Mother/Daughter Time

Ruthie and I went to a Mother/Daughter Luncheon on Saturday. We were unable to attend last year because of a conflict, so I've been looking forward to this year's. It was hosted by one of the mothers at our church and we had a wonderful time until... Well, I'll explain later in the post.

It was held in the our friend's backyard and the weather could not have been more perfect. It was warm and sunny, but a breeze kept it from being too warm. We had actually had some cooler weather come through the day before, which kept the humidity down.


Ruthie and the other girls played with bubbles and made a small craft while the last-minute preparations were made. It was a simple menu of sandwiches, fruit, and chips with dip. The hostess emphasized that the food was "plain" - plain turkey, plain chips, plain bread - for the possible picky eaters among the children. It was very sweet of her to make it so child-friendly.


For dessert, the adults had yummy lemon cake and the children had butterfly cupcakes. This is where we ran into a problem. The body of the butterfly was 3 pastel-colored peanut M&Ms (cute!). Ruthie didn't know they had peanuts in them, and I was refilling my drink when she decided to eat them. When I found out, I told her that they had peanuts in them and that she should tell me if she started itching. I wasn't too worried, though, because her allergies have never shown up too seriously.

About 10 minutes later she came up and told me that she was itching. Her face and neck were red and blotchy. I carry Benadryl with me for this (doctor recommendation) and gave her one. About 20 minutes later, she was still itching, so I gave her a second one. This seemed to take care of the problem, but it was still scary for us. This is the first reaction we've run into since she was diagnosed with allergies last fall. It really put a damper on the day, and since the party was officially over, we went home.

I had a talk with Ruth about how she cannot just eat something without being sure what is in it - especially things like candy, which can have a coating and/or unusual shape. It was also a wake-up call to me. I need to take this much more seriously than I do. Since Ruthie has never had an anaphylactic reaction, I have on many occasions left her without her epi-pen. That has to stop.

Despite the allergy learning experience, we had a wonderful time and cannot wait for next spring's repeat event.