The Green Thumb and The Brown Thumb Collaborate

My daughter has a green thumb. She gets it from my husband. Lucky them! I'm cursed with a brown thumb. ​

This past weekend, the two of them picked up some new herbs to grow on the windowsill, among them were mint and Thai basil. YUM. Frankly I'm happy that I can cook with the herbs but I'm not responsible for keeping them alive. ​

I was browsing through Dinner: A Love Story and came across this post and felt inspired. (Thank you, Jenny!)  ​So, my little Green Thumb and I set to work. We picked, washed and chopped fresh mint and basil while wheat berries were cooking on the stove. We also chopped a half of a shallot (actually that was my job... she opted out of that one, proclaiming it too smelly.) Once the wheat berries were finished we combined everything with the juice of one lime, 2 tablespoons of olive oil and some sea salt. Easy, quick, healthy. Delish. 

Lunchbox Cutlery and Crust Cutting

It's funny how developmental advances happen sometimes accidentally.
My daughter has been going to camp this summer at a fantastic place called The Barking Cat. Every day the kids go on adventures that as a parent with access to such a fabulous city, I wish I had the stamina for. The roster of places included The Met, The Museum of Natural History, The Marionette Theater, The Brooklyn Museum, The Guggenheim, Prospect Park playgrounds. The list goes on and on. Sure, we visit museums. But not four in a week. Every week.
Post- adventure the kids spend all afternoon creating art. I have been completely delighted with The Barking Cat and so impressed with how well Karen and Maria have run the program. Most importantly though, my daughter raves about it each day at pickup.
Campers are supposed to bring a packed lunch each day - fine for us because we use LaLa Lunchbox. But the other day I had one of those super tired accidental parental lapses in judgement. I prepared her sandwich in the morning and packed the other lunch foods. My daughter is not a crust fan so I trimmed the crust and, as usual, gave it to my son with his breakfast. Or so I thought.
At pickup, my daughter exclaimed "Mom! I loved taking off my own crust! Thank you for packing that knife!"

Oh.my.god. Did anyone hear that? Jesus. I packed a knife in my six year old's lunchbox? In an instant I tried (unsuccessfully) to think back to the morning... Was I using a butter knife? Or some kind of totally inappropriate Ginsu-type?
Clearly it all worked out fine, but still. I quickly opened the lunchbox and it was, in fact, a butter knife. And a dull one at that. Phew.

The good news is that now my daughter wants to cut off her own crust always. And despite the fact that I won't be sending her off with knives in her lunchbox any time soon, it's an exciting new level of self sufficiency (under the right circumstances of course!)

At This Point, I Really Should Know Better

It's quite simple, really. 

• step 1: when dining out, tell the waiter/waitress about allergies. 

• step 2: carry all medications.

• step 3: make sure said medications are current (not expired). 

I met some friends last night at one of my favorite restaurants. There are a few things on the menu that I've never ordered because my go-to standbys are so utterly delicious, it's always hard to veer from them. Last night I changed my mind. Had a hankering for something from the sea. I'm allergic to fish, but not shellfish so I ordered the octopus salad with dandelion greens. One of my dinner companions ordered the same thing - but had her dressing altered to olive oil and lemon juice. It would have been wise for me to have followed suit. 

As I learned five hours after the fact, my dressing was made with anchovy fillet. I didn't feel better hours after taking benadryl and finally Googled the recipe. I only have myself to blame. Step 1: ALWAYS tell the waiter/waitress about any allergies.  

During an allergy attack, my heart thumps. My fingers and hands shake from the medicine. I feel a strange sort of speedy buzz pulsing through my body from the inhaler, which competes with the utter exhaustion that comes from the benadryl. The reaction to my allergy medicine is sometimes just as intense as the reaction to the allergen itself. Anchovy, as it turns out, tasted quite yummy in that dressing. But I couldn't finish my dish at dinner. I felt a few hives around my mouth and one on my lip. And a golf ball sensation in my esophagus. I know that golf ball sensation. I've known it all too well for a long time. But for some reason last night, I chalked it up to indigestion and to a cross contamination allergy. My allergies to fish (and nuts) are so sensitive that I can get hives if my food is touched by the same utensil that is used to for nuts and fish. Anchovy isn't one of the more powerful or oily fish so the reaction isn't as severe. I would have known after one bite if there was salmon in that dish. And I would have known what to do. You'd think after so many years of handling my allergies I'd be smarter about things and know how to distinguish a reaction to something I've eaten from something that's touched something I've eaten but I never quite feel like I'm in my right mind when an attack comes on. I have trouble thinking clearly. 

I left my house last night without my allergy medication. Don't ask me why. I'd certainly get a lecture from my parents for that one - even now as a grown adult with children of my own. And from my husband who, until midnight was on a cross country flight back home after traveling this week for work. When I have an allergic reaction, I've got the internal struggle of feeling completely afraid and helpless and at the same time feeling ultimate pressure to take proper care of myself, by myself. Maybe that's why it's so hard to think clearly. Step 2: ALWAYS carry ALL medications. 

I've been to this restaurant a million times, I figured. I wanted to take a small purse. I didn't have room for allergy medicine. I realize how stupid that must sound. Believe me, I'm berating myself worse than any family member of mine could do. By the time I got home, I raced to take two benadryl. Benadryl has been my savior on countless occasions. I'm familiar with the hazy exhaustion it brings. But it's been so long since I had any kind of allergic incident. I'm usually so careful. I'm embarrassed to admit that the benadryl all over my house carried an expiration date of February 2011. Step 3: ALWAYS keep allergy medicines current. 

My old boss used to say that expiration dates were things to be ignored. "Marketing tools to buy more product," he'd say. I stayed up until the benadryl's sleepy effects took over, even though I didn't feel the relief I usually feel with a contact allergy. Unusual. It had been an uneasy, uncomfortable 2 hours. I finally googled the recipe for the dish and discovered the underlying reason: the anchovy. No wonder. It wasn't a contact allergy at all. It was a real allergy. I.ate.fish. What an idiot. After some internal debate (and back and forth texts with my husband who landed late and had trouble finding a taxi thanks to last night's storm) I took another benadryl and a dose of the inhaler. The golf ball feeling went away after 10 minutes. My body felt relief. 

I had a conversation with my mom just the other day about the terror a parent feels when his or her child has anaphylaxis. According to the Food Allergy and Anaphylaxis Network, each of my children has a 7 in 10 chance of having some sort of allergy because my husband and I both have them. "Challenging as it is, you learn to deal with the terror when they are little. You find ways to control situations as much as possible so that you avoid allergens. You get the help you need for them when that fails," she said. "But then there's a whole new level of terror that you feel as a parent when they grow up and you hope that you've done what needs to be done so that they take care of themselves." 

Shame on me for not telling the waitress about my allergies. And for not carrying my benadryl with me always. And for not having current supply in stock. I'm okay now. It's just going to be a long, tired day. 

People: if you have allergies, please don't be a jackass. I say that in the nicest way possible. Take care of yourself, in the way that you know you have to do for your own best interest. 

A Confession! And All Good Things in Moderation

I'm a chocolate person. Some people are not. I find that odd, of course. 

So here's a confession... I have stashes of chocolate lying around my house and in my car and in at least three of my purses. When I was a kid, my grandpa was like this. We used to laugh about it. He wasn't the chocolate bar type - he was a box guy. As a kid with severe allergies, those boxed chocolate bon bon shaped things with their random fillings were a danger zone for me. ​ But I remember finding little boxes of them all around his apartment in the Bronx and getting a chuckle out of it but also being upset that I couldn't indulge. 

As an adult, I like to have a bit of chocolate every day. ​It usually amounts to a one or two inch square. And with such a flood of delicious chocolate products on the market today, it's hard not to indulge. Of course I have my rules. I never buy milk chocolate. I'll only buy bars that are at least 55% cocoa (my sweet spot, as it were, is 70% or more cocoa bars) and my top three fave flavors are orange peel, candied ginger and mint. That sweet melty goodness of the square on my tongue can round out any day nicely. 

I've read countless articles praising small amounts of chocolate. ​Some have gone so far as to say that dark chocolate is healthy, like this article. I was overjoyed to read this article from the Huffington Post this spring about the relationship between chocolate and cholesterol. And this one from ABC News, Dark Chocolate for a Healthier Heart, is sure to please chocolate lovers. 

Today we see articles galore about too much of this and not enough of that. And eat this for a healthy heart, but not if you have diabetes. And avoid this if you don't want gout but get lots of it if you want abs of steel. It's dizzying. I'm okay with having a little bit of chocolate every day. I live my life healthfully. I eat well and exercise regularly and always have. One chocolate bar can last 2 weeks or more in my house. ​So am I advocating running out and buying up the world's cocoa beans and expecting that to cure life's ills? No way. I dont think that a headline in a few magazines should justify lifestyle behaviors that are beyond the scope of rational. So why, you might ask, do I have what I describe as stashes? Good question. If I'm out and unable to stop what I'm doing but need a bite of something, I can whip out of square of that chocolate bar. If I'm sitting in traffic, starving and cursing myself for driving in the first place, one square of that trusty chocolate saves the day. We all know that eating a chocolate bar a day isn't healthy. But a bite or two seems okay to me. I'm able to stop after that. All good things in moderation. 

Food Allergies and Superstar Caregivers

​I've got food allergies. Life threatening ones. I grew up during a time when food allergies were not nearly as common as they are today and I have no way to calculate or fully understand the impact it truly had on my family life. I just saw a tweet from The Food Allergy & Anaphylaxis Network with a link to a survey about the impact of allergies on caregivers. Frankly, despite how awful it is that so many kids suffer from some kind of food allergy today, I'm relieved to see that the issues surrounding their caregivers are being addressed (and so much more attention is paid to allergies in general). 

Kids used to tell me that I should live in a bubble. I'm allergic to nuts and fish (among other things) - but my allergies go beyond just not being able to eat them. The oils of certain nuts and fish are so powerful that my body reacts just to smelling them, or touching a door knob that someone who ate those foods just touched. I carry an epi-pen and have been to the emergency room to get through bad reactions. Having allergies has made me more aware of the food I put into my body. I was a label reader long before it was cool. The ability to control what goes into my body is something that arose out of both need and anxiety in me. Those feelings are also what led me to create one of the specific features of LaLa Lunchbox. Users can customize their food library. Having choices and adding favorite foods is always a good thing, but being able to remove foods that make you sick or add foods that are in the safe zone was absolutely a must for my app. 

Bizarre as it may sound, I had not previously considered the full picture impact of my allergies on my parents or my sister until I started reading Feeding Eden, by Susan Weissman. I plan to write a full review when I've finished the book and am finding it thoroughly engaging, honest and very emotional thus far. 

For all of the caregivers of food allergy sufferers out there - hats off to you. To all of the food allergy sufferers, I hope you can take comfort and find safety in the amazing support systems that exist for you today.