Change of Plans

It's funny how you have plans to do something, and then everything completely changes. For the past week we had been looking forward to going out with our friends who we haven't seen in a very long time. They were going to meet us at our house at 4:00, but then 2:00 came along and it started snowing. Kelsey and I headed over to Mom's to get something we needed, and we played a couple of games and played with little Jack. I didn't think much of the snow until we went out to drive in it. We tried to turn out of Mom and Dad's neighborhood, and the traffic was completely stopped, so we took the long way home. We saw a car slide about 15 feet, and their wheel almost came off. Our friends had called to cancel, so now we didn't have plans for dinner. I made it almost all the way home, but couldn't quite get all the way up the hill (Peter easily managed to do it, after I quit attempting and felt fine to leave the car parked horribly on the side of the road... :)

So the change of plans was getting to try a recipe out of the new cookbook that Mom and Dad gave me for Christmas. My mouth has been watering as I have been reading all of the recipes. The recipes are pretty involved, so I thought tonight would be a perfect night to take the time to try it (not realizing that it would take me over 2 hours to make it!) Lots happened in betweeen starting and finishing this dinner(burning some of the chicken, burning my arm after olive oil splattered on it when I put the chicken in the pan, having olive oil splatter all over the island and the floor, dropping some food on the floor, squishing whole tomatoes by hand and having juice squirt who knows where (yes, the recipe says to squish the tomatoes by hand....!) When the meal was finally done, I set it on the table feeling a little scared that someone would dare complain after all I (and Peter) went through. To my surprise, we loved the dinner. I couldn't believe my ears when Conner said, "These mushrooms are REALLY good!" We agreed that it's not a dinner that we can make after work, but it's definitely one to make again (after my arm recovers :) We finished up the night watching Julie and Julia, pretty appropriate movie after our dinner experience!