A Wife Loved Like The Church

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I’m no chef. I’m the girl who can eat spaghetti with plain tomato sauce and call it a “tasty meal”. Because I love spaghetti with plain sauce. I would eat it every day if I could. And that’s just it: Cooking is about making something you want to eat, not that you need to eat.

That is a lesson I’ve finally learned.

One day last fall, as I served dinner, I mentioned how I followed the recipe to a tee despite not wanting to. I didn’t want diced onions, but chunks, and I thought other spices would have gone better, but didn’t use them. Jonathan said “Sarah, you need to cook what you want to eat.” I do that. Right? I like diced onions over chunky onions. Right? Wrong. I love onions. Especially when in large chunks sauteed to perfection. I love spicy foods. I love vegetables that have just the perfect mixture of tender and crisp. I just love eating. So with that one sentence “cook what you want to eat” I changed how I cook. I stopped following recipes and started cooking based on taste, smell and sight.

This might sound very “chefy”, like I know what spices to always use and what foods go best together. I don’t. Ask Jon. I’ve had some pretty spectacular failures. Like the-dog-wont-eat-this failures. But, when things are a success, they are a success. Why? Because everything I’ve made I want to eat. I want to eat the sauteed carrots in curry sauce. I want to eat the spicy black bean burgers. I don’t need to eat them, but I want to eat them because I like them.

It’s taken time to build my cooking confidence. I’m very fortunate because Jonathan is a gracious eater (and so were the Abdos) so every meal is met with hearty thanks. Even the not so great ones. I started off slowly. Adding garlic with my oil. Giving up diced onions for chunked. Exploring “unusual” spices.

For all you timid cooks I have something to say – you can do it! I was once in your shoes. I thought adding more milk than suggested to my mac-n-cheese was taking it “too far”. But as I ventured out, I became more and more brave. And as I’ve become braver, I’ve falling in love with the art of cooking. The art of cooking what I want to eat.

Bon Appetit!

And neither is my home. While I’d love for my house to look “Southern Living” fresh every single day it just doesn’t. However, while I’m learning to overlook the less than perfect life of parenthood, this drives me a little crazy:

But thanks to IKEA’s storage and my husband’s strength, in just a few hours order was restored:

I went to bed one very happy mama, knowing that for just one moment my home (or at least one room) was perfect.

Today we are heading to a couple’s conference for our church. We planned to take Hannah (since she’s still nursing) and have a babysitter for Julia. However, our sitter had to cancel so now Julia is coming along too. Now with two kids in tow, we decided to make a family adventure out of the weekend. And what better adventure than IKEA?!

If you haven’t had the pleasure of going to an IKEA you are missing out on something HUGE (literally). IKEA is like a giant playhouse for adults. They specialize in home furnishings, ranging from kitchen cabinets to nurseries. Most all of our furnishings when we got married came from IKEA. They are relatively inexpensive and most of the styles fit our personalities. We are planning to take the afternoon to drive over to IKEA (about 3 hours from the conference), spend the day shopping, have dinner in their cafeteria and then head into Chicago to see old friends. Yes, IKEA, I do love you. Ahhh….