While having mast cell disease severely limits what I can eat, drink, inhale and expose myself to in general, I can do a few things on my “unsafe” list as long as I follow a very specific protocol.

For instance, I can eat pumpkin swirl cheesecake as long as I only eat a small amount right before bedtime and take enough Benadryl to knock me out for the next 10 hours so I can sleep through whatever reaction the milk protein in it may cause.

That’s the problem with cheesecake, though. Who can only eat a few bites? Definitely not me so I still wake up all red and itchy and covered in hives with pain from that goes from head to toe. The inflammation goes deep down to my bones and even manifests itself in my hair follicles.

Seriously. My hair hurts!

But it was worth it.

Well, maybe not. 😄

I had to do something with all the pumpkin I still had left over from last year’s stash so I thought I’d be nice and make that and some pumpkin cream cheese muffins for the hubs since he is nice and mostly follows my strict diet with me just to make life easier for us both.

They both came out so good, I couldn’t help myself!

I am still paying for it and probably will be all week but I have no one to blame; it’s my own fault. It’s so hard to be on such a strict diet, though!

Some days I just don’t want to follow doctor’s orders but in the end I always go back to it because otherwise I’m too sick to do what needs to be done around here. Plus, it’s just miserable being so sick. Especially this time of year when I really would rather be admiring the lovely flowers and birds and grass with my chickens…

Or, you know, going for a drive up the mountain, which I love to do in spring. The wildflowers are blooming up there now and I want to go see them but I can’t until I feel better otherwise I’ll just ruin the trip.

Ugh.

Anyway, the wind is back to blowing at breakneck speed for the next couple of days so I’m pretty much off the hook for doing any real work outside while I recover, so that helps. I feel like we’re on track and am so happy with the progress we’ve made overall.

Almost all of the beds are planted now and we are topping them with grass clippings and straw to help keep the moisture in while feeding them at the same time…

Hopefully the wind won’t blow it all away!

Yesterday my sunflower seeds arrived in the mail…

I saved a ton of the giant sunflowers from last year and planted those all over the property already, so hopefully they’ll be popping up soon. These new ones will go in as soon as I can get out there to do it and so will these morning glories…

I also already planted some of the seeds I saved from last year from my morning glory girl but I don’t know if they’ll sprout so I wanted backups just in case, not to mention more to plant than what I saved.

Speaking of my morning glory girlie, I can’t wait to see how she turns out this time! Last year was the first year I did it and it came out really lovely I thought…

This year I’m going all out with the flowers AND the garden.

Hopefully I can keep myself from being naughty and eating things I know will make me sick so I can keep up with it all! 🙄