I think my big mistake is that I don't have roasting pan with a lid, which I plan to remedy tomorrow, but I had a chicken that had to be dealt with today. I put it in a pan, and baked it, uncovered, just like my trusty Betty Crocker cookbook said to do. After an hour and a half of popping and fizzing coming from my oven, my house is filled with a semi-light mist of smoke, and my eyes are watering. Consequently, my screen door is wide open and my fan is blowing all of the expensively-heated, smoky air out into the cold night... and I watch helplessly as my eyes start to clear only to see dollars (in the form of heated air) wafting out into the night.
In an effort to halt the hemorage, I've loosely covered the chicken with foil, hoping that will somehow reduce the obnoxious (if not noxious) fumes. I'll also need to pick up some oven cleaner at the store tomorrow. :(
Other than smoking up my house, I've been going through pictures tonight. I was terrible this Christmas, only getting out my camera for the first (Chase's family's) of the 5 Christmases we celebrated while back in Nebraska. Here are a few of my favorite pictures:
The "adults" (including Chase's parents, his two brothers, their wives, Keegan, Chase, and I) played Battle of the Sexes after the kids headed downstairs to play with their new toys. I'm pained to admit that the men anihillated the women. However, had the women gone with the opposite of what we thought every answer was, we would have won handily. It was painful.
Chase has a thing about shopping for our neices and nephews. He likes to help get them fun things - toys that will not only bring the kids joy, but will bring the parents certain levels of frustration and/or agony due to their volume, battery usage, etc. (I have never yet been permitted to purchase the kids clothing or "boring" toys. Can you feel the dread I have for when we have children... I can only imagine how brutal turn-about will be!) At any rate, this year, we got 3 of the boys snowball guns. Above Caleb is showing us just how cool the guns are.
Every now and then, a gift is given that is just too good not to play with while everyone continues to open presents. Such was the case with the gift Tyus got from Grandma Dorothy this year - it was a pretty sweet handgun that only required pulling the trigger to make its rapid-fire shooting noise. As you can see, Tyus was a pretty tough sherrif, and Chase was caught!
As I mentioned, Chase likes to be very involved in purchasing gifts for the kids. However, since Keegan became a teenager last year and since Ella, our second neice was born nearly 3 years ago, I've been able to convice my husband to let me buy for the girls. This year, they both got new purses and purse essentials every girl should have. Above, Ella is wearing her sunglasses, chatting on her "cell phone" and holding her purse in her lap. I think this is my favorite picture of Christmas, because I was SO hopeful she would like the gift, and I took this when she thought no one was really even paying attention to her. *sigh* I am a good aunt, even if I live far away!
This post is a little disconnected, but seriously, if you have advice about how to cook a chicken without setting off smoke detectors and having to clean your oven, please share. I'm generally a good cook but am obviously clueless in this area. Here's wishing you a wonderful and smoke-free week!
Tenting with foil from the beginning would probably help out immensely. Also, you can pick up semi-inexpensive rotisseries and that would probably take care of the problem. I knew a lot of people in TN who loved and used their rotisseries for all sorts of things.
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