It sounds as though she's asking to be involved and trusted more. I was struck by this:
she proceeded to ask if she could use an butter knife to cut up her apple (shes never been allowed to do this before) and i told her yes i think you may have grown old enough to do that and i gave her a really dull butter knife and let her do it
because although I've stopped short of the full Continuum Concept approach, my DS6 has been using a sharp kitchen knife to cut up fruit since he was 3 and these days I don't even feel the need to supervise him while he does it. Could you be being over-protective? Could your DD have helped you arrange and clean, rather than being sent out?
ETA: I'm sorry if this sounds critical; I don't mean it that way and I know how scary it is to let young children do things that seem dangerous! But fwiw, it's actually much easier to be safe with a sharp knife than a blunt one, because you don't have to press so hard.
