Christmas Gift Sets

Amanda and I have been busy putting together some gifts sets using the homemade soaps and body scrubs that we make.  Thought I would share a few pictures.

Oatmeal, Milk & Honey Soap and Brown Sugar Scrub

Coffee Bath Scrub and Round Soap

Men's Shaving Set w/camo bag

Wooden Soap Saver Set

Amanda has also been making beeswax candles and we have a few other projects in the making.  Hope to post pictures soon.   We would love to hear about any homemade gift ideas you have.

Thanksgiving Menu

I don't know about you, but it seems to me as if this year has totally flown by!  It's really hard to believe that Thanksgiving is only a couple of weeks away!  Wow!  I'm sitting here thinking about our Thanksgiving menu and thinking that I would love to have some different side dishes this year.  Our menu usually consists of turkey and dressing, sweet potato casserole, lettuce salad, bread, greens beans (or green bean casserole), blueberry cream cheese pie, sweet potato pie, and cookies of some sort.   For some reason my family loves to have salad with their Thanksgiving meal, so I know that we will have that, but I would love some ideas for other side dishes and if they happen to "already be" gluten free that would be totally awesome, if not I'm getting good at adapting :)  I would love to hear what you're having and shared recipes would be an added bonus! 

A Great Weekend

It seems like as my children get older, our weekends get more and more hectic.  Everyone is going different directions trying to complete things that we didn't have time for during the week.  This weekend was not that way.  My husband was off work from Thursday through Sunday and didn't seem to have any projects that he needed (or wanted) to do, Heath was off Saturday and Sunday, Caleb had to work Saturday, but was home Sunday, and since Amanda's husband (Alan) was out of town for the weekend we saw a lot of her and the girls.  Murry, Ferrell, and I did take care of a few things around here on Friday, but it was all stuff that we worked on together like moving and insulating the chicken tractor and working in the garden.   Murry also took the time to help Amanda get things taken care of at her home so maybe she won't have any frozen pipes this year.  

On Saturday, Murry, Ferrell, Heath, Amanda, Rachel, Ellen, and I all went to the Vardaman Sweet Potato Festival and had a blast.  We haven't done anything like that as a family in a looong time.  I just hate that Caleb had to work.  He used to love going to the Sweet Potato Festival and entering the Sweet Potato Pie eating contest, but I guess it may be a good thing he didn't get to go, because now that he is gluten free he would not have been able to participate in the pie eating contest and that was always the high light of the day for him :)  

After we got home from Vardaman, Murry & Ferrell killed one of our roosters so that I would have it to cook this week.  They didn't really have time to take care of more than one since we had company coming that evening, but that's okay we'll get the rest of them taken care of soon :) 

Amanda and Heath's half brother has a birthday this month, so he came over on Saturday and I made him an early birthday supper.  He had requested tacos, rotel dip w/sausage, and strawberry cake.  We enjoyed a great time of fellowship with this sweet young man and on Sunday our entire family (with the exception of Alan) was able to be in our home church for services.  Our pastor outdid himself with the preaching services both morning and evening.  You could definitely feel the presence of God!  I am so thankful for a pastor that follows the leading of the Holy Spirit and I am also thankful that God blessed us with a wonderful, "family" weekend.  It was just what I needed! 

Subscribe & Save

I enjoy cooking!  I've always enjoyed cooking and especially making bread.  I love the smell of freshly ground wheat and hand kneading dough has always had a soothing effect on me (yeah I know I'm strange).   Since Caleb has had to go gluten free, breadmaking has become more of a challenge.  Did you know that you can't knead gluten free bread?  No really, you can't!   Gluten free bread "dough" is more like a cake batter.   For the past year I've been grinding rice and beans to mix with other flours to make a decent sandwich bread for Caleb.  (Oh, by the way,  freshly ground beans DO NOT smell anything like freshly ground wheat, just in case you were wondering :)   In the past I've always done my bread making from scratch.  No mixes and no bread machine for me.  No sir!  It just wasn't the same.  Well, I've learned that there is definitely a time and place for bread mixes and to get a really good (taste and texture) sandwich bread we've started using Gluten Free Pantry's Favorite Sandwich Bread Mix.  It really is good.  Even my "non-gluten free" family members like it, which is saying a lot.  (Because of the expense involved most of our gluten free bread is for Caleb only, but we all have to taste anything new :)  Since Caleb has been gluten free we really haven't been eating a lot of bread.  I worry about cross contaminating if I try to make whole wheat for the rest of the family and it is a real issue, because Caleb is extremely sensitive to cross contamination.  He will be sick for days with just the slightest amount of gluten.  Since I've discovered the Gluten Free Pantry's Favorite Sandwich Bread Mix I have been making about a loaf a week or sometimes every other week for Caleb.  I usually make it and let it cool on the rack, then I go ahead and slice it up into sandwich size slices and freeze it.  That way he can take out what he needs and we don't have much waste.   This bread mix is not as expensive as some of the others we've tried and it definitely has simplified things for me.  I do still grind and make my own gluten free flour mixes to use, but I keep some of this bread mix on hand for those times when I just can't seem to get everything done.  

The thing that really helps with the cost of purchasing gluten free, ready made items is the Subscribe & Save option at Amazon.com.  With Subscribe & Save you get 15% percent off of your product and also free shipping.  When I combine this feature with my Swagbucks gift cards I quite often get my shipment for under $5.  We are signed up with Subscribe & Save on several gluten free items and have them delivered at different times.  Some things come every three months and some things come every six months.  You can set up delivery any way you want, for us this spacing works better financially.  I have plenty of time between shipments to accumulate enough Swagbucks to make a real difference in total cost.   If you buy many gluten free items (flours, mixes or ready made snacks) you may want to check into this option.  For us it works.