Baby A last christmas

As is becoming tradition for me, a little roundup of the year that was! It’s been a big adventure, as we welcomed our new daughter in the late part of 2013, the new year was a haze of cluster feeding, but as we found a new rhythm once again we had a lovely time amongst our online friends as the year unfolded. Less eating out, and more kitchen adventures, as well as a good dose of sleep-deprived opinion!

January and February: Are you kidding?!

Not time for blogging with new Baby A in the house, things were a little chaotic! Not least when we established fairly early on that she seemed to have a cow’s milk protein allergy. Poor little mite had dreadful rashes, a poorly tummy, and would cry for no reason at all for hours on end. A new phase of free from living for us – dairy free and gluten free for me whilst breastfeeding – eep! We were helped a great deal by Dairy Free Baby and Me, Nia, and others on twitter.

Isabel at the Allergy & Free From show

March: Meet the Manufacturers

We were delighted to present something a little different by starting a new feature: ‘meet the manufacturer’ – interviews with some of our favourite gluten free brands. Perkier kicked off by telling us about their rapid growth, Nature’s Path‘s UK director told us about his background as a children’s author, and the founder of Delicious Alchemy shared the personal story behind being the first company to bring gluten free oats to the UK market. Finally, the wonderful Isabel shared the story behind her naturally gluten free mixes.

April: Oats, oats, everywhere!

Talking to so many purveyors of breakfast yumminess obviously gave me oats on the brain! We looked for new ways to use them, especially as we were in need of some slow-release energy to get us through those 3am feeds with Baby A.

Blueberry, Banana & Oat Bites

May: Bored of oats, what about corn?

Thanks to twitter folks, I found lots of delicious ways to use up a stash of cornmeal (polenta).

June: The best gluten free machine mix is…

Due to a lot of online shopping whilst baby-feeding I finally got round to settling one of the questions that had plagued me since my coeliac diagnosis – which is the best gluten free bread you can get out of a bread machine?

July: Baby Led Weaning

By this point Baby A was LOVING her food! I started a new section of the blog to put down some of the bite-sized baby-friendly dairy-free snacks I made for her. We took introducing new foods slowly in case any other allergies emerged, but so far so good! We’ll try a milk challenge again when she’s 1 year old.

Bloggers, burgers, beers

August: Summer Perks

Now getting some sleep I reinvested energy into getting fit and healthy, and inspired by Perkier, shared some of my healthier ‘summer perks’.

September: These are a few of my favourite things

Bored of blogs just sharing ‘here’s a yummy free thing someone sent me’ I blogged my favourite gluten free products – the ones I actually regularly buy and recommend.

October: The Schichttorte

A little video of my gluten free, dairy free take on the Great British Bake Off technical challenge. I’d love to make some more videos, watch out in 2015!

A Coeliactivist

November: Gluten Free Identity

With more time on my hands I turned my attention to the question of gluten free identity and branding. Which gluten free tribe are you in?!

December: Happy Birthday, Baby A!

A recipe I’m particularly proud of – Baby A’s dairy free, gluten free and added sugar free carrot cake.

I hope you and yours have a happy christmas, and we look forwards to sharing more of our adventures in 2015 xxx

Happy Christmas from the B family xxx