Simply..simple.

Yesterday was post #50...That's just an itty bitty milestone in my little blog life...but anyway.

Last night I felt oh so very homemaker-ish. It was about 10pm. I was sitting on the computer, bored, with a mostly-clean apartment and not a ton of ambition. What I normally do when I'm bored is reach for the handle on the fridge. (I never said I was perfect.) Well, tonight when I did, I noticed a lovely little cauliflower, sitting all alone.

Remember this post? Well, I decided to roast some cauliflower and then mash it up with my awesome hand mixer (still don't know the actual name...) and whip up some diet mashed potatoes.

Then, the oven was still hot, and I looked in my pantry. Chick peas. I could totally roast those. So I drained and rinsed the huge can, sprayed 'em with some pam, and salt and peppered them before roasting for about 15 minutes. They're so good, and an awesome snack!

I realize I didn't cook up a turkey dinner with homemade cranberry sauce and gram's secret gravy recipe, but this was a milestone for me. Oh, and in case you're wondering, I had a small cup of veggie juice and had a couple bites of my creations. Not bad for reaching for the fridge door, huh?

Let's backtrack for a second- back to the mashed "potatoes." Whenever I use that mystery hand mixer that my mom gave me, which belonged to my great-grandmother, I think of her being in her apartment in Brooklyn teaching my mom how to use it. How simple (and maybe more difficult!) it was to "make-ah-da-sauce" (Italians talk funny sometimes.) They didn't have processors. I know what you're thinking- duh...

I looked around my own apartment. We live so simply. Yes, Chad has his big TV, but we have a small kitchen table that was my grandfather's. Our couch is a love seat from my parents' set. We don't have much. It's mostly second hand.

But I wouldn't trade this life for much else.

I'm a simple person. I don't need "things" to be happy or survive. I thrive off of love, happiness, laughter, (weird, isn't all that in my blog address?) and family. I mean, let's face it, I went into a pretty selfless career path.

Sometimes Chad says "must be nice to have a big house and a boat and three SUVS and a private jet and a town named after your first dog" but I don't think it would be. Money is nice, but it's not what makes a person. I know that even given the chance, I would not be interested in the slightest in having a huge house. (A huge yard is another thing. My only dream is to have Callie in my backyard and a nice garden.)

It almost makes me sad to hear him say things like that. I want him to see the beauty in the small, simple place we have. Sure, we don't own it, but that's not entirely important. There's a little saying "Home is wherever I am with you."

That's how I'm feeling today.