The gluten free project...

Yesterday we started cleaning out the cupboards. Dh and I have decided that the family is going to live without gluten for a month. The kids are all on board, too, but slightly less enthusiastic.

Well, they were pretty excited yesterday when I said to eat all the perogies in the freezer... ;-)

It all started when I had my Stay-cation (that is a vacation at home - for those of you who don't watch Corner Gas) and I refused to cook the entire time. I bought a lot of bread and sandwich stuff and left the family to fend for themselves. By the end of the week Sunshine was sick, sick sick...

Sunshine has always CRAVED pasta. You *could* get between her and a bowl of macaroni, but it wouldn't be safe... and I've mentioned to her before that I didn't think that was normal. She was much more willing to try an elimination diet when she was sicker than a dog.

For the last 2 months + she has been as faithful to the gluten free diet as she can be and her health is MUCH improved. She hasn't gained any weight, but she looks like she is a healthier weight and she isn't PALE anymore. It is noticable enought that many people have commented on it.

In an effort to streamline things and make her life a little more fibre-filled we got some whole grains and were trying them all. I started feeling really good then I ate barley and felt not so good. That was when I started looking around the house at the rest of us...

Dh - depression and anxiety.

Me- Osteoporosis, chronic sinus infections and numerous digestive complaints

Don't Know, Don't Care- Irritibility, fatigue, and severe PMS (One time I threw a chocolate bar at her in order to distract her and save myself... Not my finest moment, but I was in danger!)

Sunshine - Cyclical vomiting, choronic ear infections and numerous digestive complaints

Brown Bear - Chronic sinus infections

Schmidt - Chronic sinus infections and NO sense of smell

So I was talking to the Dr yesterday (who coincidentally did his internship with pediatric celiac patients...) and he said that gluten is hard to break down and "your diet will improve if you stop eating gluten regardless of whether you have Celiac disease or not."

We were going to try it for a month anyway, but when I came home armed with that tidbit the kids were more willing to try. We packed up all the food that has wheat, gluten and all the hidden gluten and it was a lot. REALLY a lot. There is wheat in everything, but we started looking and there are lots of wheat free/ gluten free things, too.

There are new labelling laws in Canada and that makes it a LOT easier to find the gluten. Companies that aren't trying to hide gluten will tell you on their websites which products are gluten free and which aren't.

This project is really challenging us to look at our relationship with food. Food *should* be something that takes time to cook and doesn't come out of a cardboard box. It also doesn't have to be four food groups and dessert. Boy is that one a tough sell for me!

We begin officially on Sunday, but most of us are starting today. 'Don't know Don't care' is going over to her friend's house to 'wheat it up' tonight though... :-)

Oh, and I've already been asked about cake. I make delicous gluten free cake... I'm not giving up chocolate cake...

Bead love

When I was little I would visit the farm where my mother grew up. It was a simple, wholesome (read: no TV...) place. I was fed milk still warm from the cow and played with sticks and chased chickens. Well, I chased chickens until I got caught by my Grandpa who would bring me to my Grandma.

My Grandma would usually try to engage me as 'helper,' but sometimes she would put me in a quiet room with the button box. My first love is cake, but my second love is beads. This unnatural bead love comes from sitting on my Grandma's bed with the button box.

So, when I found out that my new Team Coordinator, Curly Sue, makes beads... that's right... *MAKES* beads- I nearly swooned! This morning she said she has an Etsy store so I took the bus to get home faster and look at them. She said, "it is only six beads."

If I made ONE bead I would carry it with me, in my pocket, and show everyone that I ever met. For the REST of my LIFE! Because I love you all I will share... :-)

Tea and Cake- or death.

If you know who Eddie Izzard is you will think that is funny. If you don't ... You'll think - WOW! Kim is *Weird* with a capital W. True enough, but I'm not talking about my weirdness, today. I'm talking about cake.

So, Brown Bear turns 17 in about a week and a half and my thoughts naturally turn to cake.

This is Zu. She is from Singapore. Her blog is called quick and easy treats. It seems 'easy' in a way that few detail oriented North Americans can replicate... My favourite part is where you just HAVE 30 egg whites to make this cake.



The Zebra Cake... basically a marble cake. Seems like we are narrowing in on something. Wouldnn't it be great for a party where you had to take it and impress a bunch of people?



The blob cake.... Now we are talking... This cake has gone too far in the other direction. Too many chemicals and colours, but I am going to steal the blob idea.




Wouldn't it be fun, I thought, if it was done in shades of chocolate and made into a camouflage pattern? And chocolate on top?! There would be very little food colouring in that... :-)

I thought this was a very versatile idea, though, and you could do shades of pink for little girls or your child's favourite colour. Or a white cake with smaller blobs of colour. I have thought of a lot of unit study enders in the last couple days...

This is a good time of year to look for sparkle sugar in the bakery section of your store. It is a lot cheaper than edible glitter and nearly as wonderful. Of course you can dye your own sugar, for free, with one drop of food colouring or (bit on the end of a toothpick if it is gel) and stir it up.

I know! I am an evil genius of cheapness! You may now praise me without holding back. ;-P But before you run off and post my camo cake idea on all your lists and every soldier's wife on three continents comes running over to look at it- just remember that you saw it here first.

Alright- that's all. I know all you can think about is cake, anyway, right? Go bake!

:-)

Extreme (?) frugality...

This month I've been measuring food and being more thoughtful about what I eat. I am not restricting calories, but eating only the amount of food that I need and not more. So far I've lost about 14 lbs in 3 months.

The first two weeks was TOUGH! You know who wants to eat a half cup of pasta? Me! Four times in a row! Once I got used to the smaller portions it was a lot easier.

Now I'm eating a lot of whole grains and counting fibre. I need 25 grams of fibre/ day. I'm getting the hang of it. I'm adding ground flax to my morning oatmeal. Lunch is always soup so I've been making big pots of whole grain & vegetable soup and the family LOVES it! The last couple nights for supper I've made a whole grain/ gluten free option for Sunshine and I.

One night the men had perogies and I had whole grains with fried mushrooms and onions on top. Brown bear likes those spinach pizzas that come in a box 3/ $10 so I told him that he could make that himself and last night he did. Schmidt made a quick stir fry one night and we just mixed the millet in with the veggies instead of serving it on a bed of rice.

Cabbage is on sale at Co-op next week... :-)

Aloo Gobi

Since my sweet sister, Jam Tart, asked...

4 tsp Ghee (I used olive oil)
1/2 tsp cumim seeds
1 onion chopped
1 1/2 inch (4 cm) piece fresh gingerroot, finely chopped
1 fresh green chili, seeded and thinly sliced (I used dried red chillies)
1 large head of cauliflower
1 lb large waxy potatoes, peeled and cut into large chunks (I used leftovers)
1/2 tsp ground coriander
1/2 tsp of garam masala
1/4 tsp of salt

Heat your oil or ghee then stir in onion, ginger and chili, stir for 5-8 minutes until the onion is golden. Stir in cauliflower and potatoes, followed by all the spices. Cover the pan and reduce heat to the lowest setting and simmer until everything is hot and vegetables are soft enough to make you happy.

You can make it a more traditional yellow curry by adding a little tumeric (1/4 tsp or so) but it isn't necessary. Everyone in the house liked this. It doesn't seem like it would be very filling, but it is and if you use leftover potatoes it cooks very quickly.

Grocery shopping

I do not grocery shop according to the traditional, frugal method. I don't shop with a list except for things I need and don't want to forget. When you get to a certain age... not everything sticks.
There isn't usually more than ten things or so on my grocery list.

I look at the flyers and see if anything is an especially good sale, but it usually isn't. I am always on the look out for a really good deal, though. For example- one week this summer cauliflower was on for a really good price. I bought about 10 heads. We had cauliflower in soup, stir fry, aloo gobi, boiled, mashed and mixed with mashed potato and under cheese sauce. The family didn't really realize that they were eating cauliflower every day, but they were.

Whatever is avaialable and affordable- that is what we eat. Sometimes it is a little challenging to come up with meals from the ingreadients that I have in the house, but that is when I stretch myself and try some new recipes- like aloo gobi.

If fruit is on sale we try to get a case per month. I hate those thin plastic bags that rip when they are full and when you are buying fruit for 6 people the bag better be full! Today we got a 40 lb. case of apples for $35. Sometimes when you buy a case you get a little better price on it, but it depends on their mark up.

When I'm done with the flyer sale items (always at the front of the store,) fruits and veg I go through the bulk whole grains. We are buying a lot more whole grains now that Sunshine can't eat gluten. She cried two big tears when we had chicken balls for lunch today! :-(

After the whole grains we go up and down every aisle and get the few things on my list, but we mostly look for unadvertised sales, marked down items and discontinued products. Some examples of things from todays shopping trip:

Unadvertised sales: Cheemo perogies- $2.40 off, Stash tea - Save $2.58 on two boxes, mouthwash- save $1, tapioca 50 cents off.

The only thing we were' shopping for' was mouthwash and bought the one that was on sale. We all like perogies, but don't usually buy them because they aren't gluten free and the large bags are expensive. Since they are on sale we will eat them when Sunshine girl is working! :-) Stash tea is my favourite and I never buy it (or any herbal tea) unless it is on sale. Today the stash tea was the same sale price as all the other tea. Tapioca... it was on sale and it is gluten free ... and I hope Sunshine likes it...

Discontinued and marked down items. At my store marked down items are about 70-75 % off and discontinued items are 90% off. Some of the things I got today include whole grain crackers $1.44/ box, box of yogurt $2.75, and dark chocolate mousse $.68. The pudding is gluten free and we are all pretty happy about that!

Things might be marked down or discontinued because they are close to the expiration date, they weren't a good seller or they are getting rid of them so they can change the packaging. The cashiers tell me that a lot of people won't buy them, though, because they think something is wrong with the products.

We have bought some things that weren't absolute favourites, but nothing that was inedible. Fortunately Schmidt has no sense of taste or smell and he will happily eat pretty much anything.

We try for a good balance of the food groups and it isn't all about the money. We have a budget that we stay under, but we are definitely not going to eat the cheapest food there is just to save a few dollars. For example, if the crackers I bought today had been anything but whole grain I wouldn't have bought them.

Decluttering

You know that feeling you have when you move into a new, empty place? That is what I'm going for, but without the move!

I have decluttered my environment as much as I'm reasonably able. I have kids who are 18 and 19 1/2 and the few extra things that I have around here are going to go with them when they move out. The 18 year old is chomping at the bit and can't wait to go.

Anyway- now I've started on all the OTHER clutter in my life. I got on the national Do Not Call list. I still get the recordings... and the bill collectors who have the wrong people... but it is not 5 or 6 calls a day like it was before.

The other thing I'm decluttering is email. I've had my address for about 8 years and I haven't been as protective of it as my home address. So I've signed up for newsletters and 'special offers' and a lot of educational things. I figured out they don't REALLY want to help me or save me money- they only want to market to me. They are email FLYERS and they must all go.

I'm coming down to the end of that, I think, and the next thing I'm going to tackle is television. How much television am I watching for background noise? Quite a bit I think.

"Only the pure of heart can make a good soup"

Well according to Beethoven anyway! I make a lot of soup and it is what we usually have for lunch. The problem with good soup is that it takes a long time to cook.

I have an ice cream pail in the freezer and all the scraps, peels, skins, vegetable water and bones go into it. When the pail is full I put the frozen lump into the crock pot on low over night. Then in the morning I can deal with the stock and make soup. I have enough scraps to do this 2-3 times a week.

I usually add some acid to the stock if I'm using bones. I just use vinegar or there is usually a soft tomato kicking around in my fridge. I've also used a little tomato juice, V-8 juice or salsa.

There is no real recipe. You just use whatever you have. You don't have to serve it with a tablespoon of sour cream and a buttered multigrain bun... but I'm going to!

Pedestrians are people, too.

So I forgot my bus tickets at work and didn't realize it until I was on the road. :-/ It looked pretty bare and dry so I decided to walk home. I have a limited number of tickets and have to walk 5 more times this month, anyway. I only work 2 kms from home so it isn't bad.

I get as far as downtown (where I live) and I'm nearly killed in the cross walk by a woman in a burgundy minivan. And I'm a little bit annoyed by it!

I still have a lot of work to do and if I am killed today- it won't get done! Seriously! It won't.

On the agenda today- bank, grocery store and car dealership. We are going to check how much we owe on our vehicle. Oh, yeah! We also need the hardware store. You know I don't have a furnace filter, yet, don't you?

It's Tuesday, but it sure FEELS like a Monday...

Thanksgiving Sunday

So it is Thanksgiving Sunday and a lovely long weekend for most people and stat holiday for the rest of us. I only work 2 hours tomorrow, but it still works out pretty nicely with stat pay. Stat pay is the good thing about working in a rotation. The bad thing is that you never get that day off.

The traditional meal is, of course, turkey. I think turkey is disgusting so we are having a cross rib bison roast with potatoes and carrots. Schmidt will probably want to make tarts. Any time there is an event he wants to make tarts. It is usually butter tarts, but we are out of raisins so it will have to be a jam tart or something like that.

We've been eating through the freezer a little bit and last week I found a chunk of Costco roast. We ate it, but privately agreed that beef is pale and insipid next to wild meat or bison. We also agreed that we are never going to buy beef again!

Thanksgiving weekend

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=518XP8prwZo

This is the girl from the Ukraine that draws pictures in sand on a light box. If you know history- prepared to be moved! Even if you don't know history I'm sure you'll be able to follow the story.

Most of us have a lot to be thankful for... :-)

The emergency kit

Included in our emergency kit we have first aid supplies, water, medication, emergency crank lights, hand warmers and candles. One of the lights has a radio and a siren.

I also have food for at least 72 hours.

Not pictured is the dog food and emergency plan. The emergency plan is a notebook with colour copies of our ID (Provincial ID, health care card and birth certificate) and health information. I have the medical histories for each person and family history where relevant.

Each person has their own page so if we are separated the pages can be ripped out and go with the person. We also have a family code word and my teens know not to go anywhere without the code word.

You may notice the neon 'juice' and cookies. Those are for the kid who can't eat the other supplies. Next time I go to the store I'll beef that up a little. Last time I went through the kit (3 months ago!) she was still eating everything.

This brings me to my last point. Don't just make the kit- check the kit every three months. In the last three months I've found out that one kid is allergic to wheat and gluten and another was diagnosed with epilepsy. Go through it, check the expiration dates and really give it some thought. What kind of emergency are you planning for? Can you truly survive in your home for 72 hours with those supplies? Can you evacuate and survive elsewhere for 72 hours or longer?

Get prepared

All the news from my house

Sunshine girl turns 18 today and she took the picture. She opened the door leaned out the back door and click!

So far today I've waited for the bus in the snow, made and eaten oatmeal, wished happy birthday, Congratulated Schmidt for being promoted to Sergeant, helped Brown bear solve for X while adding fractions, stopped talking to dh, starting talking to dh (I need a ride...) and talked to the booking co-ordinator from work.

But it's 9:30 a.m. now and I have to go to pandemic training. :-)

The first snow...

This was the scene in my living room this morning. 'Brown Bear' and the furry dog were all curled up in a ball together, on the floor. The purple blanket is Sunshine and the taupe blanket is Schmidt.

So.... Maybe it is time to get the plastic on the windows? In my extra perky, morning sort of way I said- "let's make TEAMS!" :-)

Yeah, it didn't go over as big as you would expect.

The plan is to get plastic on the windows and turn the furnace on for 15 minutes... if we have filters. What are the chances we have filters? I mean filters that FIT. But we don't. Of course we don't! We were at the hardware store yesterday and could have done that then.

Today, there is a snowstorm. Do I feel like risking my life by going out in the first snow of the year? Not so much. My Dad was a paramedic for 25+ years and he always said, "there is nothing in the world that is so important that you need to go out for it on the first snow fall of the year..."

Well... CRUD! Apparently I didn't buy a permanent filter last year...

It's a good day for soup. In the spirit of sharing and pantry use I will give you a link I found recently.

http://www.recipepuppy.com/ Recipe puppy finds recipes from a variety of sources using the ingredients that you need to use. This is highly useful when you are using things from your pantry and want to try something new.

Have a good day, my lovelies! Tomorrow I have pandemic training so who knows what I'll have to say about that.

The Pantry

So this is the pantry... You kind of have to use your imagination. There are 4 shelves 5 ft high and nearly 3 ft wide. You can't really see the top shelf, cleaning supply shelf, etc.

In all it is food for about a month and baking supplies for 3 months. We also have probably 6 months worth of cleaning supplies, soap, and dishwasher detergent as well. The cleaning supplies are on their own separate shelf.

When things are going well it seems excessive to use up this amount of space for food storage, but when things aren't going well it has been a real blessing and, at times, a life saver.

15 year old 'Schmidt' is the Keeper of the Pantry. Everyone carries food to the basement, but Schmidt puts it away in its correct spot. You probably can't see from the poor quality photo, but every shelf is labeled. And everything is lined up like in a store so you can instantly see how many of that item you have left. I can't function if it is all in a jumble on the shelves.

Okay, I'm feeling a little compulsive, but honestly I know that even if my family is not going to get a tremendous variety there is still going to be food. For a month. :-)

Now, you are probably noticing announcement emails. I've turned that on as a special favour to one of my followers, but I know that can be annoying so I apologize.

Tomorrow may be the dog on the treadmill or perhaps the adventures of Kim and the Window Plastic.... stay tuned...

Thoughts on a frosty morning

Even the furry dog wasn't that impressed with the back yard this morning!

So, Sunshine Girl has a cold. We made The Cure. Cure is made from strong green tea, honey, lemon and sliced ginger. There are no real amounts. The only rule is that you need enough honey and lemon to make the ginger feel hot.

Anyway- it's not a guaranteed, 100% FOR SURE cure and she is still snuffy and miserable. Well, as miserable as she ever gets. We don't call her the Sunshine Child for nothing, you know.

This morning I suggest cough syrup- you know- the kind in a bottle. She went rummaging in the medicine cabinet and came back with Buckley's ( http://www.buckleys.com/home.html ) The tag line is, "it tastes awful, but it works."

It DOES taste awful. In fact it is really fun to watch people take it for the first time. Okay, well, when you are broke you have to make your own fun, right?

The picture this morning is my sister, Jam Tart. The person facing the camera is some random tourist. There will be new pictures soon. I found my camera cable this morning, but there is something about how the computer doesn't recognize the cable or something. It's all monkey to me!

I'll stand in the middle of the room and yell, "I need HELP getting pictures off my CAMERA!" until a teen comes and does it for me. Tomorrow is grocery shopping day and maybe I will let you see my pantry. I know you care!

Before I forget - I don't twitter or tweet of face space or my book or any of that. Also, this isn't one of those fun blogs where the owner bribes her readers with small appliances and other presents just for showing up and reading. You have to just come and read my stuff cuz you love me. And I know you do! :-)

My first unfiltered thought

So first post... no pressure. =8-| I'm not sure I have any thoughts worth sharing, but here we go.

I suppose I should introduce us. I am Kim and I live with my husband, 4 teens and 1 furry dog in Northern Alberta.

I won't be sharing any identifiable photos of my kids or family, but I've got some great before and after pictures of my dog when we had him shaved this year!

I am a frugal, homeschool mom. I also work sleep over nights in a group home for developmentally disabled adults. I have learned a lot of things from those tasks and I'll probably share. In an unfiltered kind of way.

Sadly, I was born without a filter between my brain and my fingers and sometimes I just say whatever comes into my head.

Let me introduce my teens to you: Teen #1, 19- "Don't Know Don't Care"- DKDC for short. Teen #2, 18- Sunshine Girl. Teen #3, almost 17- Brown Bear. Teen #4, 15- Schmidt. There is also a kid who isn't ours and doesn't live with us. He is just here every day and eats our food. He's almost 15 and we'll call him, "Neighbour Kid"