Frugal Fridays – Homemade Citrus Cleaner

 
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Homemade Citrus Cleaner - CradleRockingMama

So this is an oldie but goodie: make your own homemade citrus cleaner!

Why should you bother with making your own all-purpose cleaner? Two reasons: no nasty chemicals, and HUGE cost savings.

To give an example, we had one last bottle of 409 All-Purpose Cleaner under our cabinet that had not been disposed of yet. Going to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services own database of Household Products netted me this lovely description:

Warnings: Not recommended for use on soft vinyls or varnishes. For painted surfaces, test small area first. Eye irritant. Do not get in eyes. Wash thoroughly with soap and water after handling. Keep out of reach of children.
Acute Health Effects: From MSDS: HEALTH HAZARD DATA EYE IRRITANT. Avoid eye and prolonged skin contact.Do not ingest.
First Aid: EYE CONTACT: Immediately flush eyes with plenty of water. If irritation persists, see a doctor. SKIN CONTACT: Wash with water. Seek medical attention if irritation develops or persists.INGESTION: Drink a glassful of water. Call a physician. Do not induce vomiting. Do not give anything by mouth to an unconscious or convulsing person. INHALATION: If breathing problems develop remove to fresh air. Seek medical attention if respiratory irritation develops or breathing becomes difficult.

Nice, huh? And we’re supposed to spray this on EVERYTHING in our houses?

The Environmental Working Group ranks 409 All-purpose Cleaner a “D” on their graded list of general purpose cleaners.

The worst part? Many of their ingredients have NO DATA on their effects, either short or long term. Somehow, despite the lack of safety data, Clorox can put these ingredients in a cleaner we are expected to use on our babies high chairs, our kitchen counters, and anywhere else in our homes we have a mess to clean.

It’s disgusting, insulting, and dangerous.

Not to mention expensive! You’ll spend at least three bucks for the privilege of poisoning your family.

None of this was acceptable to me, so I made a healthier, cheaper decision for my family. I make my own all-purpose cleaner out of citrus peels and vinegar!

Vinegar has long been touted as a miracle worker in the home, but the addition of citrus peels really knocks this out of the park.

The process of making this cleaner allows the natural citrus oils to release into the vinegar; the active ingredient in the citrus oils for cleaning is d-limonene. I found data that indicates this humble little element of the citrus peel can be used to safely strip paint, clean away heavy machinery oils, and even may (at a complete 180 to your standard household cleaner) prevent and/or treat cancer!

It’s just a win/win/win, all the way around.

It’s also so easy, it’s ridiculous. 

Now that citrus season is upon us, all you have to do is start eating lemons, limes and oranges. All those peels you have when you’re done snacking? Throw ’em in a ziploc bag until you have enough to fill a quart mason jar.

Citrus peels in a mason jar, covered in vinegar.

Citrus peels in a mason jar, covered in vinegar.

Then shove the jar as full of peels as you can, cover with plain white vinegar, and put a lid on it for at least two weeks.

After two weeks (or longer, if you’d like), pour the liquid through a mesh strainer into a spray bottle to catch any peel bits and top off with plain old water.

My current bottle in use; the next batch is steeping on the counter in the background.

My current bottle in use; the next batch is steeping on the counter in the background.

Voila! A homemade, powerhouse, grease-cutting, non-toxic, REALLY cheap cleaner for almost all surfaces and needs in your home! 

If you prefer, you can pour the vinegar solution into a plain jar and use it undiluted for particularly tough messes, but for the most part, the water dilution works for just about anything you will encounter in your home.

I’ve used this on my kitchen counters, dining room table, bathroom counters, and even as my floor cleaner.

It works just as well as any chemical solvents I’ve ever used. Occasionally I have to break out the baking soda to give a little scouring “oomph” to my cleaning, but really, this is an amazing solution to a nasty problem.

Plus, it fits nicely in the “use it up” part of the Depression-era mantra: “Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without”. 

Hope that helps!

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Have you ever made your own citrus vinegar? How did you like it?

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“DE-gan” or “NoDE”

 
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SumPics Photo BlogOy.

Y’all, I’m tired.

Yesterday I shared my awesome solution to the birthday cake frosting problem, and without a second thought I called it “Vegan”.

Yep. A recipe whose “secret ingredient” is CHICKEN FAT, I called Vegan.

See, the problem is that we are dairy and egg free; over the years I’ve come to rely on Vegan recipes to help my family eat well and safely.

So for US, Vegan means “dairy and egg free…and we’ll toss some chicken in to make it better”.

That doesn’t exactly fly with True Vegans, obviously.

So, my apologies, my Vegan readers. I wasn’t ignorant, I wasn’t being insulting, I was just tired and didn’t pay attention to what I wrote.

All of this brings up something I’ve been mulling over since I got called out for my slip-up yesterday, though. Several people commented – before I even explained my “meat-eating vegan” thing – that they are the same way!

We aren’t the only dairy and egg free people out there who start with vegan recipes and add some meat.

So shouldn’t we have a word that means that so we don’t have to constantly type out “dairy free and egg free” when we’re either writing or googling for recipes?

I decided we dairy and egg free people need a shorter name for our needs. Darrel and I thought last night, and the two best names we came up with are “DE-gan” and “NoDE”.

That would be “D(airy)E(gg)-gan” and “NoD(airy)E(gg)”, just to clarify.

What do you think? Shall we join forces and coin a NEW allergy word? Which word has your vote? Or can you think up a better option?

Leave a comment here or on my Facebook wall and lets have fun with this idea!!

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Speaking of getting a conversation going, I need your help!

We did the craft show last weekend and are still willing to do another one. The next one is in a few weeks, and this time Darrel and I want to sell some of his prints.

He has some framed and canvas photos for sale, but we think the price point is too high on those. We lost count of the number of people who commented that they LOVED the photos and “wouldn’t that look great in my ________”, but didn’t buy anything.

So, some prints, matted and for sale at much less expensive prices…well, we think that might actually sell. (Haven’t we all seen – and sometimes bought – a pretty picture for $15 that was matted and ready to pop in a frame?)

Only problem is – we can’t decide which pictures to print! And we certainly don’t want to print pictures that we  like that are wholly unpopular with everyone else! We can’t afford to make mistakes like that!

So here’s where I need your help: would you please take a moment and leave a comment voting for your top three favorite pictures out of our leading contenders? I’ve numbered each picture so you can just say which numbers you like best.

I’m mostly interested in the photos that would most likely incite you to BUY if you saw them at a crafts show.

Pretty please? With dextrose on top?

You can comment here or on my FB wall, and we would really appreciate the input!

Between the DE-gan conversation and photo voting, it should be pretty interesting today!

Thanks a bunch, y’all! You are the best readers in the blogosphere!!

Photo #1

WindmillSunset

Photo #2

Violin Bokeh

Photo #3

Summertime Boots

Photo #4

Outsider

Photo #5

Into the flower

Photo #6

SumPics Photo Blog

Photo #7

Double Falls

Photo #8

Crayon Circle

Photo #9

Cowboy Sunset

Photo #10

Chalk Wave

So, which of these photos would you most likely hang in your house? Thanks for helping us get ready for our next arts and crafts show! 

Delicious Dairy/Egg/Gluten & Fructose-Free Chocolate Cake AND Frosting!

 
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Dairy, Egg, Gluten & Fructose Free Chocolate Cake and Frosting

(Edited Post Notes: I know, I know – I said this was Vegan, originally! Obviously, it is clearly NOT a Vegan recipe once you read through it. What can I say? My tired Mommy brain thought writing “dairy, egg, gluten, and fructose-free” looked too cumbersome and made the decision that being dairy and egg free was vegan – without considering the rest of the recipe! Major head slap moment. Sorry for the confusion, but I’ve fixed it everywhere in the post now. We really need to coin a term that means “dairy and egg free”, don’t you think? Thanks for understanding!)

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Edited 6/25/2014: I’ve since created a MUCH better frosting/icing recipe! Check it out here!

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Call off the dogs, the hunt is over!

It’s safe to say I’m pretty good in the kitchen, but one thing has stumped me this year: how to make a cake frosting with no dairy and no fructose.

The boys birthday cake was yummy but downright sad looking. It wasn’t even just plain old yummy – it was “yummy for an allergy free cake” yummy…which we all know is code for “it kind of sucked but it was better than I thought it would be when you take all the good ingredients out”.

That is just not  good enough! I’ve been on a mission ever since to find a way to make my boys a birthday cake next year that fits ALL the dietary restrictions: no dairy, no egg, no corn, no rice, no fructose, no wheat. Also, one that looks pretty would be preferable.

I think I finally found the solution to that nearly impossible task!

I went through several batches of cupcakes in this process, and the end recipe is a very simple variation of the Wacky Cake. That’s easy enough to find anywhere, right?

But the frosting…Oh, the Frosting! That’s where I’m particularly pleased!

This is an altered version of the traditional buttercream. It ices well, pipes beautifully, holds its shape and is exactly what a frosting is supposed to be – and it has NO sugar, NO fructose, and NO dairy!

In fact, I think you’ll be shocked at the ‘secret ingredient’ I used to replace butter!

See, with Fructose Malabsorption, coconut is often a problem. It is for Jed; so using coconut oil or coconut mana isn’t really an option. We also have suspicions of palm, which rules out a palm shortening.

I suppose I could have just used a regular vegetable shortening, but frankly, those skeeve me out. We try to avoid soy wherever possible, and the processing they use for vegetable (soy) shortening makes it one of the most unhealthy foods on the planet. Not to mention Zac is FPIES to soy, and I’d like to create a food that *might* one day be safe for him.

Since we also can’t have dairy, what’s a Mama to do?

The answer?

CHICKEN FAT.

I kid you not.

Remember when I shared about cleaning your fats to use in beauty care recipes and cooking recipes? I cleaned the chicken fat 5 times until it had no more little bits in it and had an almost flavorless taste.

Then I chilled it and used that instead of butter in the frosting recipe – and it works beautifully!

Anyway, that’s the backstory…on to the recipe!

So here’s what you do:

For the cake, mix your dry ingredients together well.

Cake dry ingredients well sifted...

Cake dry ingredients well sifted…

Then mix your wet ingredients together.

Wet ingredients mixed together...

Wet ingredients mixed together…

Then mix your wet ingredients into your dry ingredients and stir until just combined…don’t stir too long!

And, a cake batter is formed!

And, a cake batter is formed!

I made cupcakes out of this, so I have to be honest: I don’t know how well this will perform as a layer cake. I was so excited I had to share it anyway, and it works great as a cupcake recipe!

Make sure you fill your cupcake liners no higher than 3/4 of the way. They tend to want to ‘overflow’ and then sink. (Told you I went through several batches!)

So fill your cupcake liners…

Filled cupcake liners.

Filled cupcake liners. Some are filled too much. Ask me how I know this.

Bake at 350 for 30 minutes, until a toothpick comes out clean.

Voila! Cupcakes done!

Finished cupcakes!

Finished cupcakes!

Let them cool completely, then frost them.

While the cupcakes bake is an excellent time to get your frosting together.

It’s almost the same process as a traditional buttercream, except you don’t really have to ‘cream’ your fat before adding the sugar. Chicken fat doesn’t ever get terribly hard, and being chilled in the fridge gives it just the right texture.

As for the ‘sugar’ part of the recipe, I used straight dextrose powder. To make it perfect for a frosting, I turned it into powdered dextrose by grinding it in a coffee grinder with a tiny bit of Arrowroot Starch. The texture was perfect!

(And since I was making a chocolate cake with chocolate frosting, I didn’t sweat it that there were still some coffee grinds in the grinder when I started. In fact, I took it a step further and used actual brewed coffee instead of water for the frosting when the time came – after all, chocolate and coffee go together, right?)

So for the frosting, I had a bowl full of homemade powdered dextrose, to which I added cocoa powder. Then I sifted that together well.

Powdered dextrose and cocoa powder sifted together...

Powdered dextrose and cocoa powder sifted together…

After sifting, I added the chicken fat, vanilla, and slowly added brewed coffee and water until it reached just the right consistency.

Frosting ready to go!

Frosting ready to go!

Divine!

I know this sounds improbable (and maybe even disgusting), but I promise it works like a charm! Darrel said it tasted just like chocolate frosting is supposed to taste, and even after being told chicken fat was in it said he couldn’t detect the hint of it at all. Jed, of course, LOVED his “Happy Party Cakes” and sneaks cupcakes as often as he can.

Now, you can have this at room temperature for a short while, but it really will do better if you store the cake in the fridge. So yes, it will do fine for a half hour or so on the table at a birthday party, but before the photo op starts and after it’s mostly been served, stick it back in the fridge. If the chicken fat melts too much, it won’t hold its shape very well.

So try it – it might be just the answer for your dairy/soy/egg/wheat/fructose concerns at birthday party time!

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DELICIOUS DAIRY/EGG/GLUTEN & FRUCTOSE-FREE CHOCOLATE CAKE AND FROSTING

Cupcakes
– 3/4 c. almond flour
– 3/4 c. millet flour
– 1 c. dextrose
– 1/2 tsp. sea salt
– 1 tsp. baking soda
– 3 T. cocoa powder
– 1 tsp. vanilla
– 1/3 c. oil (I used olive oil)
– 1 T. white vinegar
– 1 c. cold water

  1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
  2. Mix together your dry ingredients and sift together well.
  3. Mix together your wet ingredients in a separate bowl.
  4. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and blend until just combined – do not over mix!
  5. Pour batter into cupcake liners in a muffin pan up to three quarters of the way to the top. Do not overfill!
  6. Bake for 30 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

Frosting
– 1 1/3 c. dextrose
– 1 tsp. arrowroot starch
– 3 T. cleaned chicken fat
– 1/4 c. cocoa powder
– 4-8 T. coffee or water as needed for consistency

  1. Using a coffee grinder, grind the dextrose and arrowroot starch until you’ve made a “powdered sugar” texture powder.
  2. Add cocoa powder to the powdered dextrose and sift together well.
  3. Add the chicken fat and 2-4 T. of the coffee or water and begin whipping the ingredients together.
  4. Add more coffee or water as needed until it reaches a smooth, spreadable, but firm texture.
  5. Store in the fridge until ready to use, then frost your cupcakes or cake as usual!
  6. Enjoy having a “creamy”, fructose free frosting for your cake!

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Have you ever tried something like this? What did you think? Do you have any fructose free frostings you’re fond of?

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Rocephin Reaction

 
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photo courtesy of Rasmus Thomsen at http://freedigitalphotos.net

photo courtesy of Rasmus Thomsen at http://freedigitalphotos.net
We don’t quite know which direction to steer next.

Before my impromptu craft fair hiatus, I left our regularly scheduled posting with a cliff-hanger: Zac had an ear infection last week that required another round of Rocephin shots.

Obviously, this is not great news; at the same time, though, I admit to being a little excited. After our last round of Rocephin shots it seemed like Zac’s tummy got all straightened up and he enjoyed baseline for a while.

If he truly does suffer from gut dysbiosis, that makes some sense. All the bad bacteria were killed off, making him a tad healthier for a while.

I hoped the same thing would happen this time.

It didn’t.

Instead, he proved that Rocephin ranks up there with acetaminophen and ibuprofen on medications that make him react; he’s had green, mucousy diarrhea all. week. long.

His heinie is bright red with yet another acidic diaper rash.

It’s a horrible thing to change your child’s diaper and have them scream in pain and thrash to get away from being wiped – even if you’re using plain, warm water to rinse their little tushie.

Slowly but surely he’s getting better. I say slowly because after the antibiotic reaction began, he managed to find a stray bit of crayon and ate it and the reaction became immeasurably worse. So it’s taking some time for his little insides to straighten out.

When that happens? I just don’t know what to do.

I strongly believe he needs some gut rest. The poor little guy has been in the midst of one big succession of FPIES reactions non-stop since the end of August, at least. Giving his tummy some time off is probably just what he needs.

I also strongly believe he needs a food. That we need to re-trial the Ali or the quinoa ASAP. I’m just very worried that without a little time to rest and heal, he will have a very hard time finding ANY foods his body can handle.

Darrel and I don’t waste any time trying to get Zac some foods. But is it really wasting time to do gut rest if that helps him find safe foods easier?

I’ve been waiting on some response emails from our doctors, after deciding to cancel the appointments last week. Maybe, when they respond, I’ll have a better idea of what to do next.

Until then, we are going to work on getting our house cleaned out and de-catted after the cats are moved to my parents house.

We’ve learned that there is no real way to “de-protein” carpet, not to mention he has been handily removing carpet fibers and eating them, so for Zac’s health we may have to go further in the hole financially to replace our living room carpet with something hard. What’s the cheapest flooring option out there? Anyone have a suggestion? I’m guessing vinyl or linoleum is our best choice. We certainly can’t afford to extend the wood from the rest of the house as we had eventually planned to do.

I’m starting to get really scared. Zac has reacted to everything we’ve given him; even medications. Are we missing something? Is there something more going on with him? How could we find out? Is there some other doctor we should be trying to see?

So many questions, so many serious needs, and no real answers or ways to move forward. 

We’re in, to use a sailing expression, the doldrums. Our winds have stopped blowing and we’re just…sitting here. Waiting. Biding our time.

Fun, fun, fun. 

Well, never fear; I’m not personally depressed over anything, and neither is Darrel. We’re a little scared, but that’s getting to be a normal thing in our house. We’ll keep working through our FPIES mystery one step at a time until we solve the puzzle for our sweet Zac.

In the meantime, Jed has just BLOOMED developmentally! We finally found a safe bacon and sausage for him to eat, and he’s been chowing down on piggy for the last two weeks. Coinciding with that increase in protein consumption, his vocabulary has sky-rocketed, and his imaginative play has taken off!

He’s turned our small hallway into the “common room” – those of you who watch Thomas the Tank Engine might recognize the “Engine Driver’s Common Room” a la Mr. Perkins. That’s our hallway now: the “common room”. He creates his own little stories on what we are to do in there, and we must all play along or he gets very upset.

Last night, coming home from an errand he started talking about going through a tunnel. I suppose the trees DID look like a small tunnel for about 5 feet. Suddenly, it became the Time Tunnel from Dinosaur Train and we were going back in time! He told me a whole big story about going through the Time Tunnel as we made our way home!

I love watching him create new worlds in his head and tell me all about them. Does anyone know if there is a connection between the quantity of protein a child eats and developmental growth? It sure seems like the bacon and sausage consumption coincides directly with this new development.

In any case, it’s awesome. And I LOVE watching him eat!

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How are things in your neck of the woods?

A Weekend at the Apple Festival

 
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A Weekend at the Apple Festival

Well, our big debut at the Apple Festival is over and done with, and I plan to put my energy back here again.

Oh, and into my Etsy shop, too.

Thank y’all for sticking around and being patient with me last week during our frantic rush to get everything ready to sell. It was a crazy week, but very manageable with being able to focus so intently on the crafting tasks at hand.

So now you’re wondering, “How did it go?”

It went…meh.

There are some things that you just can’t know until you try something. This being our first arts and crafts show, I learned a thing or two this weekend.

  • Fridays are always slow. That’s the day when the kiddos get field trips from school to come visit, and kiddos, as a rule, don’t have a whole lotta moolah to drop on, say, art for your living room walls or jewelry for Mom.
  • Sundays are usually slow. That’s when everyone comes from church to wander, eat some goodies, and socialize. They don’t come to buy.
  • You’re screwed if it’s an outdoor festival and it rains. Foot traffic drops to non-existent and sales bottom out.
  • There is a difference between an “arts and crafts show” and a “festival”. At an arts and crafts show, people come to see cool handmade goodies to buy. At a festival, people come to buy fudge and funnel cakes, walk around, socialize, sit and enjoy the musical performances and jump in the bouncy castle. They don’t necessarily come to buy. (Did I mention this was a Festival? Yeah. A hand full of vendors did brisk trade this weekend. I think most of us, though, barely covered the expense of showing up.)
  • People are very skittish. Darrel and the lady in the booth next to us both observed that making eye contact, or, heaven forbid, actually daring to say “Hi” to someone who ventured into our booths caused them to immediately turn around and leave. Seriously! I wanted to say to some of these people, “Don’t run! I’m not being a pushy sales person – I’m just being polite!”
  • Speaking of polite, people will walk into your booth and stand there with their friends, verbally bashing everything you’ve crafted by hand with comments like “oh yes, those are SO easy to make” and “$6 for that?! Geez – I could make that, easy!” Resist the urge to smack those people upside the head. Especially when their closing shot as they leave the booth is a bright smile and “You did a really good job!” Jerks.
  • Same goes for the people who visit your booth, ask questions about your work, then smugly report that they’re going to go home and make it themselves rather than buy it from you. Again, rude jerks.
  • When you’re setting up your tent in the pouring rain, as the temperatures drop from “balmy” to “frigid”, the thought will cross your mind that, well, you’ve lost your ever-lovin’ mind. Yes, yes, you have. But don’t worry; the poor schmucks masochists vendors all around you have lost theirs, too. You’re in good company.
  • Try not to set up shop to sell things during the weekend of a government shut-down. People get scared about things like that and stop spending money. Ergo, you don’t sell much.
  • Don’t bring your food allergic kiddos to a festival. It’s just asking for total mind-blowing panic on your part!

We had my mom bring the kiddos out on Friday because we knew a cold front was set to come in for the weekend while Friday was supposed to be a bright, warm, beautiful day.

The kids loved it!

We hated it! 

It was an APPLE festival. APPLE’S, y’all! Jed can’t eat apples. Fructose, you know. He also can’t eat cornbread , pinto beans, pizza, sno-cones, Apple cider, fudge, or pretty much anything that was served at this festival.

And people are not very neat eaters when walking around eating. So there were stray bits of food all over the ground as the boys explored. Stray bits of food that we were constantly telling the kids to “put (that) down” and “don’t eat (that)!”

Darrel and I completely abandoned our booth for three hours on Friday as we tag teamed the kids to keep them out of trouble. Next time, the kids stay home. It’s just not worth the stress.

Although, it was so, SO sweet to hear Jed tell Grandma, “Grandma, I MUST have this car!” and “Ooh! A puppy dog! I love the puppy dog!”

Nah. Still not worth the stress.

So, it wasn’t a total wash, financially, but it was not nearly as successful as I’d hoped. On the plus side, as I said, almost all the vendors there commented that business was really poor this weekend and none did as well as they’d anticipated. So, it wasn’t a problem with our merchandise; it was a problem with the economy and the weather.

We’re willing to give craft shows another shot, but in the meantime I will be working this week on my Etsy shop to make it look purdier and get all my new goodies online. You’ll be the first to know about any improvements!

After all, the biggest interest in my wares I received all weekend was from photos of our booth I posted on Facebook. Obviously I’m missing out on online interest until I get my Etsy shop up and running!

So, there’s a quick overview of my weekend. It was fun, and frankly, it was really good to do something one on one with Darrel and No Kids. We haven’t done anything as a couple in a really long time. Every now and then, it’s good to remember that you enjoy hanging out with your spouse. 

He’s kind of my favorite person in the world, after all.

How was your weekend? Have you ever done an arts and crafts festival/show? What little tidbits did you learn along the way?

Another Ear Infection

 
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Thank you, everyone, for your wonderful words of comfort yesterday. My Mommy guilt decided to listen to your wisdom and chill out.

So. You know how you take your car to the mechanic and it stops making “that noise”? Yeah. Kids do that, too.

At the doctor yesterday, Zac had a beautifully clear sounding chest. Clear as a bell!

Occasionally throughout the day, he’s had some congestion. But not at the doctors office, nosiree!

Sigh.

However, despite his clear chest, she did discover something we need to be concerned about: another really nasty ear infection.

Apparently there are a ton of kids running around right now, exhibiting no signs of an ear infection, but presenting with a cough, runny nose, and chest wheeze. When the doctor examines them, she finds nothing really wrong with their lungs…but they almost all have an ear infection!

So whatever nasty buggy is causing this in all these other kids decided to set up camp in Zac.

So we started him on the Rocephin shots again, and now Darrel and I are debating what to do next and when to do it.

We pretty much agree to re-trial the formula; I know, I know, you’re thinking “didn’t they JUST re-trial the formula and prove it to be unsafe?”

Yeah, we did.

However, he had only had one non-bloody diaper before we restarted the Alimentum, and it was certainly NOT baseline poo.

His diaper was also full of junk he’d scavenged from who-knows-where: bits of plastic and styrofoam, and some random things we didn’t recognize.

Further, that was the same day he came down with his cold, and maybe the same day he came down with his ear infection.

Put it together, and it just seems like there are an awful lot of things that could have contributed to our “bad” diaper after the Ali. Since we are SO desperate to have a formula for Zac, we decided to go ahead with another  re-trial.

Maybe we’re stupid. Or maybe we’re so desperate we’re grasping at straws. Either way, Alimentum RTF gets one more shot.

Now the question is when to do it.

Do we give him some gut rest? Wait until the antibiotics are done and go for it immediately? How long do we wait?

We don’t know yet. We’re thinking it over.

In the meantime, there’s some sorta good news from the doctor. Zac is not only NOT failure to thrive…he’s risen to the 9th percentile according to the charts!!

Confusing , right? Especially since I’ve said he’s not gained any weight since March.

Yeah, I’m taking it with a grain of salt, too.

Today they weighed him on the “big boy” scale while fully dressed; in June it was on the baby scale while butt naked.

While I know he hasn’t gained any weight since March, he only tipped the scales at the doctors office at 19.6 pounds in June. So today’s weight of 20 pounds even was a gain, according to their scales.

For his age, that puts him at the 9th percentile.

Taking all the other things into account, I’m not convinced he’s actually a 9th percenter.

But I’m happy to believe he’s certainly somewhere between the 5th and 9th percentile, and that means he’s NOT failure to thrive no matter how the data is factored!

That makes Mama VERY happy, y’all!!

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I mentioned last week that Darrel and I are going to have a booth at a big craft show this weekend. I’m making all sorts of really cool things to sell…and I’m running out of time! Between getting things made for the show, cooking our normal meals, pre-cooking the food I’ll need all weekend, and other normal parts of life, I’m running on the ragged edge.

With the addition of having to drop everything for the next two days and spend two and a half hours driving Zac to the doctors for his antibiotic shot, well, I cry “uncle”!

If I can, I will keep writing this week, but in case you don’t see a post for the rest of the week I wanted to let you know that we are okay (or as okay as can be), I’m just desperately trying to get my ducks in order to be able to make some money for my family this weekend!

On that note, tell me some craft show stories! I’m having a hard time deciding my pricing on some things, so how do YOU decide if something is priced too high, too low, or just right when you’re shopping? What sorts of things do you like to buy at craft shows?

Everything I’m making for the show will eventually wind up on my Etsy shop, so I hope I picked wisely!

In case I’m not back before next Monday, have a great week and an excellent weekend!

A Very Hard Decision

 
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photo courtesy of Stuart Miles at http://freedigitalphotos.net Yeah. We didn't go on an airplane.

photo courtesy of Stuart Miles at http://freedigitalphotos.net
Yeah. We didn’t go on an airplane.

Today we are supposed to be in Atlanta, having follow up appointments with our GI and Allergist.

We are not in Atlanta. We cancelled the appointments.

It was REALLY hard to make this decision. Darrel and I spend our lives trying to make sure our kiddos have the very best of everything: food, education, health, love. So cancelling follow up appointments with our highly sought out specialists seems contrary to all our daily efforts.

Last week, though, after the reaction to the Alimentum, I felt very discouraged. In my dismay, I lamented to Darrel “What are they even going to DO at these appointments?”

See, this time around, we aren’t staying with relatives. So a hotel room was in order. And a car rental. Because we travel on space available flights, we planned to fly to Atlanta on Saturday to ensure we were there on Monday. (In case we couldn’t get on flights Saturday, we still had Sunday to try.)

Add it all up, and the bare minimum cost to us for this medical trip would have been between $660-700, and that’s not counting food for Darrel and Jed (I would have to bring all my own food, of course).  In the end, I’m sure it would have edged closer to the $1,000 mark for us to bring the boys to their doctors. 

Which, even with me out of work and not likely to be able to return to work in February, we would gladly pay – IF we knew there was some tangible benefit to seeing the doctors.

Darrel agreed with me; we sent an email to both doctors on Tuesday morning outlined the situation and asking them if there was any hope whatsoever of a medical benefit to us beyond “take the vitals, ask some questions, do some blood and stool tests and keep doing what you’re doing”.

Now, I know the doctors can’t absolutely predict what they might do at the appointments; much will depend on the test results, the status of the boys health, etc. In January, however, the GI stated that he preferred to NOT do any invasive procedures unless absolutely necessary.

I was just trying to get an idea of whether our doctors thought a 16 month old with NO safe foods, who hasn’t gained any weight since March, might possibly be categorized as “absolutely necessary”.

Because if there is to be no scoping, no hydrogen breath tests, no testing at all beyond standard stool and blood testing…well, we can get all those tests done here at home and have the results sent to the doctors in Atlanta, right? 

It was an awkward position to put the doctors in, of course. However, our finances dictate we exercise prudence in all matters right now; even medical care for our boys.

Wednesday we received a response email from our Allergist (the Rock Star). He agreed we are in a difficult position, but maintained that it is very hard to “tele-diagnose”. He offered a compromise we could live with: get our local doctors to take the vitals, order tests, and confer with him regarding continued treatments/testing/care.

Sounded good to us!

Unfortunately, I had to cancel the hotel room before Thursday night or pay a cancellation fee equal to half the cost of the room. So we waited to hear from the GI.

We’re still waiting; he never emailed back. 

So Thursday night, our hotel cancellation deadline looming, Darrel decided that we were not going to go.

Even though we KNOW there are no excellent tests for FPIES, even though we know that many FPIES families have no specialists working for them, even though we know that these appointments would likely have yielded little benefit for us, I feel like a horrible Mother right now. 

This decision is hugely guilt inducing for me; but once again, FPIES has placed us between a rock and a hard spot.

We had to weigh the risks and benefits of going to Atlanta; the risk is that we can’t make a mortgage payment if we go, and that we miss out on some vital medical help if we don’t go. The benefit is that we get some vital medical help if we go, and that we have another month of a roof over our heads if we don’t go.

Since it seemed likely we wouldn’t actually get any vital medical help, the decision is eminently logical.

Mommy Guilt doesn’t work on logic. 

So, I’m feeling pretty crappy right now.

However, today WILL see us visiting a doctor. Zac’s cold is not clearing up, and I felt a steady wheeze in his chest all day yesterday. So we will be visiting his pediatrician today to see what’s going on with him.

I’m certain he will be labeled Failure to Thrive.

I wish FPIES would go away.

__________

Please say I’m not the only Mama who’s had to make these kinds of impossible decisions regarding their kids medical care! What tough calls have you had to make?

Frugal Fridays – Dry Your Razor

 
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Dry Your Razor - cradlerockingmama

Folks, let’s talk shaving.

Women always complain about shaving; I see ecards on Pinterest celebrating the onset of fall, because apparently, fall=end of shaving season.

When I was obese, I put off shaving as much as I possibly could. For starters, it is really annoying to shave, and secondly, I never EVER wore tank tops or shorts. So who’s going to see my hairy pits and legs? Ergo, why bother?

Then I lost the weight and spring came and darned if I wasn’t wearing tank tops and shorts almost exclusively!

So now I shave once, and sometimes twice, per week at a minimum.

That’s a lot of razors to go through. Especially when razors are so expensive they’re kept on a locked display at many grocery stores.

Fortunately, I read something a while ago that has saved a lot of my razors from ending up in a landfill. I wish I could remember where I saw it so I could share the source, but I honestly don’t remember if this was in a blog, a magazine article, or an email.

UPDATE: A lovely reader recognized my tip and shared the link to the original source! Whew! I hate not giving credit to the original source. Thanks, Nicholle! So visit Clark Howard to see my inspiration. 

Anyway, here’s how to make your razor last forever.

DRY IT.

Seriously. When you’re done shaving, rinse it, pat it dry, and leave it somewhere it either won’t get wet again or will easily drain off and air dry quickly.

That’s it.

What I read that gave me this tip said that a guy did an experiment to see how he could extend the life of a disposable razor, and the thing he tried that worked the best was to simply keep the blades as dry as possible between uses.

He said that he had used the same $1 razor blade for A YEAR and it still worked just as well as when he first opened the package.

I’m here to tell you, it’s all true.

I got a package of disposable razors with a coupon a few years ago. I’ve been using one of those razors for the last eleven months, and when I shave I’m still as smooth as silk!

It doesn’t have to be an expensive razor. The cheapies will do just fine with this experiment.

Figuring the cost of a package of disposable razors at about $10 for 5, and using one new razor every two weeks, that comes to about $100 a year.

Simply by drying your razor after every use, it’ll cost $2 per year to shave!

Very simple. Very effective.

Of course, your savings are going to depend on how often you shave and how frequently you change your blades, but no matter how you cut it, this will save money AND more junk in a landfill.

Hope that helps!

__________

How long do your razors last?

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The Five Stages of Grief: DEPRESSION

 
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Depression

I really didn’t intend this week to be “The Five Stages of Grief” week, but it’s been a rough few days.

Two days ago I was furious. Yesterday, I was depressed.

Most of the day I sat around in a lethargic fog. I felt…nothing. Standing took too much energy. I literally sat on Jed’s step stool while I cooked breakfast. It was too hard to do while standing.

Jed happened to be in a “loving” mood yesterday. He told me at least two hundred times “I love you”, “I love my baby Zac”, “I love Daddy”, etc. Occasionally, one of his “I love you’s” would just melt my heart, and I would start to feel.

Those warm, loving feelings brought on by my adorable sons proclamations of love were almost immediately overtaken by sadness. It was as if cracking open the “nothingness” of depression to feel a good emotion was enough to let the tsunami of sad come flooding out.

So many times he would tell me he loved me, I would smile and hug him, then start crying.

Worse, the crying would take too much energy and my body would shut back down into depression mode, where I felt nothing again.

Depression is awful, not because you’re sad. It’s awful because it’s a great big “nothingness” that sucks the life out of you. You can’t sustain “sad” when you’re depressed; it takes too much emotional energy. Depression drains your emotions so you have no energy to expend on feelings.

Which separates you from your family, especially when your three year (who only recently learned to express the thought) decides to tell you over and over again – complete with hugs and kisses – how much he loves you.

And you know you love him. And you hug him and kiss him back.

But your heart can’t truly leap for joy like it SHOULD.

You know how they say that the opposite of love isn’t hate, it’s apathy? Imagine that being your baseline of emotions. For everything. Only, with depression, unlike an apathetic view of a person, you know you’re SUPPOSED to feel something so then you know you’re supposed to feel guilty for NOT feeling something so when you shake out of the depression? All those feelings you couldn’t have come steamrollering over you all at once and you feel like the worst person in the world for NOT feeling things when you should have.

Depression sucks.

So, why was I so depressed?

Well, after the Fury Tuesday night, Darrel and I took a little time to Talk About Stuff. I mentioned a fellow FPIES Mama who is debating on getting rid of her cats because her child is so very sensitive to cross-contamination. I expected him to simply agree with me that such a decision is gut-wrenching and awful, and continue the conversation in other directions.

He did agree; however, he also dropped a bombshell on me.

He’d been thinking we need to do the same thing.

We’re at our wits end about Zac. The poor boy can’t seem to catch a break. 16 months old with NO safe foods to eat, and when we can get him to baseline (a challenge in and of itself) we have seen him twice ruin that by eating cat poop.

The cats food bowls are not safe from the boys anywhere in the house…except on the kitchen counters. That means that no matter how much we clean the kitchen, there is a high probability that cross-contamination from the cats food is getting into OUR food. Or at least on our counters, utensils, and pots and pans, which still means it is getting into our food.

The cats use the litter box and eat their food; residue from both those things lingers on their fur and feet. Surely they’ve drug traces of those things all over the house.

Perhaps one reason why Zac is having so much trouble finding a safe food is that his “bucket” is kept almost completely full constantly from cat contamination.

This is logical.

This is killing me.

Back in 2006, I stumbled across a stray cat at my apartment complex. She followed me right into my apartment and made herself to home.

She was dirty and skinny and hungry, and surely someone else had encountered her before me…but she chose to make me her person and she’s been with me ever since.

My Punkin.

My Punkin.

Only 8 months later, I was busy renovating my newly purchased house when I found another stray; he was young, skinny, and trying to eat something covered with ants, and when we picked him up he snuggled right in and started purring.

So he joined my little “family”, too.

My Murray.

My Murray.

I love my cats. Honestly, by the time I met Darrel, if he’d not been okay with my cats I would have told him to hit the road. The cats have always been reliable companions; by that point in my dating experience, men were absolutely not.

Fortunately, Darrel liked my cats, and Darrel was a reliable guy, and we all made a happy family together.

So the idea of sending them away just KILLS ME.

Especially since my boys love the cats as much as I do. Jed’s first word (after Mama and Dada) was “Kitty”. Yesterday he told me repeatedly “I love Murray all the time”, while grinning and petting Murray.

Zac isn’t talking at all yet, but when he can get a hold of one of the cats he grunts and shrieks with excitement, bounces, and can hardly stand himself from his joy.

So taking away their beloved cats just feels…mean.

We’re fortunate; my parents have said they’re willing to take the cats in for us. So we’ll still see them occasionally. They’ll still be part of the Family. They’ll be able to come back home someday.

Still, sending my sweet kitties away isn’t the reason I was overwhelmed with depression.

It was just the catalyst.

Poor Darrel spent all day yesterday thinking I was mad at him for being “the bad guy” and pointing out the logical choice we must make. Very untrue. I wasn’t “shooting the messenger”.

I was just devastated by the message.

See, up to this point, FPIES has wreaked havoc on our lives in so many ways…but I’ve been able to maintain large elements of our lives unchanged, and adapted other parts of our lives to still be somewhat akin to our previous status quo.

I’ve felt that FPIES was a PART of our lives. Not our whole lives.

I’ve been able to hang on to the shred of hope that Zac will soon outgrow his FPIES; that he will start finding safe foods and in just a year or two will be a “normal” kid.

That in just a year or two our lives will not be so restricted by food. That in just a year or two the kiddos can go to play dates. To preschool. To Sunday School. To Church. To Europe, if we wanted!

By facing up to the truth that Zac is likely more sensitive than we’d admitted, that his case of FPIES is one of the more extreme cases, that he might even have other medical conditions compounding his FPIES, I’m facing up to the truth that FPIES has now completely taken over our lives. 

FPIES now calls the shots in our lives on every topic and in every way.

FPIES now stands front and center, a gigantic, malignant shadow in the room that makes everything we do turn grey and fuzzy with its’ presence.

It’s no longer the annoying racoon getting into our garbage cans at night; a small creature we can easily trap and contain and deal with.

Now it’s a bear that has learned to open doors, and we are completely at its mercy when it chooses to come into our home and destroy the Good and Wholesome Things we’ve built here.

The thing is, Zac’s FPIES has ALWAYS been that bear, that malignant shadow. 

We’ve just been able to pretend otherwise for the last 14 months. 

Sending the cats away is an admission of the denial I’ve been in for over a year, and the comprehension of just how much  our lives are out of our control was enough to weaken my will for depression to come and completely dull my spirit.

But…this was not the kind of depression I’ve dealt with before in my life. My depressions of yesteryear were, if not caused by, at least exacerbated by my Fructose Malabsorption. (And yes, I made the connection that Tuesday I ate some onion and garlic and immediately suffered from Fury and then Depression.)

So I don’t believe the depression I experienced on Wednesday was the type of depression that necessitates medical intervention. After taking an impromptu nap, I felt much better. Less numb.

The depression had loosened its grip.

And then Jed saved me the rest of the way. He kept telling me he loved me, and I started to feel warm fuzzies again…and very soon, all the bad feelings had washed away and I was able to feel purely the love I always  have in my heart for Jed.

And then I just felt Sad. Normal Sad.

Sad because I’m sending the cats away in order to help my son be healthy. Sad that my son is likely ‘worse’ than I had thought, medically speaking. Sad that our lives are no longer our own, and will not be our own for many years to come.

And sadness is normal when facing those facts. 

Bleak numbness is not. 

As with the anxiety attacks I’ve been dealing with this year, there is nothing I can do for depression. No medicines I can take, thanks to having to restrict my diet for Zac. No therapy I can afford, thanks to being out of work to care for Zac.

So I have no choice but to plow through my anxiety and occasional depression and simply force myself to “get over it”.

There’s no way I would do that if I had a choice. 

It is taking every ounce of willpower I have – and even strength I didn’t know I had – to keep myself even-keeled this year.

Other FPIES and special needs Mama’s surely feel these waves of anxiety and depression. So if you start to feel anxious, if you stop feeling feelings and depression washes over you, know one thing:

IT’S NOT YOUR FAULT. YOU ARE NOT WEAK.

We’ve just been dealt a really rotten hand at this poker game, and folding isn’t an option. We have to play it out. That SUCKS.

So call whomever you must call. Take whatever meds you must take. Do whatever you need to do to hang in there until this hand is played out and we can return to normal. 

To quote The Bloggess: “Depression Lies”.  Whether your depression comes from body chemistry, history of abuse, or just a really, REALLY stressful time of your life, don’t let it win. It lies.

It says we can’t let our hearts leap for joy when our children tell us they love us. It says we can’t feel anything because if we do, we’ll feel pain.

LIES.

Even with FPIES, there is so much to be content with in our lives. So much to actually be happy about and enjoy. 

Please don’t let depression steal that from you. 

__________

How do you pull out of depression when you can’t take drugs or get therapy?

Vegan Sunbutter Cups

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There are tons of “peanut butter cup” recipes online, but most of them are chock full of dairy and sugar.

Since neither of those is okay for our household, I decided to tweak and make Jed a safe butter cup to enjoy.

It was worth it! This is the first recipe I’ve made for Jed that garnered the response, “I LOVE these!”

He asks for his “black muffins” all the time, which just goes to prove that I can’t make these very often or the child will eat nothing but sunbutter cups until they’re all gone!

I will say that, having done these, there are a few things I want to try to make them prettier and easier. However, this recipe works just fine and is very simple as is, so I wanted to share it with you.

To start, you’ll need to make a double batch of my dairy-free/fructose-friendly chocolate.

Then line a muffin tin with cupcake liners and scoop some chocolate into each liner. I used my (clean) finger to smooth the chocolate out across the bottom and up the sides a little bit.

Lined with cupcake liners, you can see the 5 I've smoothed out and the rest waiting to be smoothed.

Lined with cupcake liners, you can see the 5 I’ve smoothed out and the rest waiting to be smoothed.

Smoothed on the bottom and up the sides a little bit. I might try smoothing it up the sides a little more next time I make these.

Smoothed on the bottom and up the sides a little bit. I might try smoothing it up the sides a little more next time I make these.

Set the whole pan in the freezer for about ten minutes, then bring it back to the counter.

Frozen chocolate bottoms!

Frozen chocolate bottoms!

Scoop out some sunbutter and put it on top of the chocolate; again I used my clean finger to smooth out the top of the sunbutter a bit.

Sunbutter scooped into the middle.

Sunbutter scooped into the middle.

Put the whole pan back in the freezer.

Before you bring out the pan again, re-warm your chocolate over low heat until it is warm and runny.

Bring back the pan and scoop some more chocolate over the sunbutter. The amount may vary on this step; the goal is to completely cover the sunbutter and that may take slightly more or less than 1 T.

Chocolate sort of smoothed on the top, ready to go into the freezer.

Chocolate sort of smoothed on the top, ready to go into the freezer.

Put the whole pan back in the freezer and after about ten minutes, you’ve got homemade, vegan, allergy free, fructose friendly sunbutter cups!

Now, some thoughts and notes about this:

Most recipes call for making a “filling” out of peanut or sun butter and confectioners sugar. This makes the inside of the cup sweeter and not as runny.

We’ve determined that Jed can tolerate some table sugar, but since I still prefer to avoid it whenever possible I decided to try it without any confectioners sugar.

It works, but it is very runny and messy.

I plan to try these again with two options: one is to freeze the sunbutter until hard before scooping it into the muffin liners, and another is to find something else I can mix with the sunbutter to make it not so runny.

Also, one big reason these did not turn out as “pretty” as I would have liked was that I underestimated how quickly the chocolate would set up on the frozen sunbutter!

I tend to work in “steps” in the kitchen; after getting out the frozen pan to pour the next layer of chocolate on too, the next step was, obviously, to put the chocolate on!

Rather than working one cup at a time, I scooped the chocolate on to every cup before attempting to smooth out the tops.

By the time I made it to the third cup on the “smoothing out” step, the chocolate was already firm and very difficult to smooth!

So on this step , make sure your chocolate is warm, and work one cup at a time to make these really pretty.

Of course, they’re delicious without being pretty! But being pretty is just nice, don’t you think? It takes them up a notch from “homemade” to “gourmet”, in my opinion.

These are best stored in the freezer or refrigerator. They’ll melt otherwise.

So there you have it! Homemade vegan, allergy-friendly, fructose-friendly Sunbutter Cups, suitable for bragging about to anyone.

Vegan Sunbutter Cups
 
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These gourmet, fructose-friendly, allergy-friendly sunbutter cups are delicious and fun to make!
Author:
Recipe type: candy
Serves: 1 dozen
Ingredients
  • 1 cup cacao butter
  • ½ c. cocoa powder
  • ½ c. + 2 T. maple syrup
  • pinch of sea salt
  • 2 tsp. vanilla
  • ¾ c. sunbutter
Instructions
  1. Line a muffin pan with cupcake liners.
  2. Put your cacao butter in a double boiler on your stove and heat it slowly over medium heat until just melted. Immediately remove from heat.
  3. Add the remaining ingredients EXCEPT the sunbutter to the cacao butter and whisk until smooth and shiny.
  4. Pour 1 T. of chocolate into each liner. Smooth out with your finger, trying to smooth it up the sides a bit. Set in the freezer for about ten minutes.
  5. Remove from the freezer and scoop 1 T. of sunbutter into the center of each cupcake liner. Put back in the freezer for about ten minutes.
  6. Re-warm your remaining chocolate on the stove while you wait for the sunbutter to harden.
  7. Remove the pan from the freezer and scoop chocolate over the sunbutter, working one cup at a time and smoothing the tops as needed.
  8. Put the whole pan back in the freezer for about ten more minutes.
  9. Remove the pan from the freezer and pop out the cups. At this point you can trim the paper down to the top of the candy if you'd like a nicer presentation.
  10. Enjoy some delicious, and really fairly healthy for you homemade sunbutter cups!
Notes
These aren't fructose-free, but they are fructose friendly. If you can't tolerate maple syrup, try a different sweetener that you can tolerate instead.

Have you made these before? What did you use in your filling?

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Thank Your Body Thursday, Healing With Food Friday,  Let’s Get Real, Frugal Ways Sustainable Days, and Real Food Wednesday.