Cats

It’s funny how life, and your friends lives, seems to go in cycles.  In our late twenties and early thirties we went to lots of weddings.  Then it was christenings for a few years and most recently there has been a spate of 40th birthday parties.

I’ve also noticed, while I’ve been babysitting for friends, that post 40th birthday and second child starting school seems to be the optimum time for getting cats.  I’ve been charmed by countless kittens being inquisitive, affectionate and displaying other generally cute kittenish type behaviour.  Maybe that’s because I don’t live with said kittens.  I’m sure I would soon get fed up with  kittens, and subsequently cats, strolling across my keyboard if it were happening on a daily basis.

I’m sure it won’t come as a surprise then, as I have had my 40th birthday and the boy has now started school, that round about Christmas time we were thinking of getting a cat or two.  We even went as far as buying a cat flap and a book on how to look after a cat.

Then we had the boy’s annual allergy check up and were told that getting a cat was not a good idea.  There was a very high chance that if he lived with a cat he would become sensitized to it, if he wasn’t already allergic to it.  So we shelved that idea.

It turns out though, I don’t have to be sad about not having kittens and cats strolling across my keyboard.  Anytime I sit down and try to work I generally get a small cute, although not furry, face stuck right in my face, or over my keyboard.

Easter Bonnet

It’s that time of year again.

The time when I grumble amply about how apparently difficult it is to make an easter egg that hasn’t been anywhere near a nut.

The time when I have countless conversations with myself (mostly out loud and often in public places) about whether it’s better for the smalls’ teeth to let them eat all the chocolate in one go, or better for their tummies to spread it out over a few days (well, weeks actually, I’m quite mean), or just better if I eat it all for them (see, not really mean, quite kind actually).

The time when I give each child a straw hat, some toy chicks, more stickers than are strictly necessary and instructions to make their own blooming Easter Bonnets.  Sure, I’ll dress it up by telling them that it’s better for them to make their own than have me make it for them, but really I’m just no good at all this crafty stuff.

I think they did rather well.  I particularly liked the girl’s idea of having her chicks hanging down, australian cork style.

Foiled Again

The smalls watched, fascinated, as I wrapped each half egg in foil.

Why yes, I did go to the trouble of buying easter/spring (ha!) themed foil, thank you for noticing.

I think they thought I was just going to leave unwrapped chocolate lying around the house for them to find.

Even I have some standards when it comes to leaving unwrapped food lying around the house.

Chocolate Eggs

It’s around this time of year that I spend a lot of time grumbling about irresponsible chocolate manufacturers and how it wouldn’t be hard to make mini, individually foil-wrapped, chocolate eggs (you know, the ones you use for Easter egg hunts) in a factory where they don’t also process nuts (or nutty chocolate).  Sigh.

Three years ago I bought a mold for making said mini chocolate eggs which I promptly put in a cupboard and forgot about.  Excuses for not making the eggs so far have included: not knowing how to temper chocolate, finding out how to temper chocolate but not having a chocolate thermometer and, finally, deciding I could get away without tempering the chocolate but not having pretty foil squares to wrap the eggs in (no, cutting up bits of silver foil wouldn’t be good enough, it has to be pretty foil).

This year, under increasing pressure from my children for an Easter egg hunt (and not wanting to buy loads more bags of Easter Haribo which I would end up giving to the PTA just in time for the Christmas Fayre) I cracked.  I got out the mold, washed three years worth of dust from it and melted some chocolate.

I totally wouldn’t recommend that you follow my process, although I have ended up with eggs that my children will be fine with.  They will be too wonky to stick together, but surely finding half eggs will make the hunt twice as long and therefore twice as much fun?  They also have a slight bloom (where some of the cocoa fat has risen to the surface because I didn’t bother to temper my chocolate – they look dull or sometimes white, not lovely and shiny) on some of them which is considered to be unattractive by professional chocolatiers but I suspect that my children won’t actually be assessing them in the manner of professional chocolatiers before they stuff as many into their mouth as they can manage in one go.

So , with that in mind, here’s what I did:

Take a pan of hot water and put a glass dish on top to melt the chocolate in.  Don’t let the water boil or your chocolate will melt too quickly and burn (or something equally terrible).  Buy far too many chocolate buttons, working on the theory that you will need to eat at least half of them to calm your nerves (or some equally tenuous reason for eating a large quantity of giant buttons).  Tip half of the buttons into the glass bowl, reserving the other half for, er, eating.  Melt said buttons.

Next, find your molds, wash out three years worth of dust and get your children to pose for a picture with them.  Ensure you have two large molds as you’ve been watching a lot of Star Wars lately and the girl has developed a bit of a thing for Princess Leia.  (Note, no large molds were used in the making of these eggs as I found out that I couldn’t actually get the eggs out of the mold after the chocolate had set so I had to melt those back down.)

Fill the molds (obviously).

Refrigerate until set (couldn’t tell you how long for as I made more than one batch and they got left in the fridge for varying lengths of time).  Curse about not being able to get the large eggs out, chip them out and re-melt the chocolate.  Be a little bit smug about the fact that, actually, the little ones look ok.

Repeat until you have enough eggs for an egg hunt, or have used all the melted chocolate.  Consider melting more chocolate as you’re quite in the swing of things but realise that (a) you have more than enough half eggs (18) and (b) there is no chocolate left to melt as you’ve eaten it all.

Temptation

Every now and then when I walk down this aisle, the temptation to stop, unscrew the lid, stick my finger in, scoop up a dollop and eat it is almost too much.

Mostly I don’t think about it, but occasionally I really miss peanut butter.

Not What I Was Expecting

We had the boy’s annual allergy check today.

The eagle eyed (or family members) among you will notice that as our last appointment was in May it isn’t strictly an annual check.

We were asked to come back in January this time because I’d mentioned the boy’s occasional wheeziness over the winter months.  Wheeze, dry skin (he has that too) and allergies are very much linked.

His chest was pronounced clear (as was his nose, I wasn’t expecting her to look up there, brave lady) and after a thorough questioning of me by the Good Professor’s Registrar (lovely lady by the way) it seemed that his winter wheeze was pretty much to be expected and very much kept in control by us (hurrah us).

We also mentioned again his occasional weird reaction to apples and were told to chop up an apple and zap it in the microwave for 15 seconds before giving it to him.  Apparently the heat will kill the proteins that set him off.  Who knew?

Last allergy appointment he didn’t have to have the prick tests so I assumed that we would be not doing them for a couple of years as his peanut allergy is severe enough to assume that he won’t grow out of it.  Last time he was tested he was also showing a less severe allergy to hazel nuts and a moderately severe allergy to silver birch (oh look – 5th picture down).  Unfortunately, for the boy, it was decided that today he would be tested again to see how he was doing.  His peanut allergy was off the chart as usual but interestingly he tested negative for all tree nuts.

And that’s when I got thrown a bit of a curve ball.

The Good Professor’s Registrar (lovely lady by the way) suggested that we try the boy on some tree nuts.

Unlike the Good Professor (who used to tell me that if I could guarantee the provenance of the nuts i.e. if I picked them in their shell from a tree rather than shop buy, I could try feeding them to the boy at home – I pretty much ignored that suggestion every time he made it) she suggested that we go back to the hospital and do an oral challenge.  It pretty much does what it says on the tin but in the safe(r) environs of the hospital.  I’m excited but still nervous.  What if he reacts?  I know we’ll be in hospital but there are no guarantees in this life (although – in general there are no guarantees….).  And then, what if he doesn’t react?  This could totally change the ground rules, and you know how I feel about change!

I need to think about this.  It’s a good job that they haven’t confirmed a date for the tests yet – I don’t have anything to work myself up to yet.

We did other things today (London Transport Museum, met Rebecca and her lovely son Theo) and I took other pictures.  However, even though you’ve seen this sort of thing before, this is the strongest image of my day.  The plus sign, with the small red lump beside it, above the big lump is his histamine reaction – the big lump is his peanut reaction, the histamine lump is a normal allergic reaction.  The peanut reaction is ridiculously over-sized.

Ouch and Yuck and It’s Just Not Fair.

Thanks to Weetabix

I would like to say a huge thank you to the lovely Ben at Weetabix who took the time to reply to my previous post about Weetabix and Weetabix minis.  His comment was clear, concise and explained exactly why there is a difference in the two products’ allergy information.  If only more suppliers were as transparent, living with an allergy would be that bit easier.  You can see his comment here.

Thank you Ben.

Mind you, I can’t believe he’ll be able to convert me to chocolate cereal in any form – I’ll keep you updated!

In other news, my oldest child is nearly 7 and I like to think that I don’t buy things unless they’re fairly necessary.

How then have we ended up with so many felt tip pens?  Surely one packet each would be sufficient.

Oh, and there are two packs of pens that I’ve just remembered which aren’t included in this shot, not to mention about double the quantity of crayons and pencils.  How?

Weetabix Chocolate – It’s Not Straightforward

We’ve had some nut related shenanigans today which has left me feeling mildly grumpy.

I had a call from the small’s school this morning, just as I was about to go into my school, to say that the boy had gone into a complete meltdown because they had chocolate weetabix to eat at breakfast club (lets just skip over the fact that I disagree with chocolate cereal anyway, my two always have breakfast at home before they go) and he was convinced that he’d had it before but they weren’t sure if it was safe for him.

Biting my tongue and not commenting on the fact that they had agreed only to have cereal that is ok for him (which is a pretty wide variety, including coco-pops), I explained yet again where and how to find allergy information.  I also pointed out that he was in the school’s care and until he could read it was their responsibility to read the ingredients for him.  I told them that he wasn’t to have the cereal unless they were absolutely sure it was safe.

When I got off the phone, I immediately googled chocolate weetabix (thank goodness for smart phones – I can’t access a computer once I leave home in the morning but always have my mobile) and on a cursory look it seemed that it wasn’t safe.  I phoned the school back to let them know, only to be told that they’d reached the same conclusion because they too had googled (I was very good and didn’t ask why they hadn’t tried that before phoning me).

The boy is usually very good about not being able to have the stuff that other people have.  When he goes to parties I often have to take a packed tea and always take a cake just in case.  He rarely complains and if he does get upset can always be quickly talked round.  He is incredibly stoic about it all (more so than me I dare say) but when I picked him up this afternoon he was still very cross and upset that he hadn’t been allowed something that he was sure he’d had before.  I don’t think it was because everyone else was having it – I think it was because he knew that he was telling the truth and wasn’t being believed.  I feel really bad for him but they were doing their best to protect him so what can I do?

In an attempt to try and placate him, I said that I would check the ingredients when I did our big shop this evening.

It turns out, as usual, that it’s not as simple as it could be.

There are two types of chocolate weetabix – normal and mini.

Here’s the packet for mini chocolate weetabix – not safe

and the packet for normal chocolate weetabix – safe

 

The path of nut-free living continues to be complicated, frustrating and downright unfair at times.

Christmas Cake

Slightly later than usual, I made our Christmas cake today.

My house smells of Christmas.

Birthdays and Christmases

Since I went back to work we’ve had a couple of shopping deliveries.  I don’t like having shopping delivered because there is no substitute for being able to check the labels on food packaging as I shop, but needs must and all that.

When we have a delivery I try and make sure that it will arrive when the children are still up.  They think that having the shopping delivered is the most exciting thing in the world.  All their birthdays and Christmases at once it would seem.