As you know my career for the last nine years has been mom....and altho that will still be a venture I am participating in, I seem to be less needed than I have been in the past. With one small exception that is....my B.
My youngest, B, has food allergies. She is allergic to peanuts, soy and tree nuts. And these are not mild allergies, these are the if she doesn't get help immediately she dies kind. Scariest thing in my life that's for sure. I have seen her get hives all over her body until she became one big red itchy blob and listened as she began to gasp for air. Not a moment I want to relive ever again, and I have done this twice so I know how bad it gets. My problem is this....she is a kid. All she wants is to fit in and be "normal". You all remember that, don't you? Now imagine that you can't eat most prepackaged foods because they all get made in one big plant that doesn't separate nuts from non-nut sources for foods and one drop of oil that may have splashed from one vat to another could kill you! You can't ever eat any treat that is brought in to school for anyone's birthday! You can't eat cakes at other kid's birthday parties because the bakeries use nuts in some of their foods! Imagine how much that would suck and how non-normal you would feel, on top of the fact that your mom never lets you eat anything "good" because it "could" kill you...
So enter my change of career......baker! After much research I have discovered that there is not a single guaranteed nut-free bakery in St. Louis!!!! I know for a fact there are many, MANY other families that are affected by these allergies and yet no one has stepped up to fill this void.
I love to bake...LOOOOOOOOOOOVE to do it. And to be able to create yummy concoctions that I know would be safe for her....such a relief it would be, as I'm sure it would be for other parents who worry just like I do. And it wouldn't just be for those who have a family member with allergies but also those who's children go to school with and are friends with kids with food allergies. Plus...it would be good...I just know it because I already bake it at home and it disappears around here so fast there is sometimes no point in even turning off the oven!!!
Sooo..just telling you ahead of time that should you see a nut free bakery, ask for K....might be me:)
This is a picture of the precious B at one of her most precocious moments which I absolutely cherish...and it is not recent, almost 4 years old at this point so safe to post but...who could resist a face like that and protecting it?
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