Today I would like to share with my fellow bloggers a unique opportunity for your blog this holiday season. I have got myself all signed up and invite you to join me in participating in the 2014 Holiday Gift Guide!

Bloggers 2014 Holiday Gift Guide Sign Up

I would like to take this time to officially welcome the Autumn season... I think. You never really know with this New England weather. Anyway, it's always been a toss up for me on whether Summer or Autumn is my favorite season. Growing up it was always Summer hands down, because I despise being cold and will go to great lengths to avoid it, and I love soaking up the summer sun and getting an amazing tan out of it (and the fact that my birthday is in July helps a bit too!).

As I've gotten older, I've really come to appreciate nature's Autumnal beauty. The colors can be breathtaking and I've found much solace in leaf peeping as soon as foliage turns (I'm sorry if you're not from New England and have no idea what "leaf peeping" is, you are surely missing out). I can't wait to get Liana outside for walks in the Autumn air (all bundled up of course) and watch her gaze at the new leaves.

In addition to leaf peeping, Autumn also lets us break into our fabulous boot collection and cozy up in our oh-so-soft scarves and sweaters while sipping on some warm apple cider. And it goes without saying that our recipes are now trending with apple and pumpkin deliciousness and spiced up with cinnamon, cloves, and nutmeg. Yum!


I have been trying to plan for the past few weeks what my first Autumn recipe would be and I almost settled on baking an apple pie for the first time when I saw Hannah Maggs' home baked apple pie recipe (I was only slightly disappointed that she used store bought pastry crust instead of homemade), but I decided to try out something a little different. You may have had apple crisp baked in the oven, but have you had it cooked on the stove top? Neither had I... Until now.

Today's amazing creation is brought to you with the help of Julie Johnson from the cooking station at Whole Foods Market in South Weymouth! This scrumptious appley dish is the perfect dessert to end my no sugar challenge (there is no added sugar in this recipe!) as well as welcome the beautiful crisp Autumn season. --- See what I did there? Crisp? I know, I'm spending too much time around Ashton...


Let's gather our ingredients!

1 1/2 cups apple cider
1 tbsp corn starch
2 tbsp coconut oil
2 cups vanilla granola (I had vanilla almond on hand)
3 honeycrisp apples, cored and sliced
1 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp vanilla

First we'll need to core and slice the apples.


We can put these in an airtight container in the refrigerator for now, so they don't go brown.

Now mix 1/2 cup of the apple cider with the corn starch in a small bowl and set aside.


Next let's heat our skillet over medium high heat and toast the granola. We have to first melt the coconut oil, and then add the granola. We'll stand by stirring continuously until our granola is toasted and golden brown.


Smells good already!

Next, we move the granola to a bowl and set aside. Let's add our apples, the remaining apple cider, vanilla and cinnamon.


We'll turn the heat down a bit and pop on a lid to let it simmer. As the apples become just tender, add the cornstarch slurry and heat until the mixture is thickened.


I bet your house is filled with a warm Autumnal scent by now!

We can now transfer our skillet of deliciousness to a serving dish or storing dish.


Sprinkle the top with the toasted granola and enjoy!


This apple crisp would be delicious served warm with a scoop of vanilla ice cream or my current favorite, Almond Dream's Praline Crunch ice cream. Mmmm. If you don't happen to finish it all in one sitting (kidding, kind of..) it can be stored at room temperature on the counter for 2-3 days. I know some people swear by refrigerating it, but I don't since the 'crisp' might get soggy (I think apple crisp with added sugar should be refrigerated due to the bacteria that can grow from the combination of the apples and refined sugar).

Now that I've mentioned it, you probably only just noticed that this recipe does not call for any additional sugar. Although I officially ended my 'no sugar challenge' yesterday, I still think it is important to avoid large amounts of sugar when I can. Apples already have natural sugar, so I didn't see a necessity for added sugars--and it is still mouthwatering without it!

Do let me know if you try out this recipe in the comments or by using #RecipebyDanielle on twitter or instagram! xx

On an ordinary morning off from work, I plop Liana in her high chair while I prepare her bottle and my breakfast and we will sit side by side and enjoy our meals. On this particular morning I was too afraid this would be the last of the warm sun for the season and decided breakfast outside might be nice. I opened the front door to let some air in and the package on the front step caught my eye. I saw that it was addressed to me and I immediately tore it open like a kid on Christmas morning. It was a beautiful dress for my five year old cousin Natalia. A huge grin spread across my face and I began imagining the pictures I wanted to take of her in it.

The dress: Two Tone Satin Bodice Champagne Dress by Sara's Fashion

The top of the dress is comprised of a pale cream tone satin piece that overlaps a champagne satin piece for an elegantly styled sleeveless surplice v-neck bodice. This is met in the midsection with a horizontal strip of champagne satin and pulled together with two voluminous satin flowers, one pale cream and one champagne colored. The flowers are pinned on for easy removal or rearranging. We were debating if we should take some photos with the pale cream flower in her hair and leaving the champagne one, but decided to photograph the dress just as it came. From the midsection, the dress flares out in a ballgown style with a pale cream satin "slip" underneath and two layers of sheer netting flowing over it down to the champagne satin trim at the bottom.


The back of the dress is a single tone pale cream satin with a zipper up the middle and a pale cream cord to tie a bow at the waist.

The Photo Shoot: Natalia Christiana

Fast forward a few days and Liana and I were heading two and a half hours up to New Hampshire to deliver the dress and prepare for a photo shoot with Natalia! My aim was to get a few good shots of the dress because of how gorgeous it was, some candid shots for my blog, and also some portraits that could be used for Natalia's school photos. My model did not disappoint!



Natalia LOVES this dress. She was actually the one who chose it off of the website, even though her Mom and my Mom were both trying to talk her into other dresses. She said it was comfortable, as I can imagine with the satin fabric and soft outer netting. Natalia would normally fit in a dress size 4/5, but we decided to measure her according to the Sara's Fashion sizing charts, just to be sure. It's a good thing too, because according to the chart we ordered a size 4 (the dress tag says 3/4) and it seems to fit her well.


The shoot must have lasted a couple of hours, but I honestly could have snapped photos of her all day. I had some particular poses in mind, but so did Natalia! She says, "okay one like this" and would throw a pose, "and one like this." I think she's been secretly modeling in front of a mirror. Then she says, "I want to do a shy one," and brings her chin down as she curls her arms to her chest and lifts a knee to hide her foot behind her other leg. What the heck? She's five! Where did she come up with this?



When I asked Natalia if she liked the dress, she said it was her "princess dress" and she asked if she could wear it to school. She loves the dress so much, that she had me chasing her around the yard for several hours while she posed for more photos. The shoot went well enough for us to end up with around three hundred and fifty shots! Of course a few were of her little sister Riley, who jumped into her cute Hello Kitty dress when she knew we were taking pictures. Such little cuties Megan and Dan have. :)


What really brought this photo shoot together and made it such a success was this beautiful dress! Sara's Fashion has a wide selection of stunning dresses, but Natalia definitely had a good eye for choosing a dress that is very flattering on her. When I have to buy Liana a dress for formal events in the future, I will definitely start with Sara's Fashion.


If you'd like to see more photos from the shoot, visit my blog again soon. I am going to showcase a good amount of them on one page and put a link in the menu bar above (I'll create a link in this post as well when they are up). I don't want to put them up before Megan sees them and chooses which ones she'd like to use for Natalia's school photos though.


And please, any tips for future photo shoots would be very much appreciated! I'm thinking a Halloween shoot might be in order. :)







** I was not paid to write this review, however, I was kindly offered the product for the purpose of a review. All opinions expressed are explicitly my own, and I would never positively endorse a product unless I truly love and enjoy it.

I recently finished up a series of healthy eating workshops at Whole Foods (South Weymouth) with our Healthy Eating Specialist, Sarah Howes. I'm not going to reiterate everything that I learned, but I will show you how I am applying it. One of our sessions focused on elimination diets--simply put,  removing a certain food from our diet to see how our body responds. We also briefly covered ways that sugar and flour are heavily integrated into our everyday diet and how our body uses and stores these foods. Combining these two elements, I have decided to do a no sugar elimination diet for 23 days.

I can tell already that this is going to be quite the task for me, as I have accidentally slipped up already. I meant to start on September 1st, but in the midst of having guests over I quickly scarfed down my Thai basil and edamame veggie burger without a thought. Where was the sugar? In the roll! Ugh, why didn't I think of that? With attempt #2 on the following day, I specifically picked out the yummiest sugar free lunch but what ruins my meal? A ketchup packet! :( By September 3rd, I realized that sugar is pretty tricky and I must be more careful.

So far I have made it three whole days sugar free! It doesn't sound like much, but I honestly never realized how much sugar I consume. This challenge is already so eye opening for me and I can't wait to see what else I learn.

Berry Sprouted Cereal

Review