Poor Samantha!

(she picked her outfit out today, hehe.... she loves LONG WHITE SOCKS!)

I finally got my daughter, Samantha (6) tested for allergies. I've always suspected food allergies, but the pediatrician always poo-poo'd that, so I didn't push it. He knew she had allergies, but didn't think it was food, so didn't think putting her through the testing would be worth it, as you'd treat it the same anyway.

She's been on allergy meds for years. She's had so many health issues (chronic ear infections, hives, exhaustion, two surgeries, etc...). Sometimes the allergy meds worked, but the side effects SUCK sometimes, too. Well, I got tired of not knowing and brought her to an allergist. They took the blood and ran a RAST test.

Two weeks later at the follow-up appointment, the results were handed to me by the nurse. I could hear the drum roll in my head, I swear! I apprehensively looked at the results and my heart sank! My stomach ached! .... I just kept staring at the papers...

DOG: HIGH
EGG WHITES: HIGH
WHEAT: MEDIUM
COW'S MILK: MILD
CAT: MILD

The "DOG" jumped out at me and hit me so hard. DOG EPITHELIUM. DOG EPITHELIUM. DOG EPITHELIUM. WHAT was "EPITHELIUM" and how can I get RID OF IT!? I just couldn't believe it!!! Denial is such a handy little thing, huh? How could our beloved Teddy, such a little sweet innocent thing, cause so much trouble!

Well, I am a total *mama bear* and my first reaction was that we needed to find her a new home (my denial lasted approximately 3 minutes, lol). That said, I knew that my oldest daughter, Molly (15) would be so devastated. You just can't imagine.

The allergist is one of those logical types that wants to try to first *manage* the dog before packing her bags (keep out of bedroom, no carpet in bedroom, don't allow Samantha to handle, bathe bi-weekly, HEPA air filter in room, blah blah blah...). So, against my natural personality of going FULL THROTTLE on everything I do, I am going to take his advice and try to "manage" her. I am now a manager. All of a sudden I find myself thinking of her as "the dog", LOL! I love her, but my kids are MUCH higher up on the *mama list*.

Now, the DIET: we have removed egg whites and cow's milk completely from her diet. Wheat is so difficult, so the allergist wants to try to keep this in her diet (not too much) and maybe with the removal of the other two, and the dog management, her allergies will be below the "threshold" and controlled. Allergies are all about *control*. Keeping her allergen load under that magical threshold.

Samantha's eating so healthy that we all should be so lucky! As I'm sure you all know, most processed foods have either milk or eggs in them, or both. :) She's naturally a very healthy eater, so the diet part really isn't that hard for her. She has so much self-control! It's sort of shocking to me (mostly because I DON'T... she's like her dad... thin and muscular). Even if she *wants* something, it's not hard for her to not have it! She already knows most foods and what they have in them. At school she knew not to eat the yogurt in her hot lunch. It wasn't on the menu, but they served it that day and she actually didn't eat it because she knew! And she LOVES yogurt! :::sniff sniff::: I find that amazing for a six year old!

One morning I was so tired.... I made TWO fruit salads for her breakfast without even KNOWING! How nuts is THAT??? Lucky I don't have to drive in the a.m. I need to get more sleep.



Here's the little culprit!!! She sure looks innocent enough, huh?


Samantha loves writing recipes. She makes them up or copies them or asks me what a good recipe would be. Isn't this one cute? This is an actual recipe for what she calls "Fudge Balls". They are peanut butter balls coated with chocolate. We used to make them on occasion, but can't now cuz look at all that BUTTER! :(((( Anyway, I encourage her to abbreviate lots in her recipes. This is how I do it. Who needs it all written out, yk? When I cook I don't have the patience to read all that extra nonsense! :P I hope I'm not messing her up in school with this cheater-recipe-philosophy! (most of it you can figure out, but "coketi" is chocolate, in case you want to make these, LOL):



Hope everyone is having a great Spring! I did my second show of the summer yesterday and did pretty well. Thankfully! Etsy has been slooooooooooooooow lately, so I needed a decent show!
The wind was really bad, so I had to put an extra penny in all my cello bags (I already had a penny in each one of them, hidden behind the cardstock). HAHA!

xoxo Liz