GoGo Squeez Fruit and Veggiez Pouches

A few months back, I joined BzzAgent. I love getting stuff in the mail, and I love to try new things. I'm forever reading my friends posts about new items; social media is such a great way to learn! So far, I am highly impressed! I've received four Bzz Kits so far to try free or heavily discounted items, and I've been pleased with everything I've received free or at a discount. The tasks to spread the word on the products are easy and intuitive without being pitchy. Allllll of that to say, we received GoGo Squeez Fruit and Veggiez Pouches FREE yesterday.



Jon and Tessa demanded one immediately. Since it has fruit and veggies as the first two ingredients, I was happy to let them even though I was in the process of preparing supper. I took a quick sip off of Tessa's just to get a feel for the taste. The initial taste was a bit tart, but the sweetness of the apple soon followed. Jon and Tessa were thrilled with the special snack and wanted to eat the last two in the box. Ha!

We tried the berry variety. I am *really* impressed with the ingredient list. First ingredient is apple, and the second ingredient is carrots. There are no artificial sweeteners, or anything untoward that would make me hesitate to give this to my kids again. I also really loved the cap on the pouch. It's easy enough for Tessa (newly 3 years old) to open, and it is immediately sippable. There is no need for any special spoons or anything. You can just toss these in a lunch box, diaper bag or purse, and you're ready to go without any fuss.

I cannot wait to let the kids try the other flavors too!

Hershey Kiss and Cookie Butter Blossoms

'Tis the season for baking. I received a bag of chocolate kisses from Hershey and Influenster last week. I was puzzled for something different to do with the Kisses besides the same old (and delicious) peanut butter blossoms. It would exclude my eldest who is allergist to peanuts, and I love to experiment. I went to my cupboard to rummage for ideas and pulled out a jar of Trader Joe's Speculos Cookie Butter. The stuff is divine, and I just knew it would compliment the sweet, creamy milk chocolate of a Hershey Kiss!

So here is the nitty gritty of the recipe:

3/4 cup of sugar, plus an additional 1/4 cup to roll cookies
1 stick of butter, softened
1 egg
1 cup of Trader Joe's Speculos Cookie Butter
3/4 tsp of salt
1 tsp of pure vanilla extract
3/4 tsp of baking soda
1 1/2 cups of flour

Preheat oven to 350 degrees and grease a baking sheet.

Combine flour, salt, and baking soda in a small bowl.

In a large separate bowl cream together sugar and butter. Beat in egg until incorporated. Beat in Speculos Cookie Butter and vanilla until smooth. Stir in flour mixture until combined (don't over mix).

Roll dough into 1" balls and roll in sugar. Place on baking sheet. Do not flatten like you usually do with peanut butter cookies.

Bake at 350 for 16 minutes. These cookies tend to be a bit crisper and they don't brown up as much as you'd expect. Do not over bake. When you pull them out of the oven, place an unwrapped Hershey Kiss in the middle. Let set (or don't if you love gooey chocolate) and enjoy!

Wow! Three Years!

I logged in today and noticed my last post was three years ago. So much has happened since then.

Shortly after I posted last, I found out I was unexpectedly pregnant for a third time. Our youngest, Tessa, joined our family in early December 2011. My husband graduated with his bachelor's degree in Youth Ministry two weeks later (well the official date was actually August, but he walked in December). In May of 2012, I lost my job as a resident director and we moved across the state.

My husband was offered a job at a small congregation and worked part time there and part time at Starbucks. After several months searching, I found a job working with a Girl Scouts council. Several months later, Jason accepted a full time job with a church in Texas. A dream come true! No more winters! Full time ministry! And the rest is history.

Caden is now eight and in second grade. Jonathan is five and in kindergarten. Tessa is now two. We've been down here for over a year now and love it. Our first winter was lovely!

I know work for another university in administration. I cannot seem to get away from higher education, but I love the students so much and the flow of university of life. Big or small, a college campus feels like home. I'm considering going back for a master's degree soon.

Whew! So that is the last three and half years in a nutshell. I hope to start posting more again. I've missed it so much. Smooches!

Shine

A few years ago (ahem) when I was in high school, the Newsboys were popular in Christian music circles, and by default, with my friends. I am out of the Christian music loop now, preferring to listen to worship music or secular, so maybe they still are. The other day, my husband made me listen to the local fundamentalist evangelical, erm, I mean the local Christian radio station and they played the Newsboys "Shine". It brought back some memories, let me tell ya.

After the initial nostalgia wore off, I reflected on the lyrics, and while some (most) of it is a bit silly, the following stood out to me.

"Shine. Let it shine before all men. Let them see good works and then, let them glorify the Lord."

Wow. How profound!

So often the message preached from pulpits around the world, we are told, over again that we are sanctified by grace and not by works. And praise God for it! However, what is often missed is that the world does not judge us by the grace given, but by the tangible, the observable, the flesh, our works.

There is a struggle to remain relevant to the world, while embracing holiness. On one hand, the world cannot relate to the straight skirt to the ankle, hair to the butt Christian conservative. However, the world judges the Christian who gives lip service to Christ and goes to church on Sunday, but their beliefs are not evident in their day to day living.

As I've reflected on this the last couple weeks, I initially was down on the up and coming generation. The lack of physical purity, the drunkenness, the lack of modesty, etc. Then I looked around and saw the way my Catholic boss cheats his workers out of their pay by fudging the hours. The way the Baptist housewife gossips about her neighbor. I realized that the lack of holiness is not unique to the younger generation, but is a human problem.

We will never obtain perfection in this life. We cannot hope to, but we must strive for it if we will be a credible witness for Christ. I say this as a sinner. I say this as a woman who struggles with swearing and gluttony. I say this as a woman who is sarcastic by nature and has a temper. While I encourage you, I am accusing myself. The world is watching. The bystander waiting to cross the driveway at the grocery store notices the fish sticker on your bumper as you flip the bird to the person who cut you off. Much to my chagrin, children do listen and imitate our speech.

What does the world see when you dress, walk, talk? Do you shine?

Dare I Hope?

I think I dare!

We discovered Caden's allergy to dairy around the time he was 9 months. He suffered from eczema since he was about 8 weeks of age. At the advice of his pediatrician, who insisted it was impossible for a breastfed baby to have food allergies, we gave Caden one piece of shredded cheese. He immediately went hoarse and started coughing. That incident prompted a transfer of care to another pediatrician who would allow us to visit an allergist and the official start of our food allergy journey.

After the initial visit to the allergist, which confirmed our suspicion that Caden was allergic to dairy, we also added a few other items to the list. After a spring check up, we added a few more, and so on until he turned 3, when we were able to reintroduce tomatoes.

We had one accidental exposure to dairy when Caden was 15 months (anaphylaxis and an ER trip on that one), and a fair few incidences of contact hives from dairy. We transferred care to a state university allergy clinic where the allergists and interns are much more hands on, must more up to date in allergy care, and much more supportive of food trials.

Based on the advice of the allergist, we have safely added eggs into baked goods within certain specific parameters. We were going to trial those in office, but a tart baked just outside of the specified parameters proved that wasn't the best use of our time. Our trial for peanuts was delayed due bad seasonal allergies this past fall. We intend to reschedule that soon.

At any rate, onto the part about hope. We ordered Subway last week. While I definitely wouldn't recommend to an allergic, we ate there. My husband ordered a plain sandwich for Caden and one with cheese for Jon. And Subway mislabeled them. D'oh! I was so angry at myself for not double checking before giving Caden the sandwich. He had already ingested a mouth sized bite of cheese when we realized the sandwiches were not labeled correctly. We kept a close eye on him. No hives, no funny voice, no eczema!

I intend to discuss this with his allergist when we visit again, and I don't have enough hope to believe he's actually outgrown it, especially after his numbers in 2009. However, he has improved in how sensitive he is at the very least! I cannot believe that there might actually be a day where he can eat dairy. Fingers crossed for good news from the allergist.

Life is fragile

Without getting into a ton of details, our campus reeled last week over the loss of a beloved alumnus and employee. The death was an accident, and it has affected so many of us in a profound way. While I have seen other peers buried before last week, it has always been after an illness. While I was sad to see them go home, there was always that mingled relief they were no longer in pain, no longer suffering.

When I was woken shortly after midnight to the news J had fallen to his death while hunting, it was the last bit of news I expected to hear. In fact, after I realized it was not news that someone had been smoking pot in the residence hall as I expected, for the first thirty seconds or so, I thought it was a different J. While Jason and I were not close to him, it is impossible to be on a campus this size and have even a casual history of 8+ years without feeling some sort of camaraderie with a person.

J's very pregnant wife, V, and their children are in my thoughts and prayers several times a day. I drink my coffee and think of them. I stop at a red light and think of them. I see the decorative grasses that J helped to plant, the grass that he cut, and am dumbfounded at how fragile the string of life is.

It is heartwarming to see how many lives J touched. What a testimony it was to see over 500 people who came from all over the country to commemorate his life and worship God! I hope that J could see his funeral, and if he did, I imagine he was surprised at what an impact he had on so very many people during his life. While no one really believes his race was done, he certainly fought the good fight, leaves behind many good works, and is a true testimony what it means to be a Christian man, husband and father.

My Poor Neglected Blog

Wow. I didn't realize it'd been nearly a year since I published anything! I realize that I have been missing writing, so I hope to start this up again regularly.

On an allergy note, Caden is not allergic to treenuts, fish or shellfish, so we have added that back into our diets. Our new allergist also suggested that we try using eggs in baked goods, so long as it is baked at at least 350 for 15 minutes. I tried a dairy free chocolate tart earlier this year on him, but I think the egg content was too high or something because he promptly up chucked (lovely word, eh?) about 30 minutes after eating it. He's safely eaten cake and cookies though. We're supposed to trial peanut soon, since he's never actually eaten them and his blood test results showed that he is on the cusp of being in the "clear" zone. Its actually my hope to test sesame soon too, because I'd love for him to be able to eat Kashi products. Although, I hear Lara bars are dairy free, so maybe we'll try that for a breakfast bar substitute. He stopped liking Enjoy Life snack bars when they changed their recipe :(

Jon seems to have outgrown his intolerance to egg. I haven't tried getting him to eat it yet, but he tolerates my eating it just fine. I'm starting to suspect he may have an allergy to cow's milk though. He had a bit of blood in his diaper and mucusy stools after drinking a large cup of milk two days ago. He had milk again tonight since I didn't make the connection, so we'll see what tomorrow brings forth. He doesn't seem bothered though, so I'm not convinced. Not to mention his negative allergy tests last year, but I fully admit I may just not want to face the reality of another dairy allergic kiddo. Come what may though if it is apparent it is a dairy allergy, I will cut it out of our diets.
On a dorm mom note, I have an awesome group this year.