Gabriella's New Trick

Last night in the bathtub Gabriella discovered a new skill she has....

Getting the first fishy up under her neck....

Here comes the second one.....

And, no hands!

It was hilarious!! We both were laughing so hard I could barely get a picture taken to show her what she looked like. When she saw her picture she laughed even harder! Sure love my crazy cat!!

Mini Vacation in Portland

Matt and I were blessed to be able to have an overnight trip to Portland all by ourselves! My parents generously agreed to watch Gabriella overnight so we could have a night to ourselves before Reuben is born. And it worked out great that the night she spent with them was when my cousin and her three kiddos were up visiting. I heard that the kids had a great time playing all together :)

We left Grants Pass at 8 am Saturday morning and drove almost straight through to Portland so we could hit their Saturday Farmers Market. It was awesome! So many wonderful veggies, fruits, "bands", and gluten-free baked goods.

After that we stopped for a quick check-in at our hotel and then hopped on the streetcar system for a free trip downtown.

We browsed through a couple shops and then headed to Deschutes Brewery for lunch.

Matt got some on-tap gluten-free golden ale and I was LOVING the gluten-free grilled cheese and sweet potato fries! They have a great gluten-free menu!

Matt was a good sport and posed next to the giant statue at the entrance to China town.

My request (of course) was a stop at one of the many Ben & Jerry's Scooperies. It was so hard to choose which flavors to try, but we did. Yummmmmmmmmy!

We headed back to our hotel and I started not feeling very good. About 10 minutes later I thought I was going to have an asthma attack. We figured that the culprit was the wall directly outside our room.

They didn't have any other rooms available on a different floor so we were able to get our money back but found ourselves with no hotel at 7:30pm. We hopped on our phones in the car and we able to use expedia.com to get an even cheaper room that was WAY nicer at a Red Lion motel. God is SO good!

Sunday we slept in, hit a New Seasons market for some gluten-free goodies, then headed home. We stopped at Trader Joe's (more goodies!) and then picked up some Voodoo Donuts in Eugene for my parents for watching Gabriella for us. My dad was super excited!

Gabriella was thrilled to see us and loved the "My Pal Violet" leapfrog puppy that we got for her. Such a sweetie!

I missed my little bunny so much!!! But it was really nice for Matt and I to have some time just the two of us before life gets crazy wonderful again in December!

Gluten Free Tie Dye Cupcakes

Today we made some gluten free tie-dye cupcakes from scratch. We had lots of fun grinding up our own flour and adding ingredients.

Gabriella very carefully stirred in each ingredient. Most of it stayed in the bowl!

She also helped by licking out the measuring cup I used for the applesauce.

Adding yellow ("yeyow") coloring to our cupcakes.

I let her spoon the extra batter into our second set of cupcake tins. She had a ton of fun and did a great job putting a little bit of each color in each hole. A perfect little copycat!

We took a break for naptime and then iced the cupcakes after they had cooled. The video is of her trying to ice them! She actually did a decent job of trying to mimic what I had done.

Of course she had to taste test the icing. And smear it all over my counter!

After dinner we got to eat one. She LOVED it!

Here is the recipe that we adapted and made up!

Mix:

3/4 cup millet flour

1 cup quinoa flour

1/2 cup buckwheat flour

1 1/3 cup turbinado sugar

3 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

1 tsp vanilla

1/2 cup applesauce

2 eggs

1 cup milk (or water)

Blend all ingredients together on medium for 1 minute being sure to scrape the sides of your bowl.

Separate batter into 6 bowls (about 2/3 cup of batter in each bowl)

Add food coloring of your choice until you get the desired colors.

Spray a cupcake/muffin tin with cooking spray

Ladle the colored batters one at a time into each tin. You can fill them pretty full since the batter won't rise much to overflow them.

Bake at 350 degrees F for 20-25 minutes or until they are slightly golden brown and a toothpick inserted into the middle comes out clean.

Let them cool about 5 minutes, then dump them out onto a cooling rack. When they are completely cooled you may ice them with any icing of your choice (we used cream cheese!). Store them in the refrigerator until they are all eaten!!

Washing the Car & Making "Gookies"

Gabriella loves to be involved in everything that we are doing! Tonight Matt decided to wash my car!!

She rinsed that mirror for about 5 minutes!

Scrubbing off the icky dirt

Taking time to stay hydrated.

A couple days ago we decided to bake cookies ("gookies")

Gabriella was a good little helper. She does an amazing job of listening and following directions when we are doing projects so I love having her help me with stuff.

We made gluten free shortbread cookies (I was feeling lazy so we used Bob's Red Mill mix).

She helped me hold the electric mixer and then we mixed the rest of the dough by hand. I showed her how to use the rolling pin and she went to town, rolling it back and forth very carefully.

Next we got out the cookie cutters (we are learning our shapes) and she did a great job punching out cookies. We were too busy eating them to take a picture of the finished product!

Operation Potty Training = SUCCESS!!

Today we had our 4th day in a row of completely dry!

Considering we were walking around Jacksonville for their city wide yard sale fest today, I packed a diaper expecting to have to put her in it since toilets are few and far between. Luckily a few nice people helped us out and let me take her inside restaurants and such (one lady was charging 25 cents to use their shop bathroom!) so we were able to avoid those little blue boxes. But we never needed the diaper!!

We bought some snow cones along the way (it was a million degrees outside!) and got Gabriella one with no flavoring on it. She must have held it and licked it for at least half an hour. So cute!

Gramma Sandy VS. The Car Seat

Gramma Sandy vs. The Car Seat

I think this video is pretty self explanatory. I started it about 3 minutes after the battle began.....

New Toy

Our church was cleaning out some old toys and giving them away on Sunday. We grabbed a little V-Tech Alphabet game for Gabriella. Here is a short video of her playing with it.

I tried to catch her the other day when she was using her face to push the buttons but she stopped when she saw my camera come out. Maybe I will catch her using her face next time!

Dancing Fun at Gramma Shelley's Birthday Party

Last night we went to Gramma Shelley's 50th birthday party.

Gabriella had a great time on the dance floor!

I love my little girl's moves!

Some Recent Hair Creations

I recently created a page on Facebook to show/sell my hair creations. You can check it out at Fantastic Flair For Every Day Wear

Here are some pictuers of the ones that I have made recently! I am LOVING it!! I also have sold 20 clippies/headbands in the last 2 weeks!

 

 I've been finding tutorials online and then making them my own.

Its so much fun to experiment with fabric patterns and designs. Plus my mom hooked me up with ribbon, lace and buttons that she has had for years. Hooray for moms that stock up on craft supplies!!