeling brave after Monday's loaf I decided to go through my stack of recipe books and pick a breakfast recipe. I picked one from "Everyday Grain-free Gourment", mainly because it looked easy and called for few ingredients.

Sweet Morning Popovers

Well they sound good, don't they. As I mixed the ingredients together I'm realizing that the dough is too wet. Ok, I'll add some more flour, thinking this is no big deal. Quickly, the 2 cups of almond flour becomes 3.5 cups. And yes, that's the bag, the $16 bag of ground up almonds. Please don't tell my husband. I decide to add some blueberries to the mix - a little handful of sweet Nova Scotian blueberries always makes baking better.

So here's the batter. In hindsight, I can see how the extra flour I needed to add should have been a different type. I just don't know which one.



See how wet it still looks? It formed balls, though.



There they are waiting to be baked to perfection. See how the one is smiling? It knows better.

So they needed to bake for an extra 5 minutes but came out browned to perfection.



Also dry. And heavy on the texture. Of course the children wanted to try one and who am I to deprive them of their mother's culinary creations? Only one was brave enough to eat the whole thing and he required two full glasses of orange juice to do it. Alas, even the blueberries couldn't save these.

I *think* if I had only added a bit more flour, or left out an egg, or used a different flour to add, these might have promise. And I really wanted these to taste good. But they don't.

And so now I'm a little intimidated to try baking from scratch again. Especially when the flour costs $16! Good thing it's not a common ingredient in the dishes I want to make. And that I do the grocery shopping ;)

Gluten Free baking... and the quest for perfect breads.

I have been diagnosed as 97% having celiac disease (just waiting for the biopsy results to confirm that last 3% :P). Gluten is not my friend. I have been off it for a short period of time and cannot believe the difference in how I feel. Great! I feel more energetic and my tummy is less bloated. Not too mention that I've lost weight, although that's probably because I'm starving! I miss bread and pasta :(

So what's a veggie living amongst carnivores to do? Meal planning and implementation has never been my forte but now it's a nightmare. Not only do I have to please four children but also my husband who is famished by day's end. Pasta was my go-to meal for dinner.

And bread - how I miss thee - truly I do. Breakfast just isn't the same without toast. But muffins, my stomach pines for you the most. Your delicious moistness straight from the oven... blueberries baked to perfection, jam-filled centres bursting with yumminess...

Sure there are GF prepared foods out there. Try them - I dare you! Dry (I almost choked inhaling the crumbs from a piece of bread, true story) hard and weighty. All great characteristics for a loaf of bread. Breakfast buns could be more accurately named breakfast barf. And the muffins? Forget about it! So I've bought some mixes to experiment. I've bought 10 different kinds of flour. And I've armed myself with an apron and oven mitts.

But I decided to ease into this and use a bread mix for my first try. Today's bread is brought to you by Namaste Foods. It's a regular bread mix with a cinnamon raison version on the side. Well if I'm going to do this I might as well go all out. I have followed the directions to a 'T'. Which is very unusual for me, however. I filled the bread pan, around 5 by 8, and it went two-thirds full. So now my first observation as I checked on it cooking, is that it is enormous.



Looks yummy doesn't it? Probably could have done two pans. So right away I can throw out the notion the GF bread doesn't rise nicely. It's almost done and smells delicious. Hmmmm.... Could be good for breakfast is what I'm thinking.

But the true test will be the taste.

Ok, it's delicious. Even Biker liked it - but she'll eat anything :)

Upcoming Craft Fair

at the Halifax Crafters. I wasn't able to make the last one due to a last minute trip so am extra pumped about this one.

December 5,6 from 11-5 at the Olympic Centre on Cunard Street

Check it out! You won't be disappointed.

Today only

Enjoy 10% off all orders in my artfire studio.

All prices have been adjusted accordingly. Offer valid until midnight tonight.

Ah romance...

I've been with my husband for a long time and am often bemoaning the absence of romance after four kids...





but nothing says I love you like a skate deck in our bed :)

Update on my update

Jaime The fabric just arrived! It is too cute and is prepping right now.