Merry Christmas from The Nut-Free Mom!

I wanted to take this time to say Merry Christmas to all of you who celebrate! As the year comes to a close, I can reflect on the many people I've either met through this blog or in person who are working hard to make life better and safer for people with food allergies. Thanks to all of you! Your efforts make a difference.

I also wanted to give a word of hope to parents who may be dealing with nut allergies for the first time this year. It does get easier. And you're definitely not alone. I hope you'll visit this blog often and share your concerns if you have them.

I also hope that everyone takes this opportunity to relax and enjoy time with friends and family. Food allergies can make holidays a little more difficult, but holidays aren't only about food. Serve your family some "safe" foods, bring them along to the parties with you and have fun with the spirit of the season!

If you're heading out to parties and are looking for some food allergy navigation tips, check out my holiday party guidelines. The title says "Thanksgiving" but my tips work for any holiday party.

Also, if you feel like any last-minute baking (as I'm doing today), I've heard some great feedback on my Nut-Free Snowball Cookies and Super-Easy Christmas Cookies, so check out those recipes if you wish!

To all of you, everywhere, Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas from The Nut-Free Mom!

I thought now would be a good time to provide a link to a holiday party tips post that I offered on the blog last year at this time. Please take a look before you go to another Christmas party! When you know what to look out for, it's a lot more fun to attend.

Also, I wanted to wish all of you a Merry Christmas! When you're dealing with nut allergies, it can sometimes seem like the holidays are all about avoiding foods and not what you can have. While baking gingerbread people with the kids yesterday, I realized that food allergies provide unexpected ways of offering bonding experiences and a healthier, simpler approach to eating.

For example, we can't just run out and buy cookie dough at the store. So cookies are a treat around here and that makes the whole thing more special to my kids (though I confess that I do try to bake safe treats for them on a pretty regular basis. They're definitely not deprived.) :)My kids and I ended up really enjoying the whole process of baking and decorating gingerbread cookies from scratch. We are also lucky to have been able to buy some "safe" candy for decorating but we are still limited a bit in what we can use. The girls ended up using lots of creativity and their cookies looked great.

So when you're going about your holiday celebrating with nut allergies, realize that even though finding safe foods can be tough at this time of year, the process of making food together really is a blessing in disguise. Making cookies is time-consuming so it helped us to slow down as a group until the job was done. There is so much go-go-go all year long--I for one enjoyed being "stuck in the house" with our cookie project. I'll always remember this stuff and I hope my girls do as well!

Happy, healthy, nut-free holidays everyone!