Creative Endeavors

I've been changing a few things about what we eat lately, adding in new supplements and switching some things up. One is that I've bought some wheat berries, and ground them up into flour to make my own bread. 

Here, you can see the ground flour behind, and the berries in front. Fresh flour apparently has many health benefits you lose with store flour, as they quickly diminish with the passage of time.

I'm actually able to use my high-powered blender to make the flour. I've bought three types of berries - hard red, hard white and soft white. Each has a slight differences.

My first loaf of bread! Stace has always enjoyed baking, but I was a bit intimidated. But, we have a hand-me-down breadmaker, so I decided it can't be that hard. And, after figuring out which recipe to use, it really was quick and easy to add the ingredients to the breadmaker and turn it on.

Everyone enjoyed the hot bread and butter. 

 

I'm also trying to limit our use of seed oils, like canola, grapeseed, palm oil, etc., in favor of the old-fashioned fats people have used for centuries. It was easy to switch what I use for cooking, but then you realize all the products these oils are in. 

I'm giving up my beloved flavored coffee creamer (at least what I buy at home, not that I'll refuse to use it when out and about), and switching to real whipped butter instead of canola blend spreads. Peanut butter was another thing - what I have always bought is full of palm oil. So, I'm now making my own - SO easy with my blender.

Cora also has been creative lately - Stace brought home this cookie box, a nice heavy cardboard with a magnet closure, thinking the girls might like it. 

Cora transformed it into this amazing box for her D&D minis. 

Seriously, this is impressive. She added the red felt, the dividers, and paint, plus the logo.

Grandma wanted to do something fun with the girls, so she took them to the pottery paint shop. I love this photo of them!

Their creations turned out awesome!

And, of course, Cora has been painting minis. She is talented!