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My baby girl turned 4 about a week ago.  It is AMAZING how time travels quickly.  I remember the beginning days, when she was a newborn.  And I would look at the clock every 5 minutes waiting for the next family member or friend to arrive and keep me company!  A day seemed like a year back then.  And now?  I blink and months have gone by.

I cherish my time with my daughter and make a conscious effort to be present for her throughout the day.  One of my life lessons has been to ENJOY each day.  And to enjoy my situation and life as it is TODAY.  I find myself getting caught in the trap of waiting for my life to start when …. I’ve discovered my true calling in life!  I have a vacation home in the South of France!  I have the perfect body!

But actually?  Life is right now.  And I’m going to LOVE it.

About 2 years ago, a group of girlfriends and I were talking about getting together with our significant others for a night out.  Instead of going to a loud restaurant where all 10 of us would be struggling to converse with anyone other than the folks sitting directly next to us, I suggested we get together at someone’s house and each bring a food dish.  A couples’ pot luck, if you will.

Since then, we’ve had many fun couples’ night dinners, rotating houses and conjuring up themes for each meal (Asian fusion! Italian! Cajun / Creole! Holiday! BBQ! Comfort Foods!) and the list goes on.  Luckily, I’m surrounded by girlfriends who can all throw down in the kitchen, so it’s always a ridiculously scrumptious meal.  We haven’t spent a million dollars on going out, we get quality conversations in with everyone AND whoever’s hosting gets a break on getting a babysitter for the night.  Definitely my kind of dinner party.  Cheers!

Hubby and I love to travel, so we started Peanut traveling at a young age too (2 months old).  Since then, we’ve been to lots of fun places, domestically and internationally.  Because of her insane amounts of food allergies, however, traveling takes a lot of preparation and planning.

Here are my top 5 tips for traveling with a kid who suffers from food allergies :

1. Bring a Doctor’s Note! Usually, airport security will let you through with a bottle or small container of milk (rice, almond, whole grain, soy or otherwise) for your infant.  However, as I learned the hard way, the cut off age for this is usually 2 years old.  Last summer, we were traveling to Montreal with our newly turned 3 year old.  We brought some individual box drinks of rice milk, but were not allowed through security because our daughter was over 2 (and therefore, no longer an infant).  We learned that a doctor’s note stating her allergies (to dairy, in this case) would have helped.  I’ve been traveling with one ever since.
2. Get a Kitchen. We make sure we have a kitchen wherever we travel.  This usually means renting a condo, apartment or house as opposed to booking a standard hotel room.  This can often times be more cost effective than a hotel.  For example, we booked a 3 bedroom house (with a private pool + yard + daily cleaning service) in Costa Rica for $120 / night.  Having a kitchen is necessary (and stress relieving) when you have allergies in the family.  Check out www.vrbo.com for fun options.
3. Send a Shopping List.  If you’re visiting family, like I was last weekend (San Francisco) with Peanut, I sent my brother and his wife a brief shopping list of items to have in stock when we arrived.  Easy!
4. Bring or Ship as much Food as you can! In our case, we always travel with Peanut’s favorite gluten free / dairy free / nut free / soy free snacks.  We even put big cartons of Rice Drink / Dream in our suitcase and pray they didn’t explode (they did once, on our way to Grand Cayman).  But, it’s easy to travel with pre-packaged goods : rice pasta, rice, quinoa, etc.
5. Research your Area. This may mean checking out the grocery stores (and their offerings), doctor’s offices and medical centers in the area ahead of time.  We once had to cancel a trip near the border of Panama because we realized the closest hospital (in case of medical emergency) was a 2 hour helicopter flight away from our lodging.

At the end of the day, food allergies shouldn’t restrict your travel completely!  It may be a bump in the road, but just a little one.  Enjoy!

When you become a parent, weekends, holidays and school breaks take on a whole new meaning.  This week is Peanut’s spring break and even though she still has some of her weekly to-do’s intact, a lot of her regular activities are cancelled.  This leaves us some free time during the week to get creative!

Here are some fun things we have planned this week :

1)      Play date with a friend in another city: We’ve been meaning to get together with a Santa Barbara girlfriend (we live in Los Angeles).  Since we have the time, we’ll spend an afternoon out there, letting the kids play while we catch up!

2)      Impromptu visit with Grandpa! My parents live in Orange County, but are transitioning to Ohio(!!).  Mom is already there, but Dad is still at home getting the house sold (it’s in escrow!).  We try to spend as MUCH time with Grandpa as possible, and this week’s schedule allows us yet another day.  Happiness!

3)      Girlfriend + Kid Luncheon.  Because a few girlfriends are in town this weekend for the holiday, I’ve put together a girlfriend + kid luncheon at my house on Friday.  I provide a kid friendly environment with LOTS of activities / toys etc AND lunch + libations + adult conversation for my girlfriends.  BLISS.

Although she passed away in the late 80s, I have always felt a very strong bond to my maternal grandmother.  The memories I have of her are vivid and I feel her presence all the time.  Other than a few pictures, though, I don’t have much else to remember her by.

For my birthday this year, my older sister gave me the most amazing gift.  It was a leaf that had been bronzed as a gift from my grandfather to my grandmother many many years ago.  It’s a sweet and romantic heirloom and I’m grateful that my sister passed it on to me.  I wanted to create something around the bronze leaf, however, that would save it from a lifetime collecting dust in a random drawer somewhere (albeit loved and cherished at the same time).  And, because I am not THAT creative, I called my jewelry designer girlfriend to give me a hand.

What she made for me is perfect.  I am so happy to have my grandmother close to me again.

As a busy and frugal and health conscious Mom, I like to cook easy, healthy, non time-consuming recipes that don’t break the bank.  This weekend I made some delicious fish tacos and wanted to share the simple recipe.

Ingredients

• Corn Tortillas
• Shredded Cabbage (about 4-5 cups)
• 1 Avocado
• 1 Large Onion
• Small bunch of Cilantro
• Shredded Cheddar Cheese (about 2 cups)
• 4 Pieces of Tilapia
• Bread Crumbs
• Red Pepper Flakes
• Seafood Seasoning
• Cooking Oil

The Cilantro Avocado Salsa

Cut up onion into small chunks.  Chop up the cilantro, but not too small.  Open avocado and cut out big chunks.  In a food processor or mini prep, add in half of the onion pieces, half of the cilantro and half of the avocado.  Add in about ½ cup of water.  Blend.

Remove salsa and put in a bowl.  Repeat with the other half of the ingredients.

The Fish

In a big skillet, add a cup of cooking oil and heat on high.  I use Spectrum’s organic high heat Safflower Oil.  Rinse tilapia filets and pat dry.  Season with red pepper flakes and seafood seasoning mixture.  Layer evenly with bread crumbs on both sides.  When the oil in the pan in hot, place filets in skillet.  Turn to medium high.  Cook evenly on both sides until the fish turns a crispy brown.

Making the Tacos

Heat up a tiny bit of cooking oil in a small skillet.  Heat up corn tortilla on one side.  After a few minutes, flip over and add some shredded cheese.  After it melts slightly, remove corn tortilla from the skillet.  Cut pieces of the cooked fish and put into the tortilla.  Add shredded cabbage and cilantro salsa.  Voila!

Twice a year, LA Kids Consignment holds a weekend sale.  Founder Kristin Nelson coordinates with parents in the LA community to organize and sell their gently used baby & kid stuff.  The result is an organized showroom of gently used items that are in good condition and clean.  There are roughly 50,000 items available to the public for sale, from car seats, strollers, clothes, bicycles, puzzles & games and more.

The sale runs today and tomorrow (3/20 and 3/21) from 9am-5pm at City-Art in Van Nuys, 7733 Hayvenhurst Ave, Van Nuys, CA. Kids are expensive!  Their stuff doesn’t have to be.

Hi, it’s Susanna.  From time to time, I will have contributing writers on my blog, whether they be googooswap staff members, other Moms in the community, family members, friends, etc.  Today’s post was written by Nicole, an aspiring mother (someday she hopes) and pseudo “auntie” to all her friends’ kids.  She helps me with googooswap marketing AND keeps me entertained with stories of living the single LA life (oh the memories)!

From Nicole :

Last week I learned that come Fall 2010 I will be a first time godmother to my best friend’s son/daughter; needless to say I am over the moon! Jill (my best friend) and I met in college our freshmen year.  We were stuck like glue for 4 years and then we went our separate ways after graduation; Jill to NYC and I went to LA.  Over our years apart we remained the closest of friends and I always knew that one day we would be the “other mom” to each others children.  Since I found out about the baby, I have been combing the web for articles to guide me on my journey to being the best godmom ever.

For the past few years I have been a big fan of the blog network PopSugar, so of course the first site I thought of for kicking off my research was the PopSugar blog LilSugar. If you’re not familiar with the PopSugar blog network, you should check them out. The first post I read on LilSugar basically had my name all over it: 10 Reasons Single Women Make the Best Family Friends. While Jill has been married for a few years and has child #1 on the way, I am still living the single life here in LA. In this post, my 2 favorite reasons for why I will make a best family friend were: #5 and #10:

#5 – Children reap the reward of having another adult (who isn’t a parent) to talk to about issues. – I’m looking forward to fielding questions that he/she may be too scared to ask mom or dad.
#10 – You get to live vicariously through her when she fills you in on her latest date, a spontaneous trip, or pulling an all-nighter (that doesn’t involve someone getting sick or having a nightmare). – I am 100% certain that Jill and her husband look forward to hearing about my crazy life here in LA. Sometimes I feel as though I work harder at “living it up” just so I have more fodder for a good story.

For the other 8 reasons, head over to LilSugar

Since it’s supposed to rain this Saturday in LA and I’m sure the kiddos (as well as yourselves) will be antsy to get out of the house on Sunday, why not head over to the Fowler Family Festival at UCLA? It goes from 12-5pm at the Fowler Museum on the UCLA campus. The festival celebrates 40 years of ethnic studies at UCLA and will include musical performances, art workshops, poetry readings, gallery discussions and more. Admission is free.

When Peanut was about 3 months old, she started breaking out in rashes and eczema everywhere. It was so heartbreaking and frustrating to watch the eczema spread even as we tried to do a million things to make it go away. I was breastfeeding exclusively at the time, so at one point, my diet was basically rice and meat. This still didn’t seem to help.

We went to see multiple dermatologists, a holistic chiropractor, a homeopathic doctor, an acupuncturist, an allergist and a medical doctor who specialized in biomedical interventions. Eventually, over the course of a year, we were able to pinpoint the majority of her allergies which we discovered were 99% food related. I’m so happy to report that now, at the age of 3.5, Peanut’s skin has almost completely cleared up. It’s amazing!

Having a child with a ton of food allergies has had a huge impact on our lives. From time to time, I will blog about the fun tips & strategies I’ve learned along the way to make life easier for everyone involved with food allergies. I welcome your hints, tips and questions as well!

Here are some upcoming topics :

Living with Food Allergies : Birthday Parties!

Living with Food Allergies : Traveling

Living with Food Allergies : School

Living with Food Allergies : The GFCF Diet (Gluten-free / Casein-free)

Living with Food Allergies : Picky Eaters & Nutrition!

Living with Food Allergies : Resources