Cross Country Craziness.....

Moving.... moving is hard, and stressful, and exciting, and exhilarating. It's been almost a year since my last post. I am an awful blogger. But I'm going to keep trying. It's been a very eventful year. Our little family moved cross country from Michigan to my adopted hometown of Nashville, TN. Me, the fella, the pups, the kitties, and all of our belongings, crammed into a Uhaul truck and headed south. Our home is now East Nashville.

 

 

 

 

Being back here in Nashville has been a learning experience. The fella had never been to Nashville before our move, and though I had only been gone 2 years it sometimes feels as if I've returned to an entirely different city. Moving is hard. Settling in (or re-settling in) is hard. But it's been an amazing journey too. Our life here is filled with entirely new possibilities, and adventures. We're both in better job situations, we're trying our hardest to live healthier lives, and we're soaking up all that the south has to offer. We also have a new member of our little family. Meet Winston!

 

 

 

 

 

Winston is a 3 year old Lab/Great Dane mix. He is 100 pounds of love, and I absolutely adore him. Most people think we're crazy, 3 dogs and 2 cats, but I think 5 animals is the perfect number. Our zoo is non stop entertainment (and cuddles) and I wouldn't have it any other way!

 

 

 



 

I'm hoping to be much better at the blogging this time around, and am going to try to keep at this at a regular basis. I'm not even sure that anyone out there is or will ever be reading this but just in case.... thanks for sticking with me. Life is an interesting ride, and my yellow tulip life has been no exception.

 

 

 





Sweet sweet Saturday (and Sunday)...

As the fella works on Saturdays our weekends begin on Saturday evening. This weekend I decided to start it off in the best way possible... breakfast for dinner. Awesome because 1. it's delicious and 2. we have the leftovers for a yummy brunch on Sunday, which means I dont have to make breakfast.

I stole Karen's amazing breakfast casserole recipe but tweaked it just a little bit. When we were in Grand Haven last visiting Karen and her hippie (aka her husband Kevin) she made this casserole for us using sausage, and it was delish. So we cooked up some potatoes, sausage, and green peppers and then added in tomato and green onions as well.

OH. MY. GOD

So good. So So good. And really easy. We already have a list of different ways we want to try it, and it's definitely going to be a staple for when we have company.

The good food of course needed to be followed by some weekend cocktails so we headed over to The Mayfair, which is in a small town 15 minutes or so right outside of the city. A nice little pub, had there not been a DJ spinning horrible club music. I heard more Nelly than I would have thought possible, but I think on a week night (with no DJ) it'd be a fun place for a few drinks. There's a patio on the roof that overlooks Lake Lansing, that alone deserves a second go in my opinion.

Scooter was of course super happy to see us home early (you can only handle so much Nelly in one night), and was glued to his dad's side for the rest of night. Is he not the cutest thing ever? He may have the breath of a compost pile, and destroy furniture by climbing all over it (exhibit A: the couch cushion behind Dean) but he's my favorite little greybeard.

Sunday turned out to be the laziest day ever, but sometimes you just need to stay in bed until noon...right???

Hope everybody had a grand weekend, and maybe were a little more productive than we were.

Until next time.

Potato, Potaaaaato.

My Mama can cook. Not kinda, not sorta. My mama can COOK. She's the reason that I'm a total foodie, why I endured getting up waaaay before dawn for culinary school, and why most things I do will have something to do with good eats. Even thrifting and flea market-ing usually have a planned yummy lunch/coffee break.

One of my favorite potato dishes is therefore one of my Ma's recipes. Her Rosemary/Parmesan Potatoes are amazing. Amaaaazing. Fancy, and yummier than your average Potatoes Au Gratin. The world needs to have access to these amazing potatoes, so I'm sharing the recipe below.

*It's not the healthiest of dishes, so I suggest a nice bike ride or hike after ingesting this lovely food.

Rosemary/Parmesan Potatoes

3 pounds potatoes (you can peel them, but I prefer them with peel. And you can slice or cube them, I prefer sliced).

1 tsp butter

3 cloves of minced garlic

1/2 cup of minced red onion

3 tablespoons butter

1/2 cup of all purpose flour

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tsp pepper

1 teaspoon dried rosemary, crushed.

1 cup milk

1 cup buttermilk

1 & 1/2 cup of grated parmesan cheese

-Heat oven to 350 degrees.

-Grease a 9 x 13 baking dish.

-Arrange potatoes on the bottom of the baking dish, and set aside.

-Melt 1 tsp butter in saute pan, add garlic and onion and saute for 15 minutes on lowish medium until onions are well cooked through. Do not carmelize onions.

-Stir in 3 tablespoons of butter, and melt.

-Sprinkle in flour, salt, pepper, and rosemary. Then cook and stir until mixture simmers and thickens.

-Continue stirring and slowly pour in milk and buttermilk. Bring to a boil.

-Stir in cheese (1 cup), and cook until melted and smooth.

-Pour over potatoes until evenly coated.

-Bake for half an hour, stir potatoes and then cook for a half hour longer (1 hour total).

-Sprinkle remaining parmesan cheese (1/2 cup) over top and bake for a final 20 minutes.

And Voila! You'll have the yummiest potatoes ever!





Let me introduce...

the cutest dang animals you've ever seen.

Penelope (the beagle) is our newest family member. She loves sleeping, eating, chewing, and hiking. In that order. Scooter (the.... warthog mix?) is the old man of the family. He loves eating, and his Dad. In that order.

Yertel and Sadie are the kitties. Though they look like sisters, technically they are not. I had Yertel for about 6 years before Dean was lucky enough to land me, and he had had Sadie a few years as well. They are chubby, lazy, and overly sassy. But they can cuddle like champs so we keep them. Yerts is on the right, and Sadie is on the left.

And of course then there's the fella. He may technically not be an animal.... but he's a man, so close enough. Dean is a cyclist, and bike mechanic (aka total bike bum). He puts up with my crazy ways, thrifting addiction, and is the most supportive person in my life (besides my mama, but that's like a whole other category in my opinion). He also does all the dishes, and kills bugs for me. So obviously he's a keeper.

These are all of the members of my little family (until I can convince Dean to get another dog), and as their happy faces will probably end up plastered all over this blog I thought an introduction was in order.

A Brand New Blog World.

Hello! And welcome to my little world. I'm Jessie. A manic thrifter, total foodie, lover of travelling, mama to two of the cutest pups and two of the laziest kitties, and partner to the handsomest, swellest, sweetest fella out there (ok, maybe I'm just a tad bit biased on that last one....).

We currently reside in a small city in central Michigan. I'm exploring my new surroundings and learning all that Michigan has to offer. I've decided to try and share my explorations on this here little blog. This is my first attempt at blogging, and I'm super excited. I hope to share tons of fun photos, recipes, tall-tales, and awesome thrift/vintage finds. Most of the clothing shown on the blog will be available for purchase at my etsy store: My Yellow Tulip http://www.etsy.com/shop/MyYellowTulip,
but the pups, kitties, fella, and embarrassing moments (believe me, there will be many) are all mine.

So lovely to meet you, and thanks for stopping by!