well, i'm around! :)

Whew!! life sure has been busy around here. School started and we're all at it! I've been helping up there as often as I can and with that, my housework and other fun things kinda go by the wayside. I really need to be better at that. :) So today I'm spending my day catching up around here and getting ready for the Kids to be out of school for a few days! They are ending their first 9 weeks and here they get a 5 day weekend! I've been working on some crochet projects and that's been fun! Well, I think the dryer is done, I better go fold some stuff...I'll check back in later. There are so many things I want to share with you all! :)

new menu

so this week there was a groupon for emeals.com for a 12 month subscription for $30. I wasn't willing to pay $60 for it before but I could go for the $30. what is does, if you've never heard of it before, is it sets your dinners for a week and does the grocery list too. it's all printable, and ready to go once a week! that saves me HOURS!! We choose the Gluten Free -Wal-mart plan. I was going to go with the any store, but hubs said " why not just do the Wal-mart. then you can tell if you need to go there just in case it's cheaper there" So that's what we did.

This is our first week on it. tonight's dinner, "Firecraker Chicken" with Italian pasta. Well, I opted to do their cheesy GF pasta in stead of the Italian. Dinner was served. It was yummy! the chicken is great!! the noodles were yummy too!

This is going to be a fun time as we adjust to this and try out the new meals!! :D I'm looking forward to this falling together and seeing how we like it!

First Day of School!!

today is our first day of school for this school year!!! :) for lunch today I made the girls crepes with nutella and banana, a trail mix of peanuts, raisins and chocolate chips, orange jello, a gogurt (frozen when they took it) and a water bottle with mio in it!! :) can't wait to hear how their day was!
The boy had a half day and he did GREAT!!! he came home and had the same lunch and he loved it!! He can't wait till tomorrow for more school!! :) I'm glad! i'm very glad that he is enjoying it and doing good!! Off I go to finish the house work today and get a few more things done before i go pick up the girls!!!

AHHHH!! the weekend!!

As I sit here on Friday morning, I'm thinking of my weekend. we have a birthday party for one of the sweetest ladies I know!!  I'm soo excited! She's a wonderful lady and I'm going to be so happy to get to celebrate her! :D The only problem I have is, as everyone knows, we are gluten free and there will be birthday cake! Now it will be an ice cream cake, but still it makes me nervous. My kids will so want to eat it. I'm really hoping that there won't be a bit fight. Then comes Sun. We are getting geared up for the first day of school this year! :) This will be the first year all of the kids will be in school!! I'm excited and sad at the same time...more about that later. :( only 14 more days!!! here we go for another wonderful and exciting fast paced weekend!! :)

SCHOOL!!

AH! we only have 2.5 weeks till school starts. The girls will both be at school all day. That means I have to send them lunch every day! OH the joy!! Last year I would send them sandwiches. How you ask? i'll tell you! :) we did either peanut butter or Nutella on Rice Cakes. Oh, they LOVED them!! they boy too. (I let him have them at home most days too) I want to do a few different things this next year. I'm thinking, we'll do some of those, and some lunch meat rolls with skinny cow cheese (or the off brand) spread in the middle! plenty of veggies and fruit. I sent juice boxes last year, but i think we'll be doing water this year. I'm to the point I need to make a plan and get ready! The girls already have their backpacks and lunch boxes. They boy needs to get his backpack and the the school supplies!! Oh this is going to be an interesting year! :)

WOW!!

Soo I was reminded I needed to update my blog! :) Here's the low down for what's been going on. :) We've stayed Gluten free and have done wonderful! The kids have so much more energy and they are really enjoying life. All of them are a better  size for their age. Pinkie has been putting on weight, she's always been skinny for her age. and a little small. I'd say she's gained about 5-7 pounds in the last 6 months. She was really underweight for her age, now she's about average (maybe still a little under). Which takes a load off my mind! :) Then we come to JJ! OH how she is growing and maturing! :) She makes me smile with her attitude, well most of the time. She's growing well, and adjusting to your new life. Then we get to the Boy!! OH!! wow!! he's growing soo much! :D He'll be 4 in a little over a month now. And will be starting Pre-K half day this fall (in just over 2 weeks!!). He's had a hard time with the gluten free as some of his favorite foods (cookies and crackers) are no longer allowed. It's usually good at home, but when we are out, especially at friends houses, it gets more difficult.

The Mr. and I decided to try a Paleo diet for the summer. At first we did a 30 day Challenge, then we went back to adding some other foods in. And this week, we are going back to a more Paleo diet. So I'm sure you first question is "What is Paleo?" Oh, it' sounds confusing at first but really it simple. All you eat is meat, Fruits, Veggies, Nuts, Seeds. No Grains (this includes corn). No Dairy. No Legumes (this includes Peanuts). OH at first i was VERY worried and anxious. Then Mr. went...Hun! chill!! it's meat and veggies and fruit! burgers, steak, chicken...we got this!! :) I love that man! and sure enough we made the challenge. I wasn't easy!! I had to give up the creamer for my coffee. and if you know me at all, you KNOW how i feel about my coffee! LOL! Lets just say I better have my coffee to start the day or it doesn't get started!! :) The biggest modification we are going to the Paleo is i am keeping my creamer!! And we're going to be doing some dairy in our foods. We'll also be doing some rice a few days a week. On the Challenge i lost 11 lbs. in about 4 weeks. then the 2 weeks off I gained back about 4. <sigh> I bought a stationary bike off of one of friends and have been using it. :) Soo here we go on the attempt to get more healthy! :D

That's about all for us! We're doing great, learning and getting more healthy!

oooh!

So I've been trying to make some bread recently. It's been going fairly well. I found some flour I really like. it's by Better Batter. It's simple to use and can be put in any recipe I want! The only problem I've had is that it doesn't wash very well in the dishwasher. But that's ok. I can do it. It's worth it! :) It cooks up great! and it tastes good! Everything falls though. sigh..that's ok.  The kids enjoy it! So it's nice to have bread again. It's work but yeah it's good!
We've also found that we don't enjoy the Garbanzo bean or Fava Bean flours. So I know to avoid those now too. It makes things easier  for finding things we'll enjoy! :) It's been a interesting learning experience. The kids are adjusting GREAT! Mr and I not quite so well. But that's ok. We've only had a few times that Mr has been "glutened" some have been his fault, once mine, and one time we couldn't figure it out (he thought maybe he'd been sick already).
Recently I have been making the kid's sandwiches on big rice cakes. They like the plain ones with peanut butter or Nutella, the chocolate ones with peanut butter. This next week they'll be trying the Cinnamon Apple ones with either Peanut Butter or Nutella probably some of each. The Boy sure does like them! :) that makes me happy! :)