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In one of my not-so-illustrious moments as a mom, I swung a parenting deal with my preschooler that I’ll probably still be honoring when he’s 17. The just-be-quiet-and-cooperate-and-stop-grabbing-everything-and-I’ll-let-you-pick-out-one-thing at the grocery store deal.

Foolishly, it didn’t occur to me at the time that I was setting the bar. It was a moment of pure desperation to get dinner made and lunches packed. Plus I assured myself this was the incentive I needed to get the meal-planning done on Sundays and whip through the store solo on Monday morning. The only problem is summer came…and Christmas vacation…and two weeks of snow cancellations… Before I knew it my grocery store co-pilot had earned his stripes. And lots of snacks.

Not that he was in the habit of picking out anything absurd. Yet.

Then it happened. We needed something from Whole Foods. When you’re a gluten-free, dairy-free family Whole Foods is par for the course. You seek out the 365 tags and otherwise keep your head down. To this day I’m still not sure why we went down the snack aisle. I think we were looking for Jackson’s Honest Sweet Potato Chips. But that’s where he spotted them – a 6-pack of chocolate covered rice cakes – for $4.99. Six rice cakes. For five dollars. Folks, that’s 26 bananas at Trader Joe’s!

But a deal’s a deal, right? And Allergy Moms… those tiny heart strings that pull when your child asks, “Are these gluten-free?” What are you going to do, lie? No, you tell the truth and say, “Yes, and dairy-free and nut-free, so you can even take them to school.”