Carrot Spice Muffins

I have found that the children are much more eager to get out of bed in the mornings if there's a fresh baked good on the stove for them to enjoy. This makes my nights a little late sometimes, but I'd probably otherwise be browsing pinterest. Go to bed before midnight....always at the top of my to do list!

The backbone of these muffins is the gluten free oat muffin recipe that Eric's aunt passed along to me a couple years ago. It's so yummy and so easily adaptable.

1 cup Bob's Red Mill GF oats
1 cup oat flour
1 cup brown rice flour
1 tbsp xanthan gum
1/2 tsp sea salt
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1/4 tsp ginger
2 eggs
1 cup coconut milk
1/2 cup light olive oil
1 tsp pure vanilla extract
1 cup shredded carrots

Preheat over to 350. Grease muffin pan or use liners.

Combine dry ingredients in a large mixing bowl. In a separate bowl, whisk together eggs, milk, oil and vanilla. Add wet ingredients to dry ingredients, stirring until just combined. Fold in shredded carrots.

Fill muffin cups aprox 3/4 full and bake 25 min or until a toothpick comes out clean. Makes 18 muffins.


Look at all the orange goodness! Mmm!

For the love of zucchini!

If you're at my house and it's summer time, I will likely feed you zucchini! Just like last year, I'm putting it in everything you can imagine. Hope you're hungry!

I was super thrilled when we started picking great big zucchini in May from this giant volunteer plant.


Sadly I have to report that it's already gone. Squash bugs and something that bored into our main vines took out my huge zucchini plant in the blink of an eye. I was still picking in Sept last year, but this year I'll be relying on farmers markets.....or anyone who beat the bugs and wants to share!! Katie was super impressed with this giant I picked up from a local farmer.


In addition to making sure I have at least 10 cups of shreds in the freezer for the winter, I'm making all kinds of yummy recipes. Some are favorites from last year and some are new! I did spoil myself and get a new shredder. (I used a coupon, of course!) My old one was about to break and this baby is so much easier to use.



Now on to the recipes....

Everyone had seconds of Zucchini Enchiladas! This is the recipe that caused my little food allergy melt down awhile back, but I managed to shake it off and this dish turned out fabulous. Instead of rolling them, I made a casserole. I also added some deer burger. I left the daiya off the top, so those of us that are able could add real cheese. I think this would freeze really well.



Next up is Zucchini Corn Pancakes. Hands down, my favorite from last year! I could eat these babies every. single. day. They are great hot or straight from the fridge cold. They are yummy with daiya or real cheese. These freeze really well too.



I have found that I really prefer to cook my meatloaf in the crockpot. It doesn't heat up the house as much plus I can just plop it in and it's ready by dinner. Zucchini Meatloaf came out of the crock perfectly! I made some substitutions to keep it allergy friendly and added some yellow squash I needed to use up. There's no after pic because Konny was having an FPIES rxn. :-(


A new fun recipe this year that the kids are loving is...

Zucchini Snack Cake Squares (adapted from Parents May 2012)

1 2/3 cup Namaste Perfect Flour Blend
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp sea salt
1/4 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp nutmeg
2 eggs
1 cup sugar
1/3 light olive oil
1/2 tsp pure vanilla extract
2 cups shredded zucchini

Preheat oven to 350.

Whisk dry ingredients together and set aside. In a separate bowl, whisk eggs, add sugar, then oil and vanilla, whisking after each addition. Stir in zucchini, then add the flour mixture. Pour batter into 9x9 pan coated with cooking spray. Bake for 35-45 min or until top is golden and toothpick comes out clean.

The kids love them and with all that zucchini, I really have no problem letting them eat it for breakfast. I'm pretty certain the sugar could easily be cut back to 3/4 cup and/or subbed with turbinado or sucanat.



After last year, I knew I wanted to make more Zucchini Relish because it's delicious! I made ten 1/2 pints this year so there'd be plenty to share with friends!


The most recent new zucchini recipe I've tried is Zucchini-Roni and it is fabulous! I'll admit it seemed like it was going great but then I felt crazy weird throwing in the chopped hot dog. Next time I think I'll go with apple chicken sausage or something. But maybe it was the hotdog that caused Buggy to give it rave reviews and even request seconds the next day! Nonetheless, this recipe is definitely a keeper!


As long as I can continue getting my hands on nice big zucchini, I'm going to keep finding fun new ways to cook it up! Check out my pinterest board specifically for zucchini and if anyone has a good recipe, please feel free to share!

Wet Wigglers!

Swimming lessons are one of our favorite parts of the summer!
The kids are always so excited!

This was Konny's first year and since he's a little fish in the bathtub, we knew he'd love it. By the second week, he'd figured out to hold his breath and was putting his whole head under for several seconds at a time. I think he inherited my swimmer's gene!

Katie was more confortable in the water than ever this year. She puts her whole face in and loves to jump off the side. Next year, she moves up to regular big kid lessons!

Moosey was awesome and took picture (and video!) since E and I were both in the water. They are a little blurry since I just had him use the old point and shoot instead of the SLR.

Grocery Shopping

It's been awhile since I took a picture of my groceries, so I snapped one tonight of what I bought for the for the week. I try to use a coupon for everything I buy, but as this trip demonstrates perfectly, sometimes I just buy what we need.


The Dr K is for Eric. Katie also requested soda. Since she has a virus and her temp spiked at 105, I couldn't say no. Izze bottles were .79/each as part of the buy 10, save $5, so I picked up a few in hopes they would make her happy (and they did!), but I also bought the 2 liter just in case.

The coconut water was free, the toothpaste was free, 3 of the protein bars were free, the outlet plugs were .84 and the body wash .29. I used a coupon for everything except the fruit, veggies, chips and cow's milk. My total before tax was $36.21 and my total savings was $32.68. On Friday, I also spent around $40 at the health food store stocking us up on coconut yogurt, milk and kefir to last 2-3 weeks.

Some weeks, I spend $100. Some weeks, it's much less and some weeks I skip shopping all together. I know it's totally against all things frugal, but I don't budget our groceries.

After entering the food allergy world, I decided I would not put a $$ limit on the food I purchase simply because some allergy friendly products can be more expensive. I do use coupons, shop sales and stockpile, which actually keeps our spending pretty minimal, especially compared to the average family. For the time being this system is working great for us!

Who made this mess?

Something to Crow About

Before Katie was born (which really feels like an eternity, yet was only 4.5 yrs ago), my sister in law got me hooked on making cards. I feel like it adds an even more personal touch to a hand written note. My creations aren't nearly as cute as Carrie's, but I'm coming along. I've recently been using my cricut to make some cute cards.

I made this one with the "Just Because" Cards cartridge specifically to send to my patients that have quit smoking or chewing. :-)

Review : ECOVER Laundry Soap

Because of skin issues (mostly from the boys in the his house!), the only detergents we use are free and clear varieties. Naturally Savvy provided me with Ecover's free and clear laundry detergent and I was super excited to try it!

Ecover Zero is not only 100% free of fragrance and dyes, but also completely free of optical brighteners and chlorine. This not only makes it super safe for our sensitive skin boys but also safe for Konny's cloth diapers! (Traditional free and clear detergents contain brighteners.) See how happy that makes him!?!


Ecover has over 30 yrs experience making safe, effective cleaners. Their plant-based and mineral ingredients are powerful cleaners without the hazards of chemical cleaners. Ecover products are septic tank safe, biodegradable, phosphate free and never tested on animals.

In addition the the cleaners being safe, the bottles are awesome too! They are made from sugarcane rather than corn or petrochemical-based plastic. They are 100% recyclable and 100% renewable!


My only criticism is there is no lines inside the cap for measure. There is a picture on the bottle with instructions on how much to use for what size load...still very simple to figure out. But we know that husbands do occasionally do the laundry so a line inside the cap would be helpful.

Normally, I purchase whatever free & clear variety of detergent I can get the best deal on, but I am rather enamoured with Ecover and plan to continue using it. Only having to have one bottle of detergent for clothes and diapers - yes please! You can purchase Ecover products at Vitacost. If you use my referral link, you will save $10 off your first purchase!

Be sure to check out Ecover's website as well as their facebook and twitter pages!

Disclosure: This product was provided to me at no cost through Naturally Savvy. The opinions expressed here are my own and may differ from other's experiences.

Independence Day!!

Undoubtedly Eric's favorite holiday and probably Kelton's too.

We're able to do fireworks every night for a full week, which thrills the children but definitely makes bedtime interesting. Thankfully except the 4th, everyone is supposed to stop at 10pm.




On the 3rd, Jason, Dolly and Braylee came to celebrate with us!





We only had one small setback. Kelton tripped and hit hard!
Katie wouldn't leave his side. :-)



The actual 4th was a little more laid back. We slept in and that evening went over to the pond to eat some yummy smoked pig!


It'd be nice if next year it could be under 100 outside, but we're already looking foward to it just the same!