I try to not make food the center of my kids' birthday party, but we have guests that come as far as 2 hours away, so I do a full lunch, which means food is definitely a part of our day. With other T1 low carb kids in attendance, it's important for me to make sure they have fun AND have good blood sugar.
We enjoyed a great day with friends - both Non-D and T1's - spent the day enjoying our time together and the kids were happy and healthy.
Some prep work meant going to Wal-Mart to get some sugar-free black raspberry sparking water, cutting off the labels and placing Minecraft labels I got from Amazon on. We now have some sugar-free "potion of instant healing".
Lots of raw veggies with onion dip and plain pork rinds with guacamole.
Our lunch is in the background... low carb crispy pizzas, grilled hot dogs, and a giant Instant Pot full of no-bean low carb chili with cheddar cheese and sour cream.
Dessert was sugar-free jello (no maltodextrin) with sugar-free whipped cream, vanilla and "apple cider" cupcakes, and a Minecraft themed chocolate cake. I got the cute Minecraft cupcake holders and toppers from Amazon.
Here's a close-up of the cake. The chocolate is the "dirt". The green icing is the "grass". Red "poppies". And of course the Minecraft characters that I can't begin to name.
Close-up of cupcakes and Minecraft holders and toppers.
Before the party, I sent the moms of the T1 kids the
recipes I'd be using so they'd have a chance to look over the
ingredients before they arrived. I also write what we're having with
the carb count and display it with the food so they can mix and match
what they'd like to serve.
I got these cute Minecraft balloons from Amazon too. But I didn't have helium so most are upside down. LOL. Mom-fail, but no kids noticed... or at least they were nice enough to not mention it.
Instead of Pin the Tail on the Donkey, we played Pin the Nose on the Creeper. I made this from green and black poster board. I drew on the eyes and mouth and cut out the noses from black poster board.
And we're SO grateful for all of the thoughtful presents they received! Your Thank You cards will be in the mail soon!
THANK YOU TO EVERYONE THAT CELEBRATED THE DAY WITH US! 💜💛💚💙
I was ill-prepared for Taco Tuesday and Evie was not happy that she might miss a taco night. So I grabbed some ground beef from the freezer and thawed it in the microwave. Then cooked/seasoning it in the Instant Pot.
Taco Meat... ✅
Now onto the shells. I usually use slices of provolone cheese to make crunchy shells, but I was out. So I finely grated mozzarella, made little circles (1 - 1.5 oz) of cheese on parchment and microwaved for 1 minute. Using the sides of the parchment, lift up, and hold in place for about 10 seconds until the cheese firms up. I think I like the mozzarella version even better!
Taco Shells... ✅
The kids had a taco, a second mound of taco meat with toppings (not pictured on my plate), and riced cauliflower. Taco Tuesday crisis averted and a low carb, filling dinner done quickly. I even threw in a low carb margarita for me for averting said crisis. 😉
November is National Diabetes Awareness Month
Here is Samuel's *estimated* impact since his diabetes diagnoses just a little over 7 years ago. (In reality his finger pricks have to be at least as high as his number of shots- probably about 30% higher, but we'll just go with it.)
I pray one day he doesn't have to live with this.
The kids had a blast this Halloween. They dressed up and went trick or treating just like other kids. Then we came home, had low carb treats, and followed our annual tradition of watching It's The Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown.
Here is where our family diverges from many. We go through their candy and pull out any candy that is purely glucose (Smarties, SweeTarts, Bottlecaps, etc), because hey, I'm a smart Mama (we use this to treat low blood sugar). But instead of eating their candy, they bag it up and use it to exchange for a Switch Witch Certificate - which is valid for 1 app/game for their tablet up to $5. Samuel has been wanting the game Terraria (kind of like Minecraft) so when the time came to do the Switch Witch, he practically threw his candy at me to get his certificate yelling "Terraria, Terraria!!!".
He had tons of fun getting dressed up and trick or treating, but at the end of the night, it was about having fun with the family and candy had nothing to do with it.
All day today, he has been talking about how far he got on his game and how glad he was he could switch his candy for it. That's a win in my book!
