A "Mean Mom's" Valentine's Day

Love is like a red, red rose…..
Well, in today’s classrooms all across the nation this Valentines Day love will be like a diabetic comma! While doing a little research from store to store in search of “good” Valentine’s Day treats for my son to share with his classmates I did not have much success in finding treats that could give them anything more than another trip to the dentist and possibly one to weight watchers as well. I was not surprised to say the least, of course when you start a journey with low expectations you don’t end up disappointed in your results. I found the traditional paper-foil Valentine Cards and bags upon bags of chocolates, hard candies, suckers and gummies two aisle’s wide stocked full of enough sugar to send anyone of his classmates into a comma for a week, but nothing that satisfied my criteria. My criteria you ask? It was pretty simple….something that was not chalked full of processed sugars, MSG, and artificial everything that is so common in today’s food. Something hopefully that was being marketed as a Valentine Day treat, as so the children wouldn’t raise an eye to it’s possible “healthy” content (after all we sometimes have to use the same tricks even on Valentine’s Day that we’d use on Halloween...Haha!) I’d also love if the item was organic, sustainable and the children would like it enough to ask their parents to buy it again for them. I know…my criteria seemed simple to me, but what a list to ask for from corporate America right!

The end result was that I could find nothing to satisfy my requirements in the traditional Valentine’s Day aisle, but rather I was able to find something that would work in it’s place. I bought fruit leather strips from the Stretch Island Fruit Co. in several flavors. Each fruit strip contains ½ serving of fruit and contains no processed sugar; all sugars are found naturally in the fruit! What a concept, fat free and only 45 calories per strip, and best of all peanut free for classrooms like the one my son is in with children with nut allergies! My son will use some recycled materials to create his own Valentine Cards and we will be all set! Now why did that have to be so complicated? I think these treats would have been a huge hit if they were available in the traditional Valentine’s aisle and have written a letter to the Stretch Island Fruit Company to suggest the idea in hope that they will being to market to these holidays for those “Mean Mom’s” like me out there who believe that what we feed our children should be a matter of love all year long!