Happy Tuesday!

i love fall. more than summer. there is something cleansing and refreshing about a blast of hot dry air in the summer, dont get me wrong. but its all about fall, babies! i love all things pumpkin, acorn squash, and the cooler weather. (my thoughts go out to the northeast and their freak october snowstorm. but it was 82 here the day before yesterday.)

speaking of acorn squash, i ate half of one the other day. ill probably eat the other half today. now, i dont like them steamed in the oven. i like them roasted- with some crisp edges. so i cut one in half, scooped out the innards, and cut it in slices. then, i rubbed the pieces with olive oil, sea salt, pepper, garlic powder, and a tiny bit of honey. into the oven for forty or fifty minutes. i flipped them when i thought about it- every fiften minutes or so. so good! i ate it with half an avocado (with lime) and some crock pot slow roasted pork i had going for dinner.

(crock pot roasted pork is one of my favorite things. take a pork butt, preferably bone in, and put it in the crock pot. dump in about a tablespoon of liquid smoke, pepper, and either sea salt or seasoned salt. thats it. cook it for a long time on low- i did my last one for 24 hours. its so flavorful and juicy and just falls apart.)

no pictures, but we had the pork on top of baked sweet potatoes with some smoky barbecue sauce, green onions, and cheese. (i had goat cheddar.) i scooped some more pork out of the pot and put it in a tupperware in the fridge for another night. with all the juice and meat that was left in the pot, we had beans again!

on saturday, my husband, his parents, and i went to disneyland! i love disneyland. it also happens to be where my husband proposed to me almost three years ago. (under the fireworks show, on one knee, in front of cinderellas castle, all decorated for winter. there was fake snow falling. yeah, it was so romantic. i loved it.)

i love all the kiddie rides and decorations and characters and shows. i get super giddy anytime we go.

apparently disneyland is very food allergen friendly, and gluten intolerance is no exception. the famous dole pineapple whip is GF and lactose free. it was really so good, and worth the half hour wait. i had never had one before, but it was creamy and tasted so fresh.

at some point, i also had a turkey leg. (so did my in-laws.) it was tasty, but tasted/looked more like ham on a turkey bone. not really like smoked turkey at all. (a very rude vegetarian made nasty comments while we enjoyed our turkeyham. not nice, folks. i respect you, you can return the favor.)

i didnt get a picture of the two roasted ears of corn i ate, but they were rubbed with chili, lime, and salt. the corn itself was candy sweet. yum. i had a bite of my father in laws mango, also with chili, salt, and lime. im not usually a big mango fan, but it was excellent like that! the fruit was surprisingly ripe and sweet for an amusement park.

my husband isnt big on suvenier-type things, so when we see something he gets excited about, we often get it. he drinks hot tea and hot vanilla milk a lot, and we found the perfect jack skellington mug. (from nightmare before christmas.)

isnt it great! skyler loves it.

(speaking of jack skellington, we failed to carve pumpkins for halloween. instead, we are going to carve them for christmas- nightmare before christmas!)

we had lots and lots of fun, in other words.

sadly, i think i got contaminated at some point during the day. my stomache was super uncomfortable around the time we got home, and all the next day it felt like it did the day after i got glutened before. it wasnt the horrible, crippling pain from a full on glutoning. but certainly not good. i dont know what couldve gotten me, because everything was certified GF. in any case, i didnt like it.

since my tummy wasnt happy, i just went with cold cereal for my first meal yesterday. honey kix and honey nut chex are both GF. (kix isnt labeled, because of possibility of cross contamination. upon googling it, i found that people who are extremely sensitive have had no issues with it.) i had a bowl of the two cereals, with vanilla coconut milk.

i made chicken noodle soup for dinner last night, but it sounded awful. my sweet man took us to chipotle instead. we are having soup tonight. i got my usual rice bowl at chipotle, and it was perfect.

ive found recently that drinking a cup of coffee or two cups of black tea in the morning, help with the headaches im so prone to getting in the afternoon. (im currently working with my doctor on this, along with the gluten issues.) ive always like regular cream and a touch of sugar in my coffee and sometimes tea. (i would rather have a tablespoon of cream for the great taste, than a quarter cup of milk. it isnt the same.) since im severely limiting dairy, i was ecstatic to learn about all the GF/DF creamers out there. the creme brulee from before is super yummy, but choice is nice. i also bought a sweet italian creme flavor, which ive had before and is extremely nice. its currently one of my favorites. i also tried a cinnabon flavor from another company, which im currently drinking. i like them all a lot and would recommend them! (but not with sugar. they are quite sweet enough!)

see you soon, guys! im off to play with my fur-babies.