Check out this box of Oreos. Does it seem appropriate that a child would consume a box of cookies this size for a snack after dinner? Look at the serving size and you'll notice it has 12 full size Oreo cookies in that box! If you look at the ingredients, the second ingredient is wheat flour! Maddi came home from Awanas tonight with a chocolate circle around her mouth and said "Oreos don't have gluten in them, do they?" "I ate a whole box of them for snack." In my mind I'm like, a whole box, they come in bags and yes they have gluten but I'm sure she didn't eat too many of them. She then showed us the box and Brett and I started laughing. Inside I was crying because we have been trying to be so good about keeping gluten from Maddi's diet. However, I know Maddi was upset that she ate something, a whole lot of something, she shouldn't have eaten so I didn't let her know I was upset. She said her leader told her they didn't have gluten so she ate the box of 12 cookies. 12 cookies...right before she is going to bed....filled with gluten no less!!! I can understand about the gluten mishap, I didn't know much about gluten before I started researching it either. We showed Maddi how to read labels and if she sees wheat flour listed then she shouldn't eat it. Of course many other things have gluten besides wheat flour, but that's a big easy one for her to know about. She even took her own bag of fruit snacks with her to Awanas in case the snack was cookies or crackers she couldn't eat. Oh well....today at dance she had 4 Twizzlers before she realized that they have gluten as well. The second ingredient in Twizzlers is wheat flour too. Who knew? Thankfully a little girl who has Celiac Disease saw Maddi eating Twizzlers and she told her they have gluten before she devoured too many more.

We took Maddi off gluten at the first of the year to see if there is a connection between gluten and her eczema. She was off of it for 5 weeks before we went to Disney. While we were there we let her have whatever food she wanted to see how her skin would react. It definitely flared her eczema so now we are (trying) following a gluten free diet again. I will take Maddi this week to get her blood taken to see if she has Celiac Disease. I'm really hoping she doesn't have it so that if she ocassionaly wants gluten filled foods she can eat them but she'll just know that her eczema will flare. We'll see what happens with that....poor little Maddi girl.

Friday was the day that never ended. Brett and I took Maddi to the doctor to talk about her issues with anxiety and things went well. After that we took her to lunch and then Brett and Maddi got their allergy shots together. Such a lovely daddy and daughter bonding moment : ) Later that afternoon we were at the pediatrician to talk about Celiac testing and had her swabbed for strep because her throat hurt a bit and she was getting a rash that looked like the beginning of scarlet fever. Maddi tends to get scarlet fever rash with strep. The rapid test came back negative so they are doing a culture. Now I'm pretty sure she doesn't have strep, but has 5th disease. It's not a big deal to have 5th disease but the rash is itchy and annoying. As soon as I got home from taking Maddi to the doctor my neighbor called to see if I could watch their kids while they went to the hospital to monitor her and her baby she is pregnant with. I was happy to help them out and I stayed for 45 minutes or so until the in-laws got there. Then I came home and took Maddi and her friend to dance for a sleepover (they stayed until 11:00 p.m., not the whole night). On my way there Brett called to ask if I wanted to play bunco with some neighbors. They needed a sub, so I headed over and played bunco until I went back to pick up Maddi at the sleepover. She was less than thrilled to leave the party because she was having a great time but we finally got home and made it to bed before midnight. Not a bad day Friday, just a busy day that kept getting busier as it went on.

Saturday was snowing and crazy windy so we never left our house the whole day. We didn't have to do anything so we stayed in our warm house and out of the blowing snow. It was nice to have a day of doing nothing. Sunday we made it out of the house for dance, lunch, playing with friends and Awanas.