Chicken dumplings, pumpkin curry, two art-world mysteries, a Cotswolds bookshop romance, and a big week in Milwaukee
I stayed up late Wednesday night to watch the Brewers win the World Series. I am not a sports fan as a general rule, but this is my hometown team, and I had a very personal reason to be in my chair at the end of that game. Gary was a lifelong Brewers fan. Season tickets for years. When he could no longer get to the games in person, he listened on the radio. I thought about him every inning.
Today the sausages will dance in the streets of Milwaukee (if you have never seen the Great Milwaukee Sausage Race, stop what you are doing and watch it here, the same streets that were once lined with the breweries that gave this team its name. It is a good week to be from Milwaukee.
And now, on to the favorites.
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Chicken and Pumpkin Dumplings by Plays Well With Butter. Picture a deep bowl of creamy chicken soup with tender pulled chicken and autumn squash, and then imagine it has dumplings. Soft, pillowy dumplings that have been simmered right in the broth so they absorb every bit of flavor in the pot.
Healthy Chicken Stew by Oh Sweet Basil. Tender chicken, roasted butternut squash, kale, tomatoes, and quinoa, all in one pot. It is hearty without being heavy, which is a line that is harder to walk than it sounds. This is a recipe I will make on a Sunday afternoon and eat for most of the week.
Pumpkin Lentil Curry from Tried and True Recipes. Pumpkin, lentils, chickpeas, and a few pantry staples, and the result is something that looks and tastes like it came from your favorite restaurant. It is vegetarian, naturally gluten free, and the kind of thing that fills the house with a smell that makes everyone wander into the kitchen to ask what is cooking. If you have been looking for a reason to try lentils, this is it.
If you missed my Halloween Oreo Brownies this week you may want to put them on the list for the weekend. If you want something easier try Mummy Rice Krispie Treats.
Read, Watch, Listen
“Maxxing” is Dictionary.com’s 2026 Word of the Year
10 Simple Rules for Personal Growth That Can Improve Your Everyday Life
What life in Denmark shows about the power of emotional safety
‘Don’t sweat the small stuff’: hospice workers share 12 lessons about life and death
America’s Newest National Park, Chiricahua, Is a Wonderland.
4 Foundational Ways to Start Letting Go Before Life Gets Any Harder
This psychologist has a new theory for why orcas keep attacking boats
On the Nightstand
The English Masterpiece by Katherine Reay. Lily has worked her whole life to get to this moment: assistant to the keeper of Modern Collections at the Tate, helping plan a world-class Picasso exhibit to honor the passing of the great artist. The opening is everything she dreamed. The lighting, the champagne, the glittering crowd, the international acclaim. And then she stops in front of a masterpiece and hears herself say, out loud, to a room full of people, “It’s a forgery.” The gallery falls silent.
What follows is a race against the clock as Lily tries to prove what she knows before the scandal destroys her career and her mentor Diana’s with it. Diana is polished and formidable, schooled in European high society and decades of London’s art world, and the Picasso Commemorative was to be her crowning achievement. One statement from a junior assistant is enough to send museums and collectors across the continent into chaos. Katherine Reay has a gift for putting you inside a world you know nothing about and making you feel completely at home in it. If you love art, London, women who refuse to be wrong, and a mystery with real stakes, this one is for you.
The Final Act of Juliette Willoughby by Ellery Lloyd. In 1938, a runaway heiress and artist named Juliette Willoughby died in an accidental studio fire in Paris, her masterpiece Self Portrait As Sphinx lost with her. That is the official story, and everyone knows it.
Fifty years later, two Cambridge art history students stumble across proof that the fire was no accident at all, and that what happened in that Paris studio is connected to long-buried family secrets, a generations-old curse, and, somehow, a brutal murder in present-day Dubai. A tale of obsession, love, and revenge built around a woman who refused to be painted out of history. If The English Masterpiece appeals to you, put this one on the list directly underneath it. Two art-world mysteries in a row is weekend plan.
The Village Green Bookshop by Rachael Lucas. Hannah has spent fifteen years putting herself last: mum to a football-obsessed teenager, wife to a workaholic husband, her own needs perpetually at the bottom of the pile. When the chance comes to take over the Post Office in Little Maudley, a charming Cotswold village, she takes it without looking back. And then she has the idea of adding a bookshop to the post office, which the close-knit community has feelings about, and she meets Jake, a world-class footballer whose career ended suddenly when his leg was shattered, now hiding in a beautiful Victorian mansion and coaching the local youth team.
If you want something warm and relaxing for the weekend, this is the one.
You can find all of my book recommendations at My Bookshop. Most titles are also available from Barnes and Noble, Bookshop.org, and on Libby through your local library.
Outfit of the Day
I love this color combination! Burgundy, green and ivory, is classic. This weeks outfit is a pair of burgundy wool pants, with an ivory cashmere sweater, a pair of herring bone pumps, and a hunter green bag. To keep you warm a beautiful Ralph Lauren plaid wool coat. You could add earrings or a beautiful brooch to the coat or sweater.
Outfit Seperates
That is what I have for you this week, friends. It has been a big week in Milwaukee, a good week for books, and the kind of week that makes you want to cook something from scratch and stay home this weekend.
Do not forget to come back tomorrow for Weekend Meanderings with Kim at Northern California Style and Juliet at Make Mine a Spritze. We always have something worth sharing.
Tell me: are you a Brewers fan, or is there a team that holds a special place in your heart for reasons that have nothing to do with sports? And is there a book you are adding to your stack this week?
Find me on Pinterest and Instagram for more during the week.
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