the benefits of celiac disease & money matters

Happy February everyone!  Well it has been a full two weeks since we have had any take out for dinner. While this may not be a big feat for most, it is unfortunately, for me.

While I am good at many things, cooking isn't one of them.

But since my celiac diagnosis in November, I had to choose between learning how to cook and bake or spend twice as much at the grocery store. Because the latter wasn't an option for us, I opened up to a new world of cooking and baking.

And you know what?  I kind of like it.

My parents got us a bread maker for Christmas and I absolutely love it.  I've made about two loaves per week since we got it (my son LOVES the homemade GF bread).  And as far as dinners go, its been pretty easy - most of the stuff I made was gluten-free anyway.  But I did have to make some substitutions, which is totally okay.

But the good news is that we are keeping our grocery/eating out bills at a minimum.  After moving to our new house, we have a larger mortgage which is much harder to get used to than I thought it would be (we live in an expensive part of the country. Not California expensive, but close). So we are looking at all of our options to save money and focus on what matters most.

We cancelled cable. We use our cell phones as our home phone. We stopped any and all unnecessary spending. We cook more. We stopped eating out. We lowered the thermostat.

And you know what?  Its working out. Having a tight budget feeds my creativity.  I used to think that it would hinder it (not being able to spend money on scrapbooking supplies, or artsy stuff), but being limited to what you have on hand and making it work takes a lot of creativity. And thankfully, I have plenty of that to spread around.

So I am off to bake yet another loaf of gluten-free bread and to get some laundry done before I pick up Roman from school. I hope you all have a creative day and are able to focus on what matters most to you and your family today.