Soap Nuts… That’s nuts!
If your child has ever had allergies (sometimes they pass), you’ll know all about hives. Hives are a symptom of the body’s release of histamine, as a reaction to an irritant, but lately, one of our little buddies has been having a mild reaction, almost every time he’s in the space. Luckily, the alarming red dots don’t seem to bother him at all.
Still, it would be better if he didn’t get them. So what can we do?
Well, first off, we’ve stopped offering snacks to this little friend, since the number of foods that can cause allergic reactions, and then hives, is huge. His family is taking him to a allergist, but the waiting time for an appointment, and then the testing process are both very long. Even after we stopped giving him food, he’s had the same reaction almost every time he comes in, and he’s the only one.
Next, we asked Amanda to observe this little guy, and make notes on everything he touched or did, to see if we could figure out if something in the environment could be the culprit allergen. 
Her notes seemed to point to the couch, and possibly the laundry detergent. We were using GreenWorks, a biodegradable product from Chlorox. The label says “made from all natural ingredients,” but if it’s giving our kids hives, we’re ready to throw it out.
I went up to the Soap Dispensary on Main Street, and talked to the lady there about more natural products, and she suggested “soap nuts”. Their page on how this product is used, and what it’s good for is quite informative, and with a free sample in hand, I came back to Buddings to try them out.
It entailed boiling the nuts for a few minutes to “activate” them, and then pouring the lightly bubbled mixture into a glass jar for cooling and safe keeping. We’re supposed to warm them up every time we use them, and they should last several washes!
We just washed the couch covers yesterday and the soap nuts did a decent job on some of the rubbed in finger prints, smears and… whatever that other stuff was. It’s not perfect, but it smells clean, and the biggest test is yet to come. The next time our sensitive little buddy comes in, we’ll all have our fingers crossed.
