Gluten Free Play Dough

My son is even more severely gluten intolerant than I am, so I've been leery of letting him play with regular Play Dough since it contains gluten. I looked all over Pinterest for recipes, tried one this morning, and it was an utter disaster. It more closely resembled pineapple chunky oatmeal than play dough. So I switched gears and found a recipe on About.com from the Celiac Sprue Association and gave it a try. It worked beautifully except for the fact that the actual cooking instructions were way off base, so I changed those to tell you a more accurate process.

Gluten Free Play Dough
1/2 c rice, potato, or sorghum flour
1/2 c corn starch
1/2 c salt
2 tsp cream of tartar
1 t cooking oil
food coloring of your choice

Mix the dry ingredients together well, then add in the wet ingredients, stirring until blended. The mixture will be very very watery and you'll wonder how in the world it's going to thicken up, but it will. Cook and stir constantly on medium heat for 5-10 minutes or until the mixture forms a ball. Once the dough isn't sticky to the touch, take it out of the pan and let cool a bit, then knead it more by hand. Let it cool completely before storing the dough a sealable plastic bag.

I love how simple this recipe is. This morning I just brought my son in to the kitchen, gave him a few pots and pans and a couple of spoons to play with while I worked on the play dough. In less than 15 minutes we had a wad of playdough even larger than a regular play dough can carries! I made 2 colors today, but I expect we might add some more colors to the collection next week since my son loves it so much. And that makes me a happy momma. :)

Pinspiration.

Pinterest has become a new interest of mine. Well... scratch that. It's not just an interest, it's an obsession. There. I said it. *Breathes deeply*. Hello, my name is Jen... and I'm a Pinterest addict.

I can freely admit that I've gone through every one of my pinboards and selected the 'best' cover; I have categorized and recategorized my pins into more and more boards as time goes by. Checking Pinterest as much, if not more than Facebook is not uncommon. My favorite Pinners, like my cousin Tara, who consistently posts some of the best DIY pins out there, Jane Wang (who posts fabulous recipes) and Lauren Conrad (yes... that Lauren Conrad) who has a great eye for fashion and design, pepper my pin boards.  I have three boards for food alone. I have two or three for fashion, and several for home decor, design, and organization. If I'm looking for a specific type of recipe, I check Pinterest first. If I have a vague design idea for furniture but want some more ideas, I check Pinterest. I confess that a lot of thought patterns end in "I should check Pinterest!" these days and frequently I'm met with eye rolls from my husband.

Thus, I am going to start blogging some of the Pinterest projects that are inspiring me in my own household off and on. (I know I'm only adding to the addiction, but really, it can't be helped. It's like the compulsion to scratch an itch...) I'll be posting the inspiration project, then following up with updates on my projects as they come along.

So, without further ado...

I want to take this.... (old beat-up chest of drawers currently being used as my craft supply storage.)

To something resembling this.

My chest of drawers is obviously a lot simpler in design than the inspiration piece and I don't intend on using Eiffel tower artwork in the decoupage, but I have some vary old hymnals that I think would work nicely for the drawer fronts. I'm trying to decide if I should paint the whole dresser the shade below.  I have this shade as an accent piece throughout my living room, but I'm unsure if I want to use such a vibrant color on a piece as large as the dresser... so. I don't know yet. Thoughts?

But regardless, I will post progress pics once I decide what exactly I'm doing to it. I'm excited to see how it turns out and I hope whomever my readers are, that they enjoy the process too!