*I partnered with The Human Bean for this post because we both believe it’s important to give back. All opinions are my own.*
“MOM! What if they bring peanuts and I —” my 5-year-old’s eyes were wide with serious concern as he thought about everything that could go wrong on the first day of Kindergarten.
I tried to hide the fact that I was also concerned.
In these last couple weeks of school, I’m recalling what the beginning of the school year looked like.
It’s not easy sending a 5-year-old to school when he’s seriously allergic to the most popular lunch sandwich ever, a PB&J.
Instead of worrying what everyone else was doing, we wanted to instill some personal responsibility (yes, even for a 5-year-old). We taught him not to share food, to sit next to someone who wasn’t eating nuts and to wipe down his area with a wet wipe before eating.
Of course, that’s a lot to be responsible for when you’re just five and still (occasionally) eating your own boogers.
Thankfully, 21 other parents stepped in to make his margin of error even smaller.
A full classroom of kids had parents who replaced peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for nut-free lunches. They skipped nut-based granola bars at snack time and pecan pie at the Thanksgiving feast.
After a year of going the extra mile for a kid most of the parents don’t know – I wanted to say ‘thank you.’
Even more importantly, I wanted my son to say ‘thank you.’
We want him to understand it takes extra time and effort to stock a pantry full of nut-free food for a lunch box. It takes compassion to create a safe learning experience for a child they don’t know.
Saying ‘thank you’ isn’t about him.
Saying ‘thank you’ is about acknowledging people. It’s about acknowledging their effort, their time and their compassion.
Our ‘thank you’ is sincere gratitude from the bottom of our hearts.
That’s why I teamed up with The Human Bean to give each of the 21 parents a $5 gift card.
The Human Bean is all about giving back to the communities it fuels. That includes raising more than $1.2 million to help fight breast cancer – along with food drives, its Farm Friendly Project, Earth Day celebration and much more.
A gift card from The Human Bean is the perfect way to ‘give back’ to the person who made a difference in your child’s school year.
Who do you want to thank? How will you give back?
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