Day 39 - Blueberry Muffins

     So I climb into bed last night and I'm lying there for about 10 minutes when I feel something crawl across my nose.  I SAT UP IN BED SO FAST!!!!!  I'm brushing my nose, rubbling my hands all over my face.  I'm running my fingers through my hair, then I'm doing wide sweeps of the covers and of my pillow.  All of this is going on in the dark mind you because the light switch next to bedroom door was off, so I couldn't turn the light on my nightstand on.  I was freaking out!  And I was making so much noise rustling the covers I'm extremely surprised my husband didn't say anything.  I race to the light switch, turn on the light and then closely examine the pillow, covers, floor and surrounding area because there is NO way that bugger is crawling on me again!  Nothing.  I didn't see a thing.  For all I know, I probably smeared him on my pillow, but I'm sure I would've felt that.  I was so eeeked out and jittery!!  You have to understand that I'm really not afraid of bugs, snakes or spiders.  I was the one at the vet clinic everyone came to to extinguish the little critters because no one else wanted to do it, except the doctor.  So, I really am not bothered by them WHEN I CAN SEE THEM AND DON'T FEEL THEM CRAWLING ON ME!!  Ooohh, chills just thinking about it.  I finally calmed myself down, turned off the light and climbed back into bed.  Every single one of my senses was on high alert, especially all those nerve endings on my skin.  I'm lying there wondering if I should go into another unoccupied bedroom and then I started thinking about the mouse we had in our old house. 
     Back in Rhode Island, I was sitting at the kitchen table with the kids and there was a package of Keebler Peanut Butter Sticks on the counter.  The mouse came out from behind the oven and ran over to the cookies, took one out and tried to squeeze back behind the oven, but had the cookie positioned the wrong way - like carrying a log through a door, he had it the long way instead of the end going through first.  He figured it out though.  It was pretty remarkable to see him reposition himself so that he could finally fit and take his prized possession with him.  Usually, people scream and jump on to chairs when they see a mouse, but I was entertained. However, I was really disgusted with the fact that he ran on the counter and contaminated a newly opened bag of really good cookies.
     So, yeah, this was something I thought about while lying there in bed, too.  Little creepy crawly things that really don't bother me.  What really does bother me are things that fly and come into my home.  Again, back in Rhode Island we had a chimney and on occasion birds would fly down and then be stuck in the house trying to escape.  That really frightened me because they're scared, they're flying around and they're so doggone unpredictable.  Ha ha I haven't even gotten to today's recipe yet, but this is a story I have to share.  Our daughters were about 5 and 3 years old at the time and shared a bedroom.  Our son was an infant, and I had put him down to bed and was reading the girls their nightly bedtime story.  This night will forever be stuck in my head.  The book we were reading was  Emma at the Beach.  It's about a good, little witch named, Emma, and her friends, a cat, an owl, and a bat.  We're sitting on one of their beds, one of them on either side of me when I notice something black about the size of a small shoe on the floor that I hadn't noticed before.  I thought it was a pair of pants one of the girls had thrown on the floor.  I continued reading and the thing started to move.  Interesting.  What the...?  Then it started to fly!  It was a BAT, circling around in the bedroom!  OH MY GOSH!!!!!  I'm screaming.  My daughters are screaming.  I was FREAKING OUT!!!  All I could think about were stories where the bat gets stuck in a girl's hair and has rabies and bites her in the neck.  EEEEWWWW!!  So the three of us are screaming.  My husband's downstairs and I'm thinking why the heck (ok, hell) hasn't he come up yet with all this noise?  Light bulb goes on in my head:  I'll stand up, get the bat to follow me out of the room and the girls will be fine.  Ok, I stand up, open their door, look for the bat, run out of the room and slam the door behind me.  PHEW!  I hated doing that, but we're all ok, and every thing's fine.  Wait, the girls are still screaming.  Where's the bat?  OH MY GOD!!!!  They're in their room with the door shut and the bat is STILL flying around!!  WHAT KIND OF A MOTHER AM I???!!!  OH MY GOSH, I HAVE TO GO BACK IN THERE!!!  So, I stood there in the hall, yelling for my husband, who came running up the stairs, and then took a VERY deep breath and quickly opened the door to get the girls out of their room.  What a night!  Our neighbors ended up coming over because we knew their boys would be interested in seeing it.  We eventually caught it in a hamper and took it outside to release it, but it will forever live in our memories.  So ironic that we were reading a story that had a bat in it.
     Last night, after climbing into bed the second time, a couple minutes later I thought I felt something touching my leg.  Again, I'm on even higher alert and wondering if I'll be able to fall asleep.  Finally, exhaustion just took over and the lovely Mr. Sandman paid me a visit.  Yes, you can bet I washed our bedsheets this morning.  All this previous chit chat had no relevance to today's recipe, but was something I wanted to share.
     Blueberry Muffins was the recipe for today.  They came from Alton Brown at http://www.foodnetwork.com/
Here's the link, since I can't post the recipe: http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/alton-brown/blueberry-muffins-recipe/reviews/index.html.  It called for cake flour, but I didn't have any, so I used regular.  And I also used Greek yogurt for the 1 cup of plain yogurt.

The sugar, egg, oil, and yogurt combined.

 Ready for baking!

Complete yummy goodness...

     I have to say that these were the most delicious blueberry muffins I have ever made.  Ok, to be honest, I've never made blueberry muffins from scratch, they've always been from those store bought mixes.  Not any more!  These are definitely the way to go!  They were so good!  The tops were nicely browned and a little chewy and crunchy and the inside was so moist.  MMMMMmmmmmmm......deliciousness!  The only problem I had was that even though I greased the muffin tins, they still stuck when I went to turn them out and about a quarter of the tops came off.  Next time, muffin cups.  This is where I'm going to gain most of my weight, eating the scraps of the goods that won't hold together.  A bit here, a piece there, it will all end up on my hips creating, are you ready, it just seems so appropriate with today's post, a MUFFIN TOP!  Sorry, hard for me to hold back on that one.  Also, they didn't rise up, they were more like flat muffins.  Maybe that was because I didn't use cake flour.  I didn't care though, those little bits and pieces were still delicious.  My rolling pin rating:  on a scale of 1-4 rolling pins with 4 being the best, Alton's Blueberry Muffins scored a 3½!
     Happy baking!