Crunchy Stewardship
In this podcast we are taking a deep dive into what it means to steward our lives as God originally intended for us with the resources that God has given us. We will look at topics like food, medicine, finances, mental health and lots more through a natural lens with a biblical foundation.
Crunchy Stewardship
Crunchy Christmas: Healthy Alternatives To Make The Season Bright
Welcome to our Crunchy Christmas episode! As we head into the holiday season, we're sharing practical ways to celebrate Christmas without all the toxins that typically come with it—from scented candles and fake snow to sugar-laden treats and synthetic decorations.
In this episode, we cover:
- Natural ways to scent your home
- Real vs. fake Christmas trees: what's actually healthier?
- Healthier holiday baking tips and dairy-free alternatives
- Thoughtful, crunchy gift ideas
- Voting with your dollars and making intentional purchasing decisions
- Most importantly: keeping Jesus at the center of Christmas
Plus, we share our personal Christmas traditions, dairy sensitivity discoveries, and why this season is about so much more than presents and parties.
We pray this episode brings you joy and practical wisdom as you create a healthier, more intentional Christmas celebration for your family!
Chapters:
00:00 Welcome to Crunchy Stewardship
01:19 Chrissy's Random Revelation: Menthol Crystals
05:16 Katie's Health Journey and Conspiracies
10:58 Crunchy Christmas Traditions
14:46 Real or Fake Tree?
21:14 Natural Ways to Scent Your Home
26:51 Christmas Memories and Dairy-Free Treats
29:31 Exploring Dairy Sensitivities and Alternatives
33:01 Holiday Baking Tips and Tricks
37:33 Thoughtful and Crunchy Gift Ideas
39:57 Voting With Your Dollars
42:48 Crunchy Christmas Present Ideas
48:47 The True Meaning of Christmas
Connect With Us:
Join Our Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/crunchychristianmama
Follow us on Instagram @crunchystewardship
FREE How to Afford Non-Toxic Living Workbook: https://crunchystewardship.com/how-to-afford-non-toxic-living
Hello and welcome to Crunchy Stewardship. My name is Chrissy Roach.
Katie:is Katie Fila Jones. We are two cousins who are passionate about learning and sharing knowledge to equip others to steward their spiritual, mental, emotional, financial, and physical health in order to honor God in every aspect of their lives.
Chrissy:In our podcast, we take deep dives into what it means to steward our lives as God originally intended for us with the resources that God has already given us. We look at topics like food, medicine, finances, mental health, and tons more through a natural lens and with a biblical foundation.
Katie:am sure you guys are all super excited that Chrissy is back with us this week. I know. I am very excited. It was not as fun without you, Chrissy. Um. So I am very happy that you're here. So why don't you, as we are jumping into this episode, with us your random revelation of the week. And if you are new to our podcast, this is basically a segment where one of us shares something random that we have learned this week. Um, typically about. Something crunchy. And so it usually has nothing to do with our podcast episode, just our chance to share something random we have learned. So Chrissy, what is your random revelation week,
Chrissy:Yeah, so this week I discovered menthol crystals, which is not meth crystals. It is menthol with an n. Uh, essentially it is a, like fermented, not fermented. Essentially it is distilled peppermint oil that has been re crystallized. And so it's a very concentrated peppermint oil in crystal form. And what you do is you get a pot of boiling water and you know, if you have a cold or a little bit of a sinus. Congestion going on. If you put your head with a towel around it, over a pot of boiling water, it helps to clear your sinuses with the steam and everything like that. Well, if you put one of these menthol crystals in the water, it dissolves very quickly and you all of a sudden get like a peppermint steam. Coming up and it clears your sinuses, Katie, like nobody's business. It's one of those where like I'm talking half a centimeter sized crystal will punch you in the face, but it works so tremendously well. You take one inhalation and boom, sinuses are cleared. And I am kind of obsessed with it right now'cause I'm on the back end of. Having a little bit of sinus congestion. And, um, this time actually when I, so I got the cold maybe about a week ago. Um, the very first day I started feeling a little bit stuffy. I drank a bunch of bone broth, and then I've been just been using these menthol crystals and increasing my hydration. I haven't needed any sort of medication. I, and I've been using, I guess, uh, saline spray in my nose. To kind of help loosen it up a little bit. But yeah, I haven't needed any sort of medications for this cold. Um, no decongestion, I haven't felt like I got hit by a truck, which is really nice. Uh, in comparison to the last cold that I had, I was actually out of work for like a week because it was that bad and painful, and I think it was much more than just a cold, but it was horrible. This one. Has been practically a breeze and these menthol crystals have definitely helped. And I have to add to that, uh, my friend who is pregnant right now is having a lot of, uh, nausea with her pregnancy and she said that they work for that too, at least temporarily. So mental for hopefully in the future. Uh, yeah, so that's my new thing. I did Google it because I got these at like a little hole in the wall shop a few weeks ago, and it was like a little natural remedy, spices kind of place. Um, but I did find'em on Amazon. They're like$12 for four, four ounces, which honestly, let me tell you, that's a lot of it. It takes just a teen a little bit goes a long way. So, yep, that's my random revelation. Menthol crystals are the way to go to clear your sinuses when you have a cold superior.
Katie:oil, uh, when my nose so I'll put it like in the shower and it just kind of helps to steam it up. Or like Malachi's bath, but I've never actually heard of the crystals, so I'll have to see. I've been going to our natural. Like grocery store, which is, it's like a naturalpathic kind of place, but they probably would have it there'cause I recently have been buying homeopathic remedies from them. I also, Chrissy, this past week have been going, I went and got, uh, bentonite clay died Tenacious Earth and uh, activated charcoal and. What's interesting about your mysterious cold congestion stuff that popped up? You said that it happened. It started about a week ago. Well, about a week ago. For me, I've been feeling very and I've been getting these kind of like. Dull headaches. And then my throat has been kind of, it's like not a sore throat. Like, like when you get sick, you know when you, when you could tell when you're about to get sick.'cause your throat gets this like kind of sore throat. Well, it's been like this almost tight feeling throat thing. I don't even know how to describe it, but it just feels like something squeezing me from the inside. And so it's not super painful, but it's just weird. Well, about a week ago, Chrissy, the government. Open back up, and I don't know if you've been noticing sky, there's been a lot more spraying going on the airplanes. So if you notice the chem trails, we go with our conspiracies people, but. I am not the only person. Wes has also, like about a week ago, both of us just started not sleeping well and all these weird symptoms and then I've been talking to a lot of other friends and they're like, yeah, about this time, like the, like in the past week. So I think the government opened back up on the 13th or something. Since then, I've just been like feeling really weird. And so anyway, now I'm like, how can I detox all of these like, heavy metals that are going into the air and poisoning us. Anyway, we're not gonna go into the conspiracy too much. I'm just gonna leave it there. Oh. And, um, my friend, uh, who, does. She doesn't do homeopathy. She does, um, like naturopathic, like she does tinctures and things like that. And so she made me a milk thistle tincture. I've never done tinctures before. I don't know if you have either, but interesting. It's, they're like baked with an, like an alcohol base. Um, and so they're very. They of just sting your mouth because it's like an alcohol, but you only do like one or two drops. So but I got a bunch of the other stuff from my like natural grocer store thing, which sells like stuff and everything.
Chrissy:Now the real question, did it work?
Katie:I started it, what? It's probably been three. Three or four days now. I've definitely been feeling better. I have been sleeping better, but I've also, I, on top of that too, though, I should back up. I really love magnesium for sleeping. Magnesium helps a lot and I, and I wanna say it's magnesium. I'm gonna get it wrong. Citrate. One of, there's, there's like a,
Chrissy:the one.
Katie:the magnesium. Lyce, don't even know which one it is anymore. It's
Chrissy:Gluconate,
Katie:the one that makes you
Chrissy:there's so many D, there's mag oxide, there's mag gluconate, there's mag citrate. Mag citrate makes you poop. Mag oxide increases your magnesium levels, so it's gotta be the mag gluconate
Katie:that
Chrissy:makes you sleep.
Katie:been using
Chrissy:I don't know.
Katie:I've I've been taking magnesium and then like a supplement, and then we have like this magnesium rub. It's kind of just like a. like a lotiony thing, but you put it on your belly before you go to sleep. And I've been doing that plus these other things. So I definitely have been sleeping better. So I don't know if the sleeping better is coming from the magnesium or um, the detox, but during the day I've been feeling a lot better because I was just feeling like really kind of just lethargic in the middle of the day. And. Yeah, tired and just like, kind of fuzzy, like just not all there. and then that sore throat thing, and it, again, it wasn't like a, a regular sore throat, so it definitely wasn't me getting sick because I can just tell like it's just a different type of sore throat. It just felt like something was constricting it. So anyway, um, I've definitely been feeling better, so who knows? But.
Chrissy:I, I actually talked to my naturopath doctor about, um, bentonite Clay, an activated charcoal, um, last week. He said, those are really great for food poisoning also.
Katie:so random. You wanna know how I actually know that
Chrissy:no.
Katie:is so stupid. We are, Wes and I just finished the newer. Hunger Games book. It's like the, the fourth one now, I guess a, it's technically fifth because they have three original and then they had a prequel, and then this is another prequel. Anyway, so it's the Fifth Hunger Games book, and they talk about the charcoal tablets for food poisoning, or if you do get poisoned at all, in general, like if you have any sort of like. that needs to get out of your stomach because it basically bonds with the stuff and like helps to get it out of your system. So it helps with detoxing and stuff. Anyway, that's how I learned, not not from any official stuff. It literally was from the Hunger Games that I learned that charcoal is good for food poisoning. Thank you. Hunger Games.
Chrissy:That's funny. Well, it's supported by a naturopath doctor, so there you go. All right. Well, let's transition into the actual topic for today's episode since we are leading into the holidays, and by the time this episode comes out, it will be the weekend before December. And so leading into Thanksgiving, no. Leading into Christmas. It'll be right after Thanksgiving. Um, but we are going to talk about crunchy Christmas. So how do you have all the fun festivities of Christmas time without exposing yourself to all of the toxins that come with it? With the sugar and the food colorings and the smells, and the scents and the candles, and the. Snow, the fake snow you have in your house and all the things. So there's a lot.
Katie:have a
Chrissy:And here we go.
Katie:you, when do you decorate for Christmas?
Chrissy:Whenever I have the energy and the time to do so.
Katie:of like a specific day, like, because I know a lot of people do decorate like the day after Thanksgiving, is today when this episode is coming out.
Chrissy:So traditionally my family would decorate the day after Thanksgiving, and we don't, we didn't take down the tree until January 6th. I don't know why January 6th was the day, but it was, um. I this year will probably end up decorating before Thanksgiving. Um, just'cause we have time next week. Like our whole week is kind of open and we're, we're both still working, but, um. The whole week of Thanksgiving is open in the evenings, and so we'll probably end up decorating for Christmas a little bit earlier, but I'm still having a hard time figuring out where we're gonna put the tree this year in our one bedroom apartment because every single wall has furniture on it. And I'm just thinking we put it in the middle of the kitchen. It'll be great.
Katie:Look around it.
Chrissy:Just kidding. I won't do that. Yeah, that'd be fine. Um, or in the middle of the living room. I don't know. Haven't decided, but.
Katie:We used to.
Chrissy:Why, what's your, what's your tradition?
Katie:typically sometime that weekend after Thanksgiving because it would depend on if we were in town or not. So it would never really fall like the day after Thanksgiving because always really traveled for Thanksgiving. Even if we were in Colorado, technically we would be out in the mountains at our family cabin, and so we typically wouldn't come back to our actual house until. Like that Saturday, and we would typically end up like Saturday, maybe Sunday, depending on what we were doing that day, if Wes was working or not. And that's, that's generally been it. It's kind of like, okay, Thanksgiving's over, I'm ready to put the Christmas decoration up. But we actually do have a Christmas wreath already on our front door because I don't know if I've mentioned this before on the podcast, but. The town we live in now is like the Christmas tree capital of America, apparently. And you will definitely notice that when you drive through our town, there are literally hundreds of thousands of Christmas trees, and the people that run this giant Christmas tree farm go to our church and they gifted us a beautiful real Christmas wreath, which I. I don't know that I've ever had like a real Christmas wreath except for like childhood when my mom would get them. But an adult, I don't think I've ever bought them.'cause they're usually really expensive. so beautiful. It smells so nice when I'm going in and out of the door and I'm like, oh, it smells like Christmas with the pine. It's so pretty. So, yeah. Okay, next question, Chrissy. Do you guys use a real or a fake Christmas tree?
Chrissy:We do a fake Christmas tree because the fake Christmas tree was$80 one time, and a real Christmas tree was a hundred dollars every year,
Katie:Okay.
Chrissy:and that's the reality of it.
Katie:tip, next time, go to Goodwill. We bought, bought a Christmas tree, a really nice, like pre-lit one for like 20 bucks. And we had already purchased one off of Facebook Marketplace for$50. That was also pre-lit. And the only reason we got the second one was because it was only$20 and it was so nice. And so we have two fake Christmas trees now.
Chrissy:So the first year that we actually, we bought this Christmas tree, our first year bearing, married. We only. He had the little three foot Christmas tree, because we just didn't have space in the budget to buy a big one, and I already had a small one, so we just used it. Um, and then when we moved to North Carolina and we were buying a big tree, I was being very particular and I was honestly kind of throwing a fit about it. And we were both very stressed out about the whole situation, and we just needed to buy the tree and get it done and not think about it because it was. I, I don't even remember. It was just a really not a good experience trying to figure out what kind of tree to get. And also, I'm the kind of person, even if a tree is pre-lit, I still put lights on it because there's just not enough lights on a pre-lit tree, so, oh, yes. Yeah, my tree is very lit. Like there's honestly more lights than tree on it, So I did splurge a little bit, but I'd say it's worth it. It's a nice tree. It's lasted us a long time. Well, not a long time. I guess we're on year three, but$80 for three years. I'll take it.
Katie:Like you said, it's gonna last you forever. I mean, growing up we had, we literally had the same Christmas tree since I was little. It, ours was not pre-lit growing up, but. It was the same tree and we used the same lights and if the bulbs broke, they were, we had those like really classic giant glass bulbs that like when they hit the ground they smashed. And I mean, I guess like as kids, I don't know how my parents did that, but remember actually. But we were not really allowed to help decorate the big, like the big tree quote unquote big tree.'cause we had a little one, kinda like you said, the three foot one for kids. Jenny and I were allowed to like decorate that however we wanted we weren't really allowed to touch the big tree'cause that's where all my mom's special ornaments went. And then getting bigger. We were allowed to start helping and stuff, but when we were really little, I remember it was just like that was not a thing. But yeah, we have our pre-lit ones. One of them is white. I like, it's like just, or like, it's like the kind of like yellowy white light. And then the other one is a light one and it has different settings where the lights will like. Dance and flash and change colors and stuff. And it was really our foster daughter who has autism, like she loved that tree. And we would, we had it in the basement and she would turn all the lights off in the basement and just have the tree going. And then we would play music for her and she would have a little dance party down there. And that's all she wanted to do during the Christmas season. And it was just so cute. And we love that. So it'll be, that's kind of like a. Cute, sweet thing that as we get that tree out, I'm gonna be like, oh, Kylie girl. I miss you so much. I do. I miss her so much all the time. But I don't know what Christmas decorating is gonna look like for us this year because is in storage and I am gonna make Wes find one of our Christmas trees because I can't do Christmas without putting up a Christmas tree. That just sounds like nuts. Sos. so we need to have something. We at least have this Christmas wreath up so far, but it's early, we're gonna get all of our other stuff too. So I'm excited about that. Wait, so I had, I had one more thought about Christmas trees that I had to share because Okay. If, if we're thinking about it from a crunchy perspective, do you go with a fake one that's plastic and you bring plastic into your house and. The lights are likely LED lights that aren't good for your system. Right? Whether or not it's a real or fake tree, you gotta think about the lights. But here's another thing that I was thinking about. If we,'cause I don't, I don't know if, we live in the Christmas tree capital of America apparently, and there's lots of Christmas trees and we know the people that own this Christmas tree Farm. But I don't know if I would want a real tree in our house. First off, it is messy. That's like one of our big things. They're just so messy. Um, and Wes and I really just can't deal with messy, we just don't like messes. So that's one thing. But second, I was thinking that they probably, I don't know. I don't know this for sure, but I would think that it might be pretty likely that they would spray the trees.'cause it is like a crop. It's a farm, right? So. They're probably spraying them with some sort of pesticide or herbicide or fertilizer or something. And then if you think about like bringing that into your home, newly cut, my guess is they probably don't wash'em at all or anything, so I'm like they're just bringing in all sorts of chemicals into your home. At least that's my theory. I don't know. I don't know. I haven't looked into it, but I was thinking about it the other day, so I don't know.
Chrissy:Essentially the question is, would you rather plastic or pesticides? I think I'd go with the plastic personally,
Katie:lot of
Chrissy:but yeah, and that's the biggest reason, honestly. I think looking at it, it's like, well, I'm gonna have this tree up for a month out of the entire year, and knowing me, I'm gonna detox in January anyways, so.
Katie:Yep.
Chrissy:Yeah. Now. In terms of smelly though,'cause Christmas has so many smelly, like you were even saying, the pine on Reath is so smelly, but so many of the smelly are so fake and they give me such a headache. So I wanted to talk about what are some ways. That we could make our homes smell good without exposing us to unnecessary chemicals. So candles are pretty much out, especially soy candles. Those are no-nos because soy affects your estrogen levels, and that's no bueno. Um, but they do make all natural, like beeswax candles. Um, those are much better. Nonetheless, you're still burning it. And so there's still carcinogens going into the air because things are burning. So that's the thing with candles. But they do make, uh, Christmas and fall scented essential oils. Um. I have not used them before, but I have smelled them in some other people's homes. And let me tell you, they are delightful. I love them. They smell so good. You can kind of just keep'em going all the time and your house will just always smell nice. Um, and then if you don't have an essential oils thing, there is such a thing as. Simmer pot recipes, essentially you. Put a pot of water on the stove and you throw in things like apples and cardamom and apple cider and cinnamon sticks and clove and all these different things, and you just let'em simmer and the whole house will smell like Christmas or fall depending on whatever you put in the pot. And so that's another nice thing that's relatively cost effective and. Especially nice if you're having people over for dinner or something like that, you know, uh, you could just like throw it on, leave it on the back burner, quite literally, leave it on the back burner and it could just go for the whole night and you don't really have to worry about it. So that
Katie:You could constantly bake cookies and your house just always smell like
Chrissy:sounds like That sounds like diabetes.
Katie:I love cookies.
Chrissy:would, I have not added sugar back to my diet yet. I have not added gluten, uh, they to, so, okay. So for, for reference for our listeners, I am doing like a full gut detox, gut reset right now. And so it's a six month program. We cut out pretty much everything from our diets except for meat and vegetables. And now we are slowly but surely adding things back in. And so I've added back rice, chickpeas, eggs, and peanut butter. Those are the four things I've added back so far. Um. So far, my body's pretty happy, except I have a sneaking suspicion the rice has made me break out because. The rice, the eggs and the peanut butter are the only things that I've actually been eating consistently, like each day since I've added them back. And my husband is only really eating the rice consistently. He, like, the eggs are more inconsistent for him, and the, he doesn't really eat the peanut butter at all. And, um, both of us started breaking out and so I kind of just wonder, I'm like. We started adding rice back to our diet diets, and both of us woke up like a few days later with a bunch of pimples. What in the world now, granted,
Katie:of rice or is it like, is it organic or non-organic or
Chrissy:I don't know. I mean. We have two kinds. Our white rice is not organic, but our brown rice is organic and I think we've been using more brown rice. I don't know, whatever my husband cooks with, but just an observation. So we're noticing now that we've like created an environment where bodies are more sensitive to the things that we've taken out because it hasn't had them for a while. As we put them back in, we're noticing like, oh wait, I, I feel heavy when I eat this. This is another one with the rice. It's like, oh, I feel really heavy when we eat rice. It's like, this meal would honestly just be better without it because then I wouldn't feel so heavy afterwards. And so, um. Yeah, it's crazy. Like we've kind of come to the agreement of it might actually just be better to continue with meat and vegetables and only occasionally have other things because it just feels better that way. But anyways, that, that's a side note. So in terms of the cookies. We haven't added back gluten, dairy, or sugar yet. So, and the sugar might not be for a minute.'cause both of us had insulin resistance. So we're holding off on the sugar for a little bit longer to try to make our bodies more sensitive to insulin. Uh, but we have added back a little bit of like honey and maple syrup, you know, so there's a little bit in there, but yeah, I, I'm not a fan of the cookie idea.
Katie:I would, I would like, Christmas would be wonderful if it just like cookies and the scent of pine. I just, oh, that's like. That's Christmas to me. well actually, I mean you, you probably remember this growing up, our family made a lot of Buckeyes, which are the peanut butter balls dipped in chocolate.
Chrissy:I want to make those this year except like natural with dairy free chocolate and I, I did find dairy free dark chocolate, and I am fully going to make them this year.
Katie:you could, I actually made ice cream the other day. It was my best batch of ice cream. It was a peanut butter ice cream, and it literally tasted the peanut butter balls that we would make, because of course, when we were making it, I would literally just eat the peanut butter without all the chocolate, you know, as we're like mixing it all together. recipe that we used growing up was like. jars of peanut butter and then we would put powdered sugar and butter in it. And so you would really just need to switch out the, well, if you were doing dairy free, I guess you wouldn't want butter, but if you were okay with the butter, just make sure it's like a good grass fed, you know, organic butter. But then you would wanna switch out the powdered sugar for something. And what's that like powdered something, uh, that we talked about in the past.
Chrissy:Monk, fruit, coconut sugar, monk fruit.
Katie:it's like they make it into like a powdery form that looks like powdered sugar, so you could use that. I have been loving, loving, loving, loving coconut, palm sugar in, in all my things. And so the ice cream that I made was my regular vanilla recipe that I've been using, and I call it like a vanilla maple recipe because it's milk. and cream, and then, uh, the coconut palm sugar, maple syrup, and a little bit of salt, and that's it. But then this time I added peanut butter to it and made the peanut butter flavor, and it was so good. And it tasted exactly like the peanut butter balls that we would make for the Buckeyes growing up, which is just so crazy. So I'm like, I could totally do something with this and maybe even add like chocolate swirls into it and then make almost like a. Buckeye flavored ice cream. My mind I, we got a new
Chrissy:I love that.
Katie:so
Chrissy:Ooh.
Katie:why it was ice cream batch we made because this new machine is so good. I'm so excited.
Chrissy:That's great. Max tried to make ice cream a few days ago, but with, um. Cashew milk because we've been using cashew milk because I'm sensitive to almonds and I'm sensitive to dairy, and so like all the milks are, and I haven't added oats back yet. So all the milks are kind of out except for cashew milk because I'm not sensitive to cashews. And so. We tried to make it with that, but it did not work very well. It was honestly like very watery tasting, which kind of makes sense.'cause cashew milk is mostly water, so that's a work in progress. But I think ice cream might just be something that Max enjoys without me, because my dairy, I looked closer at my sensitivities that. They took at the beginning of this program and my dairy sensitivities are like off the charts so high.
Katie:Have you asked
Chrissy:Yeah.
Katie:about raw milk and whether they feel
Chrissy:Mm-hmm. It was on there. Yeah, so they actually looked at multiple different kinds of dairy. It was like, uh, like cheddar cheese, whey a one milk, a two milk, raw milk, something else. like
Katie:it.
Chrissy:the A one and a two were both like the highest sensitivity level. And then the raw milk was like the second highest sensitivity level.
Katie:Because I have heard, I mean,
Chrissy:Yeah.
Katie:we I think you and I were kind of talking about this a while ago when, I was telling you how we switched from doing like a 2% milk and then I went to an organic whole milk and that really helped my dairy sensitivity. But now that we do raw milk. I have no problems with dairy and none, like I used to get very like gassy and just get these terrible upset stomachs and stuff from the milk that we were drinking, but then simply switching to organic and whole was already helping that. And then now that we do just full out organic raw milk, um, I have it like every day like a lot. And so it's great.
Chrissy:Well see, I'm sent, I'm curious to know what my sensitivity is because I used to get migraines very frequently, at least once or twice a week, and I haven't had a migraine in months since I started taking things out of my diet. And so, um, I have learned that like sensitivities can be more than just digestive. They can be like back pain, neck pain. Headaches, fatigue, general. Achiness, stiffness, things like that. And so, um, stay tuned. Once I start adding in my sensitive foods back in, you guys will learn what these foods actually make me feel. Um, I'm curious to know also because I definitely thought I could handle dairy without a problem. And I would say like the A two milk was definitely better for me than like the um. 2% or whole milk or something like that. The A one, but which it probably is nonetheless. But in general, I'm curious to know what exactly my body's response is to milk in general. So yeah,
Katie:So
Chrissy:love it. Okay, so what about. Pie because there's a lot of pie. Well, Thanksgiving more so, but there are ways to make pie that, uh, does not have any dairy, does not have any gluten in it, and is low sugar. So especially like a pecan pie. You can use coconut sugar and maple syrup instead of granulated sugar for the sweetener part. And then they, um, they do have gluten-free pie crust, but honestly, those don't taste very good. I would much prefer to make a gram cracker pie crust. So Simple Mills, which is a very common brand, it's sold at Target, um, has a graham cracker. They, they call it like a honey cinnamon sweet thing. Um, sweet, thin, but. It's essentially like a graham cracker and you can use that to crush up and make into your graham cracker crust to be delightful. So just a thought. There's a lot of ways to make up. Pies that doesn't use all the junk, and especially like a sweet potato pie. If you use an actual sweet potato with like butter and then you put it in a um, food processor for a while and let it really get creamy, that is so much better than buying the canned sweet potato filling. So.
Katie:you an actual sweet potato, but you meant just sweet potato in the canned versus like potato. And I was like, what else would you use besides sweet potato to make a sweet potato pie?
Chrissy:I. don't know. It's great. Or pumpkin, you use an actual pumpkin instead of the pumpkin pie filling.
Katie:a lot of
Chrissy:So.
Katie:need to and I've kind of been putting it off, but I do, actually, last year was the first time that I made pumpkin pie from an actual pumpkin. It was, it was a lot of work, but it was a. One of the big things that I learned when you make like pumpkin puree for pie specifically too, is that you need to let the water drain from the puree. as much as possible, like as much water needs to come out. So you really need to let it sit in a strainer and just drip and drip and drip, because if it's too wet, it's, it gets too goopy and stuff, you know, and it's not, it's not going to give you that like nice. Kind of condensed pie. It was just too wet, like, and so I just didn't let it drain enough. So I probably, if I were going to do it again, I just need to let the water drain more and probably a day or two beforehand.'cause I kind of tried to do it all in one day in a few hours, which it said you could do. Technically you can, but I just, you need to get more of the water out somehow. But I have like one, two, have two big pumpkins. And 1, 2, 3 little pumpkins right now that I need to go and puree because I do wanna use it also for things like pumpkin bread and stuff, we have, um, these really yummy pumpkin chocolate chip cookies that shout out to my friend who's listening, who I know that you know who you are, that you make these cookies, and now you need to send me the recipe because I want to make them with actual pumpkin. You know who you are. You send it to me, she'll know, but I, uh, need to make that. But I have so many pumpkins and I keep putting it off. Obviously they've been around since for Halloween. That's actually one of the cool things about a lot of the pumpkin, like squashes and things like that. We bought so many of them at the end of the season because everybody's trying to sell them because it's the end of the season and they're all on sale. And so we bought a ton of. Spaghetti squash and butternut squash and pumpkins and stuff that I'm like, I know we can, we'll be able to use these eventually. They don't go bad very quickly unless they're like smashed, you know? If they get like a cut in them and then rot can get inside. But if you keep them in a good place and they don't get hurt, then they last a long time. We have like acorn squash even. I really like acorn squash a lot, and delicata squash, all these yummy things. So anyway. We have a bunch of'em that we need to be eating.
Chrissy:I love it. That's great. Let's move on to the next topic. Present ideas.
Katie:This year. Like a whole running list of all of the things that I want for Christmas this year. I don't know if I'm gonna be asking for presents. I think I wanna do so different in general, and I feel like God is directing my heart in a different way, and that is hard for me because I love getting presents. love getting presents, especially like new things, like new appliances or new shoes and stuff. It's just so It's just so great. Like who doesn't love new things?
Chrissy:You wanna know something funny? Growing up, my parents had a rule that you weren't allowed to gift an appliance to each other. Like they weren't allowed to gift an appliance to each other for Christmas or birthdays. And now as an adult, I'm like, no, no, no, no, no. That is all I ever want is more appliances. I don't know, that's just a rule they had. I'm like, if you wanna buy me a brand new vacuum cleaner, that works amazing. Go for it.
Katie:That's all I want. Like my list is like mostly appliances. I feel like I love appliances and I love shoes and I, anyway, I have a whole list of like all the crunchy things that I want. But I, I honestly have been, as I've been doing, presents for other people, been trying to find like the quote unquote crunchy version. So Jenny's birthday was in November. My sister, and she was looking for athletic clothes. So instead of just going to Amazon and like looking up leggings there, I was like, Hey, there's this brand that makes organic cotton leggings. Would you be willing to try them? It's, it's a brand that I've, I've boughten clothes, I've purchased clothes from them before and I really like their clothes. I have not tried their leggings yet, so I was like, I don't know how they are or anything, but do you wanna try them?'cause it's organic cotton? She was like, yeah, go for it. So she got them. I sent them to her and she says she really loves them and so. I was really excited to hear that because again, it's like, it's like the healthier version. Instead of having the synthetic, you know, spandexy material made with crude oil on your skin and stuff, it's like now you have nice organic cotton stuff. So been just trying to switch the way I think about giving presence too, because like my mentality has also shifted a lot of like. To the concept of voting with your dollars. So if you want the world to focus more on organic and healthy versions of all the stuff, whether it's food or things for your home, you need to start like that kind of stuff and like putting your dollars towards that versus like just going with something that's cheaper because it's made with. Uh, not healthy things, and so it is more expensive to do it that way, but if you, if you've like, spend your money there, it's like a vote for the world that you want in the future. thing goes with like, uh, this one's, this one's harder for me because I don't always do it. Mostly because I feel like every company is not great, but I've been trying to to find more companies that aren't as woke and just. into all the crazy stuff, and that's hard when you have to then start to dig into like their policies and figuring out what they're doing with the money, because you'd hate to like be spending money somewhere where then they're pouring money, money into something that you really wouldn't wanna support. But basically you're supporting by money at that company. Which is really hard, I've been trying to become a little bit more aware of that as I've been doing Christmas shopping and present shopping in general. It's, not easy, and I wouldn't say that I'm, I'm not anywhere near close to. perfect or acceptable on it. It's more just like I've been thinking about it and I'm trying to take steps in the right direction, trying to be a better human over here. Okay. People just stop trying.
Chrissy:And, and I commend you on that one because that is a headache to dig into. A policy and read through it and figure out who supports who and how. And yeah, I, I just commend you on that one'cause I don't think I have the energy to do that.
Katie:it, I, I don't have the energy. It's more, it's more like if I find something out about a company that I really don't love, then I'm like, okay, I, now that I have this information, really should do better. And if I really don't wanna support whatever they are supporting that I don't agree with, then I really need to start putting my money somewhere else. Um, so I wouldn't say I'm always going and looking for that, but when I become aware of it, it's something that I've been trying to do as much as possible. But as far as just like ideas, like if you're looking for simple, like. Just crunchy Christmas. Present ideas, I feel like some really easy go-to things are things like electrolytes. electrolytes is something that everybody could benefit from and most people would really enjoy because they're yummy of the time. So I think that, I don't know why, but in my mind like that seems like a really easy win. Yeah, that's like crunchy, healthy, and everybody could benefit from, if they're not like a crunchy person, you know, because there's some stuff that I'm like, oh, I'd love to get you this. But then I feel like if I got someone, like I can't even think of anything right now. A blue light, like the crazy cool blue light glasses, like the really cool ones. You know what I'm talking about? Not even just like the. Regular off of Amazon Blue Light Glasses, but the like ones that are tinted, reddish, the ones that like really block all the good stuff. I feel like if I just like gave those out to people, they'd be like, they're actually really expensive. So I probably wouldn't just go buying those willy-nilly, but someone would be like, why? do I need these?
Chrissy:You could gift them to me. I won't look at you. Funny,
Katie:Probably not. There's
Chrissy:thanks.
Katie:over I think.
Chrissy:Oh my gosh. Okay. Just kidding. I'll stick with my$8 blue light glasses from Amazon. That's funny.
Katie:Do you have any other Christmas idea, like present, like present idea things?
Chrissy:Present ideas. I think essential oils are always a great gift. I love them. Um, it's one of those things that I kind of just ask for as a stocking stuffer now. Um, it's really easy. You can get any scent and most of the time they're pretty good if you're getting'em from a good quality place. Um. Let's see.
Katie:thing I honestly like, you could think of something like tea. A lot of people drink tea. So if you think about getting somebody a healthier tea, whether it's like now going organic or making sure it's loose leaf so it doesn't have the bags, or if you do get the pre-bagged tea, making sure it doesn't have bleach in the bag and all that stuff. So it's like you could. Do like a crunchier version of tea or even getting someone like raw honey. I feel like everybody loves honey. Was it you that gave honey out at your wedding? Yeah.
Chrissy:that was our, like our little goodie bag thing, like a thank you for coming to our wedding. We gave everyone little jars of honey.
Katie:so I'm like, people like honey. So you could like get like a raw honey, raw honey to give to your friends. Like that's like another good easy one. Or beeswax candles. You just mentioned beeswax candles earlier. It's like you could do, everybody likes candles in general, so why not get them the healthier version?
Chrissy:I actually, one year my mother-in-law got me a tea advent calendar and it had five. Five of the same flavor of tea for each day leading up to Christmas, and it was so great. I'm actually still working through it and I got that two years ago. There's still a few left that I haven't yet had, but it really opened, broadened my horizons on my tea game and made me more interested in trying different teas because I used to be very like Earl Gray Green Tea. Peppermint tea and that's it. But now my horizons have been broadened and I've got raspberry leaf and hibiscus and um, chamomile and peppermint and lavender and all the other different kinds. So, and tea is also really great. Medicinally has a lot of medicinal benefits to it also. So, um. Yeah, you can keep that in mind if you're shopping for somebody. You don't have to tell them that you're buying tea for them for a medicinal purpose. If they're gonna be offended by that, you could just do it and say, I was thinking of you and this tea sounds delicious.
Katie:I love
Chrissy:Okay. With that though, I have to. Get your opinion on this. So one of the teas that my mother-in-law got me in this advent calendar, it had like some really weird flavors in it. One of the flavors was a cocoa ginger.
Katie:I have had like chocolate teas before and I hate them. I think that they really do not taste good. I had one, I think it was actually a part of a gift pack thing too, that someone gave me a while back and I thought it sounded so cool. I was really excited to get it. I wanted to like it and every time I would bake it, I literally would like spit it out. Chocolate. Like chocolate was not meant to be in tea form, like in anyone's
Chrissy:I agree. Agreed, and I never actually tasted the chocolate ginger. I just served it to my friends. They didn't love it, but they also didn't hate it.
Katie:yeah.
Chrissy:tea that one of our friends has, we don't have it, I'm just kind of rambling at this point, but he has fa tea, which essentially pick, think of like herbal tea with like chicken broth undertones.
Katie:a bully on cube in your water and sipping it.
Chrissy:Essentially, but it does, it tastes a little bit more like herbal tea, like than Bullion Cube.
Katie:I
Chrissy:It's kind of weird. I, I never tried,
Katie:like sipping broth or something, but still,
Chrissy:do that, but
Katie:I don't know why
Chrissy:I dunno.
Katie:you say
Chrissy:There's a lot of weird teas out there. Yeah,
Katie:Well,
Chrissy:it's funny.
Katie:kind of this conversation and end with really important note about the Christmas season, which is obviously. What Christmas is all about, right, is that we are welcoming the birth of Jesus. We are celebrating the birth of Jesus and. I think it's super easy to get lost in the season with all the busyness and lose sight of what really is important, and kind of where my mindset has been going and I, and I really feel like this happens most years where. We get into the Christmas season and I'm like, I wanna make it about Jesus. And then I get lost in everything because there's all the events and all the cooking you have to do and all the presents you have to buy and the cards that you need to buy and mail out and all the things. There's, there's so many little things that happen during this time of year this year, I, I really do, I think I am. And I keep saying I think so, but God has really been convicting my heart to say no to presents for myself. I'm not saying I'm not gonna get anybody presents, but for me, instead of getting presents, asking people to like give money to something for like on my behalf kind of a thing and. I, I just, I really, I need some kind of a heart reset. And I think it's because right now for us, we're in a season of buying a lot of different things. Like we are just spending a lot of money because we're doing this house renovation, so we're just spending so much money all the time and I'm like, I really need to stop buying stuff for myself. I need people to not buy things for me, even though I have a whole Christmas list. I have things I would love for people to get me, but think that. God is really just trying to challenge me this year to be like, this is really the year that you need to stop focusing on yourself and focus on me. And it's only, it's only this, it's only Christmas, like this one year. You know, it's not like I have to do it every year and it's like God is kind of telling me like, Hey, put all this aside and let's really. on what this season is about. And now I'm not going, I'm not telling you as a listener or Chrissy, I'm not telling you that you had to go and do this, but I just, I don't know. This year, I, I really feel like God has been convicting me of that. And now that I'm putting it out here, now, you guys all know and will hold me accountable to it because I, you are really the first people I'm telling. I haven't even told Wes actually, but the last like week, I've really been thinking about it, especially as we're getting into like. Needing to buy presents and things like that for people. And I'm like, oh, it's the time of year where I'd be making my own Christmas list and sending it out to our family and stuff. But I'm like, I don't think I will. I think I'm gonna send them like places to give money or something like that. But we'll see. We'll see what happens. But now I've told you, now I've told you guys and guys can hold me accountable to that.
Chrissy:I actually love that thought, max and I, so whenever we do our love languages test thing, both of us score zero for dear, zero for zero on gifts all the way around giving and receiving. Like we just don't do gifts at all whatsoever. Um. We've told our parents in the past like, Hey, instead of presents we, we haven't told them to give to anyone. We just said instead of like things we would prefer, just a check with the amount of money that you would have spent on the gifts that we can then put towards our savings kind of thing. Um. And so we're, we're planning on doing that again this year with both of our parents. But yeah, I, I understand the whole like. We don't need more things. We have so many things, you know, and it's when we get the things out of the way, it makes it easier for us to focus on the true meaning of Christmas that Jesus came and Jesus is here and we get to celebrate that the savior of the world has come to save us. And so, um, that's the true meaning of Christmas. It's not the gifts, it's not the presents or. The cookies or the cakes and the parties and the tree. It, it really is about Jesus. And I think when we, we get the focus off of all of that other stuff and we truly focus on Jesus, then Christmas is just that much better. You know? And there's not expectations to meet and there's not, um, hurt feelings. And when things don't go your way, because ultimately. Jesus has come and he is the salvation of the world, and so that is something we can rest in and be confident in.
Katie:That was beautifully said, and I think that it needs to end right there because nothing else could be said better right now. So Wonderful. Well, as we get into this Christmas season, we, we are praying for you guys. We pray that you would find. Peace and rest this season. We pray that you do find Jesus, that you have those moments with him to thank him for coming to this world for us, um, for everything that he did on our behalf. And yeah, just praying that you keep it crunchy, you keep it Jesus focused We just pray that this episode brought you a little bit of joy as you get the season started. And with that, my name is Katie
Chrissy:My name is Chrissy.
Katie:And thanks for listening to Crunchy Stewardship. Bye.