Life, Gluten Free

Happy Halloween!

Our Jack-o-Lanterns are carved and we're ready for the trick-or-treaters to come this evening.

Hopefully no one spooky, no one frightening or gory!

We hope for princesses, some frogs here and there, friendly ghosts, fluttery butterflies and nice witches.

My butterfly and flower pumpkin

My husband's came out SO well! "Mr. Botkins King of the Pumpkins"

And we have our very own.... Rapunzel!!

Homemade Rapunzel costume and hair, thanks to my dad's wife Linda.

HUGE thanks :)

Happy Halloween everyone!

Halloween Traditions for Kids with Food Allergies

As I mentioned before, I love hallowen! Yesterday I shared some allergy-free hallowen recipes and now I am going to let you know how we celebrate Halloween in our allergy-free house.

1) We have a Halloween Party every year for Sophie and some of her friends. Sophie LOVES it and looks forward to it every year. It's really important for kids with food allergies too, because you are able to easily control the environment (knowing that all the snacks/treats you serve are safe).

2) We always carve pumpkins together (pictures in another post!)

3) We hand out non-food treats to trick-or-treaters that come to our house: stickers, pencils, erasers, etc. Sophie loves this part, because she can hand out to kids and see all of their costumes.

4) Trick-or-Treating. This is where problems can arise, but we've found away around it. We are going to let her trick-or-treat at a few houses in the neighborhood - just for fun - and then when we get back, we have safe food treats and goodies to give her and we arranged to give the trick-or-treat candy to a neighbor. (here's a pic of some of the fun books I got this year for her treat bucket)

(Pumpkin Soup, Make-a-Face Stickerpad, Fancy Nancy's Halloween and Dinosaur Train Spooky Scavenger Hunt)

5) We BOO our neighbors.

6) We always do a variety of Halloween Crafts, which can be very safe and lots of fun.

We made puppets to go along with the song 5 Little Pumpkins

Halloween Puzzles (idea from dana made it)

and of course, the Halloween Party was a big hit!

Homemade caramel on apple slices

Homemade fruit salad, homemade fruit punch and plantain chips

We set up a craft table (this year we decorated wooden halloween-themed magnets)

Owl-themed treat bags this year :)

with fun goodies...

And there you have it. A safe, fun and simple halloween!

We're ready for the trick-or-treaters!

Recipes for Allergy-free Halloween Treats

Halloween just happens to be my favorite holiday, and October my favorite month.

Which is why I am kinda sad it's almost over!

If you are still looking for something yummy to make, I am going to share with you some fun allergy-free hallowen recipes from my recipe stash!

Chocolate & Banana Truffles

Spooky Chocolate Cheesecake Bites

Candied Orange Slices

Boo-Nannas

Pumpkin Cookies

Pumpkin Spice Cake

Also, I found a few fun allery-free recipes from other bloggers to share:

Banana Mummies from Lexie's Kitchen (too cute!)

Chocolate Apples from Manifest:Vegan

Orange Snack-o-lantern Fruit Cups from Pink Parsley ** (I am making these on Halloween to surprise Sophie!)

** Allergy-free is a term I use loosely, since you can be allergic to just about anything. However, the recipes I shared above are free of some of the top allergens such as tree-nuts, gluten, sesame, eggs, etc.

Have a safe Halloween with healthy, allergy-free treats!

Chocolate & Banana Truffles

 

Earlier this week, my husband came home from work to find me in my apron making yet another chocolate treat! I had purchased some organic cream cheese on sale, thinking I might make something chocolatey with it.

And then the inspiration came.

I got out all the ingredients and went to work.

 

What came out was chocolately goodness so divine, that I had to ration his daily amounts because he just.couldnt.stop (he would eat SIX at a time, is that normal?? I think not).

And today, just a few short days later... there is just one left and he has asked me to make more soon.

Should I?

Probably yes, but in exchange for a foot massage.

Read on for the recipe!

Chocolate & Banana Truffles

contains no: eggs, tree nuts, soy, gluten

Ingredients:

1 ten ounce package of enjoylife mega chunks

1 eight ounce container of organic cream cheese

4-5 bananas cut into chunky rounds

shredded coconut

perky's crunchy rice cereal  (optional)

Directions:

Using a double broiler, slowly melt the chocolate

Add in the cream cheese and stir

Once completley melted, remove from burner

Slice the banana into chunks while the chocolate begins to cool

Start dipping the bananas when the chocolate is warm but not hot (as in, you won't burn your finger but it's warm and not cool)

Use a spoon or tongs to help coat the banana with a thick layer of chocolate

Add to unbleached waxed parchment paper

Sprinkle on  perky's rice cereal (if desired) and shredded coconut

Place in the refrigerator to cool

Come back after a while (say 20 minutes) and add the sticks (if you want, this is an optional step too!)

Press the chocolate around the sticks with your hand so they stay in well

After they refrigerate, they become very firm

Serve!

Makes about 24 truffles.

** You can sub the cream cheese for non-dairy cream cheese, too.

You may have to hold yourself (or your husband) back so you don't eat them all in one sitting.

We had a halloween party for Sophie and her friends over the weekend, and I made caramel apple slices. (with homemade maple caramel of course!)

She was stoked. It was a fun time!

Happy Halloween!

How to Boo Your Neighbor

A few weeks ago, I stumbled upon "How to start the BOO in your neighborhood" from Skip To My Lou. It was such a cute idea, Sophie and I knew we had to try it out. We picked a couple of neighbors and made up a BOO bag and a BOO bucket. I didn't get pictures of the BOO bag but it was very cute. It had casper on it and inside we put different goodies (pencils with eraser, necklace, stickers, a halloween craft, etc).

For the BOO bucket pictured above, we used some halloween-themed paper and re-used a halloween greeting card from last year to glue the poem to.

Front:

Back:

There are different poems to choose from but I decided to write one of my own. You are welcome to use it.

You've Been Boo'ed!

This bucket I filled with treats galore,

and I left it at your front door.

I ran with glee,

knowing what a surprise it would be!

You will find treats but no tricks,

it is only a friendly "BOO' from me to you.

If you enjoy it and want to employ it,

simply leave a "BOO" at a neighbors house

to surprise them with joy and be oh so coy.

Leave it at their front door, no one will suspect

it's a friendly "BOO" to say "I like you!"

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

It was so much fun and Sophie had a blast putting together the treats.

For the BOO bucket, we put in several things, including:

a bracelet

a halloween story book

stickers

a wooden wand that Sophie decorated

a balloon

inka chips

a collage by Sophie (using magazine cut-outs and washi tape)

a mini DIY pumpkin game

Have you ever BOO'ed a neighbor?

Do you want to? It's not too late, go gather some treats and get your BOO on!!

DIY Pumpkin Game

We really love pumpkins.

Do I even need to remind you how many grew in our garden? I think not.

So when I saw this project for felt pumpkin faces, I knew there was a reason that I placed approximately 20 pieces of different colored eco-felt in my shopping cart some days prior. They were on sale for .25 cents a piece too. Now who's the frugal one? I kind of felt bad for the check out guy who had to peel them a part to scan each one.

Kinda.

But glory be, good thing I purchased all of them because I had plenty for my well-planned projects and enough to spare for this cute pumpkin face game.

I just free-handed the shapes and it was a very simple and very quick process.

I am going to put it out for my daughter's halloween party this weekend.

We also made a mini version for a friend of Sophie's (not pictured, but it's the same thing just smaller).

I know you can make one too! It's very simple and the end results are a bunch of sillyness and laughter. Who could ask for more? All for a very small price!

DIY Autumn leaf wreath (for kids)

We made a fun and easy leaf wreath last week from coffee filters and watercolor paints. Since it was a perfect fall day, we took this project outside while basking in the sun and enjoying light breeze (except when the wind tried to blow away our coffee filters!).

The idea for this craft came from another mama blogger, Stephanie at Playing House. Thanks for the idea!

We chose to get a bit wild with our colors, using some blues too.

It's so fun to watch Sophie concentrating on her craft work :)

We needed rocks to weigh down our coffee filters so they wouldn't blow away!

Okay, gather your supplies and get started!

Supplies:

12 or so coffee filters (we use unbleached)

watercolor paint

paintbrushes

cardboard (I cut a wreath shape out of cardboard)

glue

Directions:

Color the coffee filters to your hearts content

Allow to dry (they dry pretty quickly!)

Fold several times and cut out leaf shapes

Let your kiddo glue the leaves to the cardboard wreath

After it dried, I glued a ribbon to the back for easy hanging

Spooky Chocolate Cheesecake Bites

Chocolate. Chocolate. Chocolate.

I can't eat chocolate, which is why this very recipe is a mix of sweat, courage and undying devotion.

My husband loves chocolate and since I love him to pieces, I buy stockpile enjoylife chocolate chips and chocolate chunks whenever they are on sale. And so, when the inspiration hits for something chocolatey.. I can make it for my one and only and then watch him eat it up.

Bite by chocolatey bite.....

(The smile is worth it.)

Spooky Chocolate Cheesecake bites

Ingredients:

10 oz of enjoylife chocolate chunks

1 tablespoon coconut oil (not melted, just room temperature)

2 tablespoon so delicious coconut creamer

12.3 ounce package of organic mori-nu silken tofu (this is the kind you buy in the baking section.. not the refrigerated kind)

shredded coconut (for topping, if desired)

chocolate chunks (I saved a few.. probably about 7, to chop into small pieces for garnish)

Directions:

Melt chocolate chips using a double-broiler method (I use a stainless steel pot and a stainless steel mixing bowl).

While melting, stir often and mix in coconut oil and coconut creamer.

Once melted and creamy, remove from stove.

Get your food processor ready and add the silken tofu first, then pour in the chocolate mixture.

Scrape the sides well!

Blend until thoroughly mixed, scraping the sides with a spatula as needed.

Add to a rectangular glass or stoneware dish.

If desired, top with shredded coconut and finely chop chocolate chunks for garnish!

Wait as long as you can to eat them or refrigerate overnight (for best results, if you want them to firm nicely).

No I cannot eat them but that's okay.

Yep, that's love, folks. That is true love. Topped with chocolate chunks. ;)

Pumpkin Hopscotch

Not to toot my own horn but I had a stroke of genuis. My daughter wanted me to draw her a hopscotch, and since it was a nice cool fall day.. I thought... why not make a PUMPKIN hopscotch?!

Yes. Hurray for orange chalk.

All I did was draw circles instead of squares, and I added green stems!

We love pumpkins!

And hopscotch!

Then we went on a scavenger hunt...

3 flowers, 1 rock, 1 stick, countless mini leaves

Welcome Fall :)

Indian Summer

We've had some family visiting for the past two weeks, and it has been really hot. That is, really hot for September and October. Instead of being in the 60s to 70s, we've been having mid to high 80's.

We were tricked though. As soon as September rolled around we had some chilly rainy days and I proudly announced to everyone "That's it, Fall is here! We've seen the last of the 80-degree temperatures!"

And I promptly ordered my daughter a warm winter jacket for this year since she outgrew last year's coat. But it's been hanging up in the closet and flipflops are still on the shoe rack.

Oh well guess I was kinda wrong.

We took our visiting family to one of our favorite hiking spots, but we couldn't help wishing it was a bit cooler like it should be in October!

See? No jackets!

It was still fun and we enjoyed the beautiful scenery.