You know about those days, right? 

It started early this morning right around 12:15am when Hailey woke up.  That in itself is not all that unusual.  Most nights somewhere between 12:15am and 2:00am Hailey wakes up and I bring her to bed with us.  (Yes, I still do that, and it still works just fine for us, thank you very much.)

Anyhoo, last night was a little different than usual in that Hailey didn’t go back to sleep until around 4am.  Yes, indeed I said 4am.  She did sleep in until about 9am, but still- that was not enough sleep for her or for me. 

We were supposed to go to story time at the library this morning, but there was no way that was going to happen.  I’m sure you can imagine how tired Hailey was this morning.  So, after lunch she went right down for her nap.  I thought surely she’d take a nice long nap after last night.  But nope- she didn’t even sleep for an hour.

The whining, crying and tantrums are enough to drive any sane person absolutely crazy.  And since I started out my day a bit on the grouchy side I’m sure you can imagine how I’m feeling right now.

But there’s only a couple more hours until I see this:

Hailey gets excited by the little things in life- a dog going by our house, a car driving down the street, a school bus dropping off or picking up neighborhood kids for school, the mailman putting mail in our mailbox, etc.  So, the other day when the mailman brought a package to our door she was beside herself with joy.  And then when we saw the box was for her she could hardly wait for me to open it.

Once I got it open we saw there were some Crayola toddler markers and some Crayola toddler stampers from Aunt Jayme.  No special reason, she just thought Hailey would enjoy them.  Isn’t that just the nicest thing you’ve heard all day?  So as Hailey screeched with delight (or perhaps impatience) I got the packages open so she could try them out.  And of course- I took pictures.

Hailey loves the stampers- they are little farm animals- and I’m sure you can tell that she was excited.

She also enjoyed writing with the markers…

…stamping farm animals all over her arms…

…and tasting the red marker.

Thank you Aunt Jayme! I know there will be lots more to be had with the markers and the stamps!

For this weeks Random Recipe Exchange Pam told us to just post “any recipe you would like to share.”  This was really hard for me because I have lots of favorite recipes.  But I finally decided on this recipe.  If you like Alice Springs Chicken at the Outback- you will love this recipe. 

Aussie Chicken

Ingredients
4 skinless, boneless chicken breast halves – pounded to 1/2 inch thickness
2 teaspoons seasoning salt
6 slices bacon, cut in half
1/2 cup prepared yellow mustard
1/2 cup honey
1/4 cup light corn syrup
1/4 cup mayonnaise
1 tablespoon dried onion flakes
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
1 cup sliced fresh mushrooms
2 cups shredded Colby-Monterey Jack cheese
2 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley

Directions
Rub the chicken breasts with the seasoning salt, cover and refrigerate for 30 minutes.
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Place bacon in a large, deep skillet. Cook over medium high heat until crisp. Set aside.
In a medium bowl, combine the mustard, honey, corn syrup, mayonnaise and dried onion flakes. Remove half of sauce, cover and refrigerate to serve later.
Heat oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Place the breasts in the skillet and saute for 3 to 5 minutes per side, or until browned. Remove from skillet and place the breasts into a 9×13 inch baking dish. Apply the honey mustard sauce to each breast, then layer each breast with mushrooms and bacon. Sprinkle top with shredded cheese.
Bake in preheated oven for 15 minutes, or until cheese is melted and chicken juices run clear. Garnish with parsley and serve with the reserved honey mustard sauce.

It is easy to make and yummy to eat!  Now go stop by Pam’s blog to see what the other participants are cooking up this week.

(picture from allrecipes.com)

I am a planner.  I like to have everything planned ahead of time and scheduled just so.  When we take a vacation I like to plan each day out with where we will be going and what we will be doing.  Rich on the other hand is a spur of the moment type of person.  He’s a “hey, let’s go to Disney World tomorrow” type of a person.  (We don’t live anywhere near Disney World, by the way).  I, on the other hand, am a “let’s plan a trip to Disney World for next year so that I have time to research every little detail before we go” type of person.

So last Saturday morning when Rich said, “Let’s go to the zoo this afternoon” I said, “No way, we can’t go to the zoo today.  When are we going to do that?  It’s not in my plans.” 

Rich said, “We can go this afternoon.”

To which I responded, “This is why everything must be planned ahead of time.  I am going grocery shopping this morning.  Then I need to feed Hailey her lunch and then she has to go down for her nap at 1pm.  After her nap (which usually goes until about 3-3:30-pm) I must feed her a snack and then go to Target.  Then I will be hurrying home to get dinner ready.  The zoo closes at 5pm.  How in the world will we have time to go to the zoo?  If you had told me ahead of time that you wanted to go to the zoo we could have gone this morning.”

I went to get ready to the grocery store.  I started thinking about how much Hailey would love a trip to the zoo, she thinks animals are fantastic.  I thought if her nap was cut short so we could go that afternoon it wouldn’t really be all that terrible. 

So, guess what I did?  I changed my plans, at the last minute.  And I only twitched a little bit. 

I got the grocery shopping done.  Rich fed Hailey an early lunch and put her down for an early nap.  When she got up we went to the zoo.  We had a blast. 

After the zoo we all went to Target and got home in time for me to fix dinner and still eat at a reasonable hour.

Imagine that.  Last minute plans and things still went smoothly.  Who knew?