Attempt at a Sugarless Holiday

With the holidays coming up, I, like many of us moms, find myself scrambling to try to fit in every fun family tradition, event, and party to our holidays. I've noticed that this year, though, some things have changed. I was always one to put cooking at the top of my Christmas "to do" list. As an avid cook I always loved being in the kitchen and cooking for others was pretty much my love language if you will. But as of late, I found myself not focusing on creating food for memories but trying to create new experiences that alone would serve as memories. By putting food at the top of my "to do" list for the holidays meant now having to spend hours and lots of money researching gluten free, artifical color free, refined sugar free, chocolate free YUMMY holiday desserts. Oh my word are you kidding me? Why not just take Christmas carols, the tree and lights out of the holiday while you're at it?! And when I say spending "money" to research such recipes, I mean that in terms of buying the overly priced GF ingredients, only to have my son not be able to handle the food or not like it, and lately it has been more the latter. So now I'm just trying to take some of the candy and sugar out of his holidays a bit. Even looking toward their classroom holiday parties, my poor kiddo is already dreading the party. He knows that even if I bring him in his typical "gluten free dessert" he will be looking over at the kid next to him grinning ear to ear shoving down a beautiful dark red icing cupcake with those little green sprinkles. Solution? Well, a friend told me the other day, just pull him out of school early and take him to do something fun. Simple. Brilliant. And I think that's exactly what I'm going to do, if he's up for it. But as I roll through the rest of this season, hopefully I can avoid making sugar and foods one of the centerpieces of the season and create memories that include board games, fireplaces and our family together.