Monday, October 19, 2015

What the teal pumpkin means to me

I am proud to introduce the very first blog post from my son, “JR" (name changed to protect his identity). JR is a second-grader who deals with many different food and non-food allergies. He wants to tell his school and the whole world about the teal pumpkin project! - Jessica

"JR" decorating his teal pumpkin at the Portland Food Allergy Research & Education Walk.
Some people in the world have allergies. I have allergies also. My Mom and me are talking about allergies at Halloween. We should have teal pumpkins because teal is the color for food allergies. Trick-or-treating scares me a little bit because I might get an allergy. We need to be careful about the food. I still like trick-or-treating because I can trade the food that I’m allergic to. Every Halloween, we put the teal pumpkin up. The teal pumpkin means that our house has treats that are not food. They are little toys for kids who have allergies so they don’t have to trade the food! I feel very happy to have kids not have allergies. So this Halloween will you put up a teal pumpkin?

For more resources and to take the teal pumpkin pledge, please see Food Allergy Research and Education! You can take the "pledge" and also print off teal pumpkin flyers for your door to let trick-or-treaters know you have non-food "treats" available.


The TEAL PUMPKIN PROJECT and the Teal Pumpkin Image are trademarks of Food Allergy Research & Education (FARE).