Bread Pudding and a China Cabinet Re-Vamp!

I came home from our vacation inspired. Inspired to cook and to breathe some new life into our china cabinet. Random, I know. Let me explain.

While in the airport terminal in New Orleans buying pralines for my grandma, I had an impulse buy of bread pudding mix they had by the cash register (remember how I am with those impulse purchases? Dangerous.) I love bread pudding and make Emeril's Bourbon Bread Pudding abnormally often now that I think about it. It's just too flippin' easy and delicious and my husband is a bourbon drinker so everybody wins. Post said purchase, I realized that the mix is a "just add water" deal. Just add water, bread and raisins. Interesting.

So here's what you need:
- 1 packet of the mix
- 1 loaf of slightly old french bread torn into pieces (it calls for 8 cups)
- about a handful of raisins
- 2 cups water

Dissolve the mix in the water...

Add the liquid to the bread and the raisins and stir until everything's coated...

Put in an 8x8 greased pan and bake at 325 degrees for 50 minutes. And here's the finished product.

And it was delicious. Add a scoop of vanilla ice cream or a dollop of cool whip on top and you're in heaven!

I looked on the pudding mix company's website, The Praline Connection, and you can't order it online... bummer. But I did find this option online, or I'm sure you can find some sort of mix in the grocery store, I've just never looked for it, but I will now!

Ok, so onto the china hutch that I re-vamped. I adore our china hutch. It's beautiful and gives us some much needed storage. On our flight home, I was thinking about house stuff and reminiscing about how I was so thrilled with that side table I repainted last week... I decided to add a coat of paint to our china cabinet. One our way home from the airport, we stopped at Home Depot and I picked out a lovely shade of paint called Egyptian Nile. Doesn't it sound exotic?

Here's the before shot:

And here's the after shot:

Not too bad, right? We also moved it from our kitchen to our dining room which was a feat in itself but now the room feels much more complete. As a matter of fact, at this very moment I am sitting at our dining room table, eating my bread pudding and admiring my paint job as I type. Sigh... all in a days work.