It might not look like much to you: it's just a spatula, or in my mom's simple terms (probably as we were growing up), "a turner."

It has been burned: see the corner missing. The hole to hang it burned off long ago. But I've had it since college; it's the best spatula I've ever had. And it was a gift from my dad.

My sister Karen once joked that she guessed the kitchen knife set he once bought each of us came out of the trunk of someone's car in the grocery store parking lot. That was my dad. It was all about finding a good deal and I'm sure my spatula was no different.

He bought it for me as I moved into an apartment after living in the dorms at college for two years. And there was a non-stick frying pan that I used until the non-stick coating started to peel off.

But the spatula remains.

He never told us he loved us, that wasn't him. But this was something he could, provide us with what we needed. What he didn't know, and what I didn't expect, is that this spatula really is the best one I've ever had and it's the one I reach for every time I'm cooking.

Thanks, Dad.

Everyone thought I was a little off when I said I was going to paint my new kitchen lime green. But just like everyone thought my yard was too small for a large pool, I knew what I was doing.

And when my kitchen won a Moen Faucet design contest, it was further proof I knew what I was doing. Somewhere I have photos of the original kitchen from when we bought the house in 2001: the brown appliances and orange and yellow linoleum that the tile guy scraped out. We initially replaced the appliances (of which the stove only still exists and will only go away if dies) and put down a gray tile floor, the rest had to wait because of finances.

The kitchen wasn't supposed to part of the major remodel undertaken in 2005 but as I looked at the new addition to the house and the dining room that then would have a bigger opening to the kitchen, I looked at my then husband and said there was no way we couldn't do the kitchen, too.

While my only beef with my kitchen is that it's not bigger (and I remind myself of the small kitchen my grandmother cooked in), I am incredibly happy even ten years later. I know a lot of people choose a brown scheme or choose a Tuscan theme but I wanted something that reflected me. I also didn't see myself with a Southwestern theme so much as I wanted it to be a combination of Southwestern and new retro. I found it in the bright tiles that pop against the gray counters, gray tile floor, and the white cabinets.

The best part of all is that it's a happy place to cook and create, one where I feel like I'm in my element. It's part of me.