Friday Favorites~a weekly series where we share our favorite books, decor, fashion finds, recipes, podcasts, articles and more.
FRIDAY FAVORITES NO. 626
Good Friday morning to you friends, did you have a good week? We had a great week, it was busy and productive. Yesterday the tilers were here doing some last minute grout work and today the wallpaper is getting installed! I am a little nervous, I hope that it looks as good on the walls as it does on the sample.
My toe is feeling better, it is still tender, Â a little swollen and bruised. It’s hard to get my shoe on but I think it is on the mend. If you missed it last Saturday I ran into something and thought I broke my toe.
The only plans this weekend are finishing my taxes, and by that I mean compiling the information. I still have to do my expenses. Why or why do I procrastinate?
Enough about me, tell me what are your plans for the weekend?
Food
Easy, delicious meals don’t have to take all day. This week I found three that you can make in under an hour, one in 20 minutes! Enjoy.
White Bean And Pesto Chicken Salad With Arugula, an easy, beautiful and delicious salad.
A 20 minute meal! That’s right, in under 20 minutes you can have a steaming, comforting  bowl of one pot creamy lemon gnocchi on the table for you and your family.
Doesn’t this One Pan Mediterranean rice bake look delicious? It’s another easy and delicious dinner that you can make in less than 40 minutes.
St.Partick’s day is just around the corner, why not make these chocolate cupcakes with Bailey’s Irish cream frosting to celebrate?
LINKS TO READ+WATCH+LISTEN
Looking forward to watching this movie.
The Incredible Shrinking Woman.Â
The Diabolical World of Phone Scams
Five years on: The countries that never locked down for Covid-19
Prolific blood donor who saved 2.4 million babies dies at 88
Is Domino’s pizza inflation-proof?
I Used to Teach Students. Now I Catch ChatGPT Cheats
Books
The Forbidden Garden
Every garden is a story, waiting to be told…
At the nursery she runs with her sisters on the New England coast, Sorrel Sparrow has honed her rare gift for nurturing plants and flowers. Now that reputation, and a stroke of good timing, lands Sorrel an unexpected opportunity: reviving a long-dormant Shakespearean garden on an English country estate.
Arriving at Kirkwood Hall, ancestral home of Sir Graham Kirkwood and his wife Stella, Sorrel is shocked by the desolate state of the walled garden. Generations have tried—and failed—to bring it back to glory. Sorrel senses heartbreak and betrayal here, perhaps even enchantment. Intrigued by the house’s history—especially the haunting tapestries that grace its walls—and increasingly drawn to Stella’s enigmatic brother, Sorrel sets to work. And though she knows her true home is across the sea with her sisters, instinct tells her that the English garden’s destiny is entwined with her own, if she can only unravel its secrets…
The Tea Rose
The Tea Rose is a towering old-fashioned story, imbued with a modern sensibility, of a family’s destruction, of murder and revenge, of love lost and won again, and of one determined woman’s quest to survive and triumph.
East London, 1888-a city apart. A place of shadow and light where thieves, whores, and dreamers mingle, where children play in the cobbled streets by day and a killer stalks at night, where bright hopes meet the darkest truths.
Here, by the whispering waters of the Thames, a bright and defiant young woman dares to dream of a life beyond tumbledown wharves, gaslit alleys, and the grim and crumbling dwellings of the poor.
Fiona Finnegan, a worker in a tea factory, hopes to own a shop one day, together with her lifelong love, Joe Bristow, a costermonger’s son. With nothing but their faith in each other to spur them on, Fiona and Joe struggle, save, and sacrifice to achieve their dreams.
But Fiona’s dreams are shattered when the actions of a dark and brutal man take from her nearly everything-and everyone-she holds dear. Fearing her own death at the dark man’s hands, she is forced to flee London for New York. There, her indomitable spirit-and the ghosts of her past-propel her rise from a modest west side shopfront to the top of Manhattan’s tea trade.
Some stories live forever…
Sage Singer is a baker. She works through the night, preparing the day’s breads and pastries, trying to escape a reality of loneliness, bad memories, and the shadow of her mother’s death. When Josef Weber, an elderly man in Sage’s grief support group, begins stopping by the bakery, they strike up an unlikely friendship. Despite their differences, they see in each other the hidden scars that others can’t.
Everything changes on the day that Josef confesses a long-buried and shameÂful secret and asks Sage for an extraordinary favor. If she says yes, she faces not only moral repercussions, but potentially legal ones as well. With the integrity of the closest friend she’s ever had clouded, Sage begins to question the assumptions and expectations she’s made about her life and her family. In this searingly honest novel, Jodi Picoult gracefully explores the lengths to which we will go in order to keep the past from dictating the future.
Need More Book Recommendations?
If you have already read these books or missed something I have featured before on the blog check out My Bookshop on Amazon.Â
Window Shopping
Florals are everywhere this spring, in the house and in your closet. While I personally love an all over floral dress some prefer them more subdued. This dress fits the bill for both, it is floral but not an all over pattern in a classic shirtdress style that will take you from Spring thru Summer.
Outfit Details~Click the photos
Pair it with your favorite ballet flats or sandals and a tote and you have a beautiful look.
Until Next Time
I hope that you found something to read, make and to enjoy on Friday Favorites. Don’t forget WEEKEND MEANDERINGS tomorrow with Kim, Juliet is taking a break.
Before you go, tell me what made you smile this week?
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On My Radar
