Allergy Friendly Passion Lunch for Good Friday

Lacy at Catholic Icing created an incredibly clever interactive lunch for her kids to retell the story of Good Friday. I think it is brilliant but wanted to make a few adaptations so it would work better for my family. This one is safe for my kids' food allergies (eggs, nuts, dairy, sesame seed), has a hand out to help me remember what I'm doing without scrolling on my phone, and ends with Hot Cross Buns so I can include that traditional treat while adding the step of Jesus Being Laid in the Tomb.  

A couple of notes about the food:

- In the picture for the Crown of Thorns you can see that I used the Aldi GF cookies with their GF pretzels stuck in them because when I originally did this we were also a gluten free family. Now that we can have wheat again I'm using Lacy's original idea of Ritz crackers.

- For the silver coins I originally melted down the Enjoy Life chocolate chips and made round drops on parchment paper, let them cool, and then wrapped them in aluminum foil. This year I bought an Enjoy Life chocolate bar, will break it into pieces, wrap them up, and call it good enough.

- My kids don't love Sunbutter so the sandwich is butter and jelly cut out in the shape of an Easter egg. Egg salad sandwiches would work, too, but if you can have eggs I'd probably just stick with Lacy's hard boiled one to make it easier.

- Because we are dairy free I used strawberries to represent Peter's ear being cut off.

- For the Hot Cross Buns I use this recipe, shape them into rounds, and then ice them once they are baked. It is not a traditional Hot Cross Bun but it is dairy and egg free, my kids like them, and it works for us.

I hope this is helpful and I wish you a very holy, beautiful, Triduum. If you are joining the Church this weekend please know that I am praying for you!

The Best and Easiest Dairy and Egg Free Cinnamon Rolls

My mom makes amazing cinnamon rolls. She got the recipe from her friend, who got the recipe from a cook in her high school's cafeteria. It's amazing to me that once upon a time high school cafeterias were serving fresh, made-from-scratch cinnamon rolls, but I digress. Her cinnamon roll recipe makes three dozen, freezes well, tastes amazing, and takes all day to make. It also calls for milk and eggs, two items which are no-go's in our food-allergy-filled home.

I wanted to have cinnamon rolls to feed my kids on Easter and Christmas mornings, just like my mom always did, but I wanted them to be easier to make and be egg and dairy free. Easy peasy!  (That last bit was sarcasm.)

But I finally figured out the perfect solution for my family. The recipe I use is actually the white bread recipe that came with my bread machine, very slightly modified. Because I am able to make these in the bread machine it is so super easy, but if you don't have a machine you can still use a good, ole fashioned bowl and spoon.

Ingredients:
Dough
1 1/3 C water
4 Tbsp vegetable oil
4 heaping Tbsp sugar
2 tsp salt
4 C flour + more for kneading
1 1/2 tsp yeast

Filling
Butter or dairy-free butter-like spread such as Earth Balance, approximately 2 Tbsp
1/3 C sugar + 2 Tbsp cinnamon, mixed together

Icing
2 C powdered sugar
2 dashes of salt
1 Tbsp water (or more depending on desired consistency)

*Honestly, for the filling and the icing I have never measured anything so these are approximate. If you like your rolls more or less cinnamon-y then adjust accordingly. Likewise, if you like more or less icing on your rolls - you guessed it! - adjust accordingly.


**I use this recipe for dinner rolls, soup bowls, bread to serve with stew, Santa Lucia buns, and more. I've found a vegan bread recipe that tastes great and I make it work for whatever I need. For non sweet breads I use 3 Tbsp sugar instead of 4 heaping Tbsp. For the Santa Lucia buns I add saffron. I have found that all you have to do is change the shape, maybe the ingredients, and possibly the baking time and this recipe can become a lot of things.

Bread Machine Directions: Add all ingredients to bread machine in order they are listed. Choose Dough setting, start, walk away.

Bowl and Spoon Directions: Mix yeast and one cup of flour. Add warm water and set aside to let yeast activate. Once yeast mixture is bubbly and has grown a bit (5-10 minutes) add oil then other dry ingredients. Combine until sticky; if using a mixer allow dough hook to knead the dough for 5-10 minutes. If using spoon, turn out onto lightly floured surface and knead dough for 5-10 minutes. Dough should have a good stretch and be velvety with just a touch of stickiness.

Place dough in a large, lightly greased, oven-proof bowl and cover. Keep in a warm place until dough has doubled, about 60 minutes. (I like to pre-heat my oven to its lowest setting, then turn off, and allow my dough to rise there.)

Risen dough in bread machine should be 

popping  up over the top of the basket. 

Next Step for Both Methods:
Once Bread Machine is done or dough in bowl has doubled turn it out onto a lightly floured surface and with a lightly floured rolling pin roll out into a 9x13 rectangle.

Cover dough with butter or Earth Balance Spread and then sprinkle with cinnamon sugar mixture.

Roll the dough up so you have a thick, long rope, seam-side down.

Cut off the uneven ends and discard (or, you know, eat). Cut the rolled dough in half, then cut each half in half. Cut each quarter section into thirds so you have twelve slices.

Arrange slices in an greased 9"x 13" dish and place in a warm place until rolls have doubled, usually 45-60 minutes.

Bake in a preheated 350 degree oven for 15 minutes or until lightly browned. Allow rolls to cool before icing.

King Cake Method:
If you want to turn the cinnamon rolls into King Cake you line a large baking sheet with parchment paper and arrange the sliced rolls in a circle. Rise, bake, and ice as directed above. Sprinkle with green, yellow, and purple decorating sugar.

Some prefer their King Cake with a cream cheese filling and to do so I just substitute cream cheese in place of the butter. Tofutti makes a good dairy-free "cream cheese."

You can use this at Epiphany or Mardi Gras - both are appropriate times to feast on King Cake. If you have a little plastic baby Jesus you can tuck him in the underside of one of the rolls once they have baked. Then the person who finds the baby Jesus is King for the Day - which can mean whatever you want in your home.

Coffee Cake: Fluffy, Delicious, & Egg and Dairy Free

At the request of a reader, I give you our super yummy, nice and fluffy, and egg, nut, and dairy free. 

The recipe I use is adapted from the recipe my mom used throughout my childhood. I think it came from her Betty Crocker Cookbook and you can see that my copy of it is well used. 

It's a super simple recipe and you start by mixing all the dry ingredients together. 

Next, you add the Crisco. We used to use butter before we were dairy free but now we use Butter Flavored Crisco Baking Sticks. Really you want the crumbles to be a bit smaller than what I did here but this is a super forgiving recipe so I cheated a bit. 

Next you add the milk and mix it all together. Pour the batter in a 9"x13" dish that has been coated with non-stick cooking spray. Prepare the crumble topping and sprinkle and spread it over the batter. 

 Pop it in a preheated oven, making your house smell great. Once it's done baking I usually let it cool a bit in the pan before we serve it up. It lasts for several days in an air-tight container but we usually eat it in a day.

Coffee Cake Recipe

Batter Ingredients:

3 C flour

1 1/2 C sugar

5 tsp baking powder

1 1/2 tsp salt

1/2 C Crisco Butter Flavored Baking Stick

1 1/2 C coconut milk

1 1/2 tsp Ener-G egg replacer mixed with 2 Tbsp warm water 

Crumb Topping Ingredients:

2/3 C brown sugar

1/2 C flour

1 tsp cinnamon

6 Tbsp Crisco Butter Flavored Baking Stick

Directions:

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Coat a 9"x13" dish with non-stick spray. 

Mix all the dry ingredients together. Add the Crisco, cutting it into the flour mix until there are smallish crumbs of Crisco + flour mix. Add the milk and egg replacer and mix well, scraping the bottom of the bowl to be certain you're not leaving any flour behind. Set batter aside. 

In a separate, small mixing bowl combine the brown sugar, flour, and cinnamon for the crumb topping. Cut in the Crisco until crumbly.

Pour batter into prepared baking dish, smoothing out surface. Cover with crumb topping, spreading it evenly over the top and going to the edges. 

Bake in preheated oven for 25-30 minutes or until inserted toothpick comes out clean. 

Serves 12-15. 

A Head Cold of Jane Austen Proportions (+ what we've been doing in the radio silence)

I owe a very sincere apology to Jane Austen. When Jane Bennet caught cold and had to stay at Netherfield for several days I thought it was ridiculous. I mean, it's a cold. Likewise, when Harriet Smith caught cold and had to stay in bed for days I thought that was also ridiculous. 

But then in mid-December I got sick. I got really, really, really sick with a cold of Jane Austen proportions. 

The last week of school before Christmas break Ben came down with something. He slept 20 hours a day and barely ate anything. One by one all six of my kids fell ill and when Baby Tee was also sick I took him to the doctor. Strep throat for the baby and so everyone got antibiotics. By the time the kids were starting to feel better my throat was starting to hurt, I had a congested headache and a cough. 

And for over four weeks I would cough and sleep and lay around. I would start to feel better and then crash with more coughing, sleeping, and laying around. Often I would wish that *I* was at Netherfield with a household staff to cook, clean, and care for the children while I laid in bed and got better. (Alright, honestly, I often have that wish even when I'm healthy.)

It wasn't strep; it wasn't bronchitis; and while I thought it had turned into walking pneumonia and was even treated for it with some antibiotics I think, in the end, it was just a super duper, really bad cold - just like the prompt care doctor told me. Five weeks later I am still occasionally coughing but I finally feel fairly caught up with life. 

There were a lot of really good things that happened in those five weeks, especially in December, and I wanted to share some of the highlights. 

St. Nick brought a gingerbread village for the kids to assemble and decorate. 

Travis was able to finish and hang my shelves. They are made from the wood of an oak tree that stood in my maternal grandfather's yard. We kept the bark on them and glossed them up. This is pretty much the first and only time where how I imagined a finished project looking is how the finished project actually looks. And I loooooove it!

The little Fiat sign is from JustLovePrints.

So Fresh & So Clean Clean print from Brick House in the City.

On Christmas morning we put on our finest, went to the 7am Mass, and tried to get a good family photo. This is as good as it gets, and yes, there is a hideous mural on the back wall of my parish. I dream of whitewashing it. 

My parents, my uncle, and my paternal grandfather came over to watch the kids open their gifts and to eat homemade sausage bread and cinnamon rolls, bacon, and coffee. Behold: the only picture I took:

Five days later we celebrated Baby Tee's first birthday and our tenth anniversary with a party. Our parents, siblings, and friends were invited and so I set out a yummy spread, decorated with fresh greens and items used in our wedding reception, and...

put on my new favorite outfit and (a rare thing these days) make-up.

L, my 8 year old, was pursuing her Cake Making badge in American Heritage Girls and so she spent the day with her aunt, a professional baker, and designed and baked the anniversary cake for us...

And the birthday cupcakes for Tee.

 We were married on my paternal grandfather's 80th birthday so along with Tee's 1st, we celebrated Grandpa's 90th. L made him a special cupcake and everyone sang Happy Birthday to him.

Fortunately I was feeling fairly well for Christmas and our anniversary but right after each I crashed again. Instead of doing an Advent Calendar I like to celebrate the Twelve Days of Christmas but this year the only thing I was able to do was make and decorate Christmas cookies and that was only because my mom came over to help. Oh well.

If you're looking for a good gingerbread cookie recipe Mary's from Better Than Eden is the best I've ever had. Follow her tip and save them for the next day. I don't know why, but they are so much better Day Two. And that St. Nick cookie cutter came from Catholic Curio, in case you were wondering.

 And if you're looking for a good something to watch, well I have been busy with all my laying around.

Amazon Prime: Mr. Holmes, the BBC's Emma, Grantchester, Endevour, and the Matt Smith Doctor Who episodes all kept me company.

Netflix: Spotlight, Sherlock, The Crown, A Royal Night Out, Death Comes to Pemberly, Madame Secretary, The Imitation Game, The Returned, and E.T. have also been good distractions.

Gosh, I look like such a bum, don't I?

I'll leave you with my current favorite song, a reward of sorts for making to the end of this post.

Alex da Kid's Not Easy

Stay healthy, you guys. Oh man, stay healthy.

So, how ya been?

I thought we'd catch up and chat about how things have been going. 

Clementines are in season, of course, and we go through at least one bag a week here because all the kids like them and I love them. Clementines mean winter to me, winter and cute little fingers peeling, peeling, peeling.

I got the outside decorations mostly up, but I realized Mary and Joseph need new lightbulbs. Commence search. Eventually I will cut some greens to fill the flower pots by the Holy Family and to fill the basket that sits at my front door. But I'm happy with what we've got. The kids looooove the train and I feel ridiculously proud of myself for figuring out its set-up.

I don't have Advent candles for our wreath yet, just a little votive candle sitting where the first week's purple taper should go. I'm reading Isaiah right now in my Bible but I'm finding my prayer time so dry.  Those two facts seem to compliment each other, at least in my mind.


I'm figuring out how we'll do the feast days this season and I'm thinking it will look like this:
Christmas lights and music (we usually keep these off until Gaudete Sunday)
Hot chocolate + candy canes + clementines for after-school snacks
St. Nicholas on the 6th: stockings will be filled when the kids wake in the morning and maybe we'll eat Shepherd's Pie for dinner because we all love it, not because it has anything to do with St. Nick.
Immaculate Conception on the 8th: chicken + pasta + cauliflower + canned pears + white frosted sugar cookies for dessert (it's all white, get it?)
Fulton Sheen on the 9th: homemade pizza with meat and pineapple (for me) but no cheese (it's surprisingly good!)
Our Lady of Guadalupe on the 12: tacos or maybe enchiladas if I can find a good dairy-free recipe (is that possible? Is my gringa showing?)
St. Lucy on the 13th: Brinner!  Santa Lucia roll recipe Grace shared on the blog several years back + bacon + sausage + fruit
The kids' school break starts on the 16th and the feast days stop so we'll see how this all goes.


Today I wanted thumbprint cookies, though Jofis wanted chocolate chip cookies incredibly badly. I told him that we should make the thumbprint cookies, though, because we could frost them with purple Advent frosting and that would be super special. He was half convinced but then he got to lick the beater, roll the dough, smoosh his thumb in the dough balls, and eat frosting. So he stopped complaining.

We're listening to Advent music around here, but not too much of it. I have a playlist (o'er there in the sidebar) but I'm also trying to have silence in the house. Gee golly, it's nice.

I will share one success, if you will allow me to. This year we're doing the Jesse Tree and it finally feels good - like they're getting it. The three oldest kids all have Religion in school and they are learning so much. It's good to see that what we've been trying to do for years is being nurtured at school and then they come home and we can continue to build on it. This relates to the Jesse Tree in that each night I read from the booklet that came with our set. I do this sort of read + ask questions so the kids tell the story + summarize the Scripture and then the child of the night finds the ornament that goes with the Scripture.  It's like, this is what it's supposed to be! And it only took 6 years!


Finally, Likable Art shared this new video they made for Life Teen and I thought it was so beautiful.



What about you? Got any successes or struggles to share? How's life treating you?

Our Grocery Budget + What's for Supper

One year ago I wrote a series called Financial Hardships & Surprise Pregnancies. In it I talked a bit about groceries, our food budget, and our meal plan and there were requests for me to write more. So here it is, under the category of "Better Late than Never": the follow up post.

I want to start by touching on a couple of things that help to make this work for our family.

First, because of our food allergies I have to make almost everything from scratch but I do love to cook so it's a small sacrifice. However, it can be hard to figure out what we can eat based on what we have, what we can afford to buy, what everyone can and will eat, and then balance that with feast days and evening activities. All that to say, I love having a meal plan but I sorta don't like sitting down and writing up a meal plan.

Second, our income has increased a wee bit since last year and now our weekly grocery budget is about $130. Travis gives me $260 every two weeks. About once a month I will go to Costco for any variety of things: crackers, bacon, chicken breasts, flour, rice, detergent. I will spend about $50 there and then the rest will be divided between my two weeks shopping budget. Sometimes I will spend $120 one week and less the next but with the envelope system I always know how much cash I have and that I have to make it work for me.

Third, we bought half a cow in the spring from a local farmer (whose parents were the witnesses at my grandparents' wedding!) We still have about 1/3 of that meat in the deep freeze. Buying from the farmer is a big expense up front but it means we only spend ~$3 a pound on roasts, steaks, stew meat, ground beef, and liver (what do I do with liver?).

Updated with a fourth, when I say "groceries" I actually mean everything we eat and use in our house on a daily basis: tissues, paper towels, food, drinks, diapers, wet wipes, make-up, deodorant, cleaning products, garbage bags, hair products, feminine products, tealight candles used in holiday decorations, fresh flowers, and so on.

And fifth, we are a family of eight, six kids and two adults. Our oldest is eight and our youngest is almost ten months. While the baby is not eating a ton of food I am buying some special things for him and his diapers come out of our grocery budget so I think it's fair to include him in the count.

Okay, I think that's enough groundwork. Here goes:

Today I went grocery shopping and spent $109. It should feed us through the week though come Friday (pay day) I may pop back into the store in case I've run out of milk, bread, or sanity. My grocery list looked like this:

I also picked up apples, bananas, strawberries, hand soap refill, Earth Balance butter, shampoo, conditioner, mini bagels, bread, and a fountain soda. I didn't use coupons this week but I did make an effort to buy Kroger products so I would save with my Kroger card + earn fuel points. I know my meal plan says chili on Friday but we eat meatless on Fridays and I don't know why I wrote that down. So I bought no beans and we'll have something else instead.

After shopping my fridge looked like this:

And my freezer like this:

The cupboards have the bread, crackers, cereal, pop tarts, fruit snacks, oatmeal, chips, pretzels, canned food, and other items that make up our other meals. Generally speaking those menus look like this:

Breakfast options:
cold cereal, oatmeal, pop tart, bagel, toast, Eggo waffle, and sometimes homemade coffee cake or pancakes

Lunch options:
chicken nuggets, hot dogs, mac and cheese, fresh fruit, chips, pretzels, mini mallows, carrot sticks, leftovers

Snack options:
fresh fruit, carrot sticks, crackers, baked goods, popcorn, chips, mallows

And then for this week here's what we're having:

Monday: Shepherd's Pie and Biscuits
I make my Shepherd's Pie in a cast iron skillet so I can just bake it in the same dish. Both the pie and the biscuits are easily adapted for our food allergies and I use ground round instead of lamb to save on cost.

Tuesday: Italian Sausage + Homemade Red Sauce + GF Spaghetti Noodles and Frozen Veg and Applesauce

Wednesday: Chicken + Rice + Stir Fry Veggies

Thursday: Soup Bones + Noodles and Frozen Veg and Canned Peaches
I don't have a recipe for this because my mom made this up, but let me tell you it's amazing. She boiled the meat off the bones, took bones out, added noodles to the meat and broth. Then she made a roux, added that to the cooked noodles, meat, and what was left of the broth. She seasoned it with salt and pepper and it's delish.

Friday: Potato Soup and Home Baked Bread

Saturday: Ribs and Rice and Frozen Veg

Sunday: Brinner (that's breakfast for dinner)

I don't know if this is helpful at all but if you have any questions please feel free to ask. I'm sure there's ways I could save even more money (I have two friends who are amazing at gardening, canning, freezing, and baking and I know that really helps them a great deal.) but, again, this is what works for us here and now. Please share your tips and tricks, because the point really is about helping one another feed the masses on our budgets and I'd love to learn from you.

Eat up and enjoy!

Life Lately

I have finally caught up with my life and it feels really good. ~whew~ I needed a breather after the back-to-school rush of it all. Our family has hit a stride and as long as I can keep my act together and continue to fold and put away the kids laundry we should be okay.

So tons of wonderful things have been happening. Birthdays, the Blessed Is She team retreat (which deserves its own post, really), cooler weather in my neck of the woods, and all the little things that make life so great. So this is a bit of a highlight reel type post, but first let's start with a song. Catchy with depressing lyrics:



Second:
Ben lost his first tooth, right at bed time last week. He was so excited and we were so exhausted that we went to bed at the same time as the kids. In the morning Ben was disappointed because the Tooth Fairy hadn't come but Daddy saved the day. As Ben was eating breakfast Travis passed the kids room, still dark at 6:15am, and caught something out of the corner of his eye. He told Ben and L this and they immediately *knew* it *was* the Tooth Fairy and she *hadn't* forgotten him, she just didn't know that we'd be up already and he was her very last stop. So all's well that ends well.

He lost his second tooth after much wiggling, pushing, pulling, and apple eating at breakfast on Wednesday of this week. Big sister L was an active participant in getting it out (and I think caused him some pain, too. : /  )


Third:
Funny story: Last week the new Hatch Prints tote came in the mail. When I pulled it out of its USPS packaging it looked like this:

 And Ben asked, "Is it garlic bread?!" This kid looooooves garlic bread so he was pretty sure it was the best mail day ever.

He was unimpressed and uninterested when he saw that it was actually this awesome bag, but I was incredibly happy.

Currently it is holding: library books, LuLaRoe leggings, wallet, diapers, wet wipes, baby toys, and a pouch filled with rosary, kleenexes, pens, chapstick, and lipstick. It's gotta work hard at this house.


Fourth:
Baby Tee started pulling himself up to kneeling. And then he figured out crawling, abandoning The Worm to master the official crawl. He has great confidence and found his way to the bathroom for his first time to play with the toilet paper. Within two days of that he was pulling himself to standing and within a week he took his first "cruising" steps.

With all these accomplishments comes the need to constantly yell at people for leaving the bathroom and basement doors open and a little (or a lot) of sentimentality and mourning as my baby gets older.


Fifth:
Jofis is wearing big boy undies all through the day. I waited until he was well past three and interested, making potty training super easy. I bribed him with candy for pee and sorbet for poop and in no time he was good to go. I am down to one in diapers again and it is awesome.

Jofis is also becoming a master story teller. He will passionately tell you "ooooky" stories about ghosts and ditches (witches) and big, big, big scary monsters. He acts things out and illustrates size with his arms and hands. His face is incredibly animated and he gleefully smiles when he gets to the really juicy parts. In short, it is adorable.


Sixth:
Last week was a lot of fun for liturgical feasting. Michaelmas (the feast of St. Michael, St. Gabriel, and St. Raphael - the archangels) was celebrated wholeheartedly. The kids and I read about St. Raphael in the Book of Tobit at breakfast becuase I couldn't quite remember what was up with the fish. Inspired by Molly's clever post about St. Michael's leggings, the girls and I wore our own leggings.  

Inspired by Haley's blog name and book Feast! we dined on roasted chicken and carrots for dinner with cake topped with blackberry compote for dessert. As Ben ate he asked, "Am I making the devil mad by eating blackberries?" eager to bring a bit of consternation to the guy.

When I was in college my chaplain was Fr. Gary Caster - a wonderful priest, preacher, and friend of St. Therese. He instilled in my friends and I a deep love of St. Therese and so October 1st cannot pass without some roses and something to honor my friends - Therese in Heaven and those on earth. I didn't get the chance to make something French for dinner or decorate rose cupcakes (like Tracy's - hers were gorgeous!)  but while all but the baby were with friends or family Travis and I ate Five Guys burgers and fries for dinner so I still call that a win.

Seventh:

St. Francis' feast day was this week of course and to celebrate our water heater broke and we had to buy a new one. We are following Dave Ramsey's Baby Steps so fortunately we had the money in savings to pay for it, but it's a big purchase. It seemed like a fitting day for it to happen.

In what I would describe as a parenting win, though, my school aged kids climbed in the car at pick-up and asked what we were going to do to celebrate St. Francis' feast. I had not even thought about it but it seems that I have established a precedent in our home: feast days = a special dinner, dessert, or activity. This has been my goal the whole time - for my kids to love living out their faith - and so we brainstormed on the way home. In the end spaghetti in honor of Francis' Italian heritage and cut out cookies shaped like animals were the winners. 

We used dogs, dinosaurs, butterflies, Easter bunnies, and Halloween bats and cats. Afterwards I found our Thanksgiving turkey; I'll have to remember that one for next year. 

So that's it. A pretty good couple of weeks. And now I'm off to link up with the wonderful Kelly at This Ain't the Lyceum. Have a fun weekend, you guys! :)