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My mom and grandma make the best bread pudding and one of them usually makes it every Thanksgiving and Christmas and while some would call it a dessert….we Hoppens call it a side dish. Saturday was a cool crisp fall morning and the first one of the season and we had every intention of venturing […]

The mornings and evenings are getting chillier and chillier around here and when that happens my brain immediately goes COMFORT FOOD. Joe said a few days ago remember when we could travel and we had that awesome fondue in Switzerland? Random.. it was like five years ago. But yea I never forget a good pot […]

It was really hard for me to take down the gallery wall in the formal dining room. It was the first room we ever completed and it had been that way for a number of years. I’m someone that once I get things the way I like them, I don’t really change them. Unless I […]

I don’t know if it was my son driving his paw patrol through the bowl of flour or what but these muffins are some of the best pumpkin muffins i’ve ever made. I know, I know I say that about all the muffins I make.. (see blueberry muffins here) but i’m not joking around. They […]

It all started with a ceramic egg holder that popped up in my my Instagram feed before I fell into a rabbit hole of all the cute kitchen goods on the internet right now. Most shopping experiences lately have been lack luster and I find myself still roaming online during my free time. I have […]

I read the other day that there could potentially be a pumpkin puree shortage this year. I shouldn’t be surprised it is 2020 after all. Maybe this is the time in my life when I teach myself to whip up my own pumpkin puree? hmmmm I smell a weekend activity. An activity… Kind of like […]

Otto is obsessed with the “little house” in Pentwater and begs to go back every time I pick him up from daycare. When Joe and I bought this place back in 2012 it was nothing to brag about. It had been a home to mice and who knows what else, electrical cords taped together and […]

When my friend Mark said that he was expanding his store, Warehouse 55 you know I had to make the 3 hour road trip to have some solo shopping time in the new Warehouse 55 Expansion. I first visited the store back when they first opened and found so many beautiful and amazing things for […]

I am not one of those people that changes things up on a regular basis. I agonize over putting a hole in the wall and getting things just right and then leaving it that way for years and years. I finally on Sunday, on a whim, took down the gallery wall that was in the […]

I think that shishito peppers might be my most favorite new vegetable I’ve introduced into the garden this year. They have a nice sweet heat and we have been tossing them with olive oil, salt and pepper and roasting them at 400 degrees for about 10 minutes until they’re soft and blistered. We then either […]

On Saturday I had the rare opportunity to have some alone time at the farmers market. Since I was heading to the sale at Garden House on my way back I decided to try a market I haven’t been to in a while. I headed south to the Kalmazoo Farmers Market. I forgot how absolutely […]

This weekend one of my favorite antique stores, Garden House Vintage Market was having their weekend sale and of course you know I can’t resist an antique sale. I’m so grateful that we are able to shop (safely) and browse antique malls again. It reminds me of when Otto was a newborn and antique stores […]