My 12-year-old-son is home today, slightly ill. Not too ill. Not so ill he can’t make dioramas of the Battle of the Alamo with plastic toy soldiers on the floor of our family room.

He just rushed into my office asking for something he could make “blood” with. Blood? Yeah, blood for Jim Bowie’s death. Bowie had tuberculosis in 1836, and was in the Alamo’s infirmary when Santa Anna’s troops broke in and killed him.

Surely, at moments like these, any mother can quickly locate red paint or a red marker, but no, neither one of those items were found in the time allotted. So we started experimenting with foodstuffs.

“How about that natural red food dye?” my son asked eagerly.

We used it in Valentine’s Day cookie icing in 2006.

“Honey, I don’t see that here.” I said, moving neglected cans of black beans around in our pantry.

“How about pomegranate juice?” he asked.

“Well, I think that might come off brown, and besides, we’re out. Oh! Hey! I’ve got black cherry juice.”

The Lakewood organic brand is fresh pressed, but not nearly thick enough to look like blood on Bowie’s miniature bed linens (made out of torn paper towel).

So we mixed in some Emergen-C black cherry “heart health” powder (the powerful antioxidant formula).

My son stared at our concoction. “No, this looks too gritty.” But as time elapsed, the cherry juice ripened into a nice dark red. “Yeah, okay,” he nodded approvingly, and ran off.

“Just don’t spill it on the rug!” I shouted up after him.