Hullo, friends!

Life has been full of uncertainty. And if you’re anything like me, uncertainty is absolutely unsettling.

In an effort to stay grounded, I’ve started relying on rituals and routines to help me hold it all together.

Now that Kenna has a wheelchair, we’ve started taking a walk every day. (As long as it’s not raining. Princess loathes getting wet outside of a pool.)

And I’ve discovered taking time to dream has been nothing short of therapeutic. Oh, but if you want those dreams to come true in real life, you need to definitely grab the 300 Wishlist. If you know me at all, you know it’s not enough to have an idea, I have to turn it into a concrete plan.

I use the 300 Wishlist to focus my energy and my efforts, to track my personal metrics, to truly identify what matters to me, and ensure I craft a plan to make it happen.

Let’s start making our dreams come true. Together.

—Nicole

This week, I’m thinking about the small ways we feed our souls.

Not in the grand, cinematic, “I have completely reinvented my life and now everything is glowing” kind of way.

More like: pasta on the stove. Laundry in the dryer. A kid getting braver with her wheelchair. A mama taking pictures of dinner because somehow, even in the middle of a hard week, beauty still counts.

Next week is a big one for us.

Kenna has an eye appointment on Tuesday, and then on Friday, she has a heart cath. We’re also trying to get oxygen approved and delivered so it’s ready when we come home, just in case we need it.

So this week has felt like a strange little bridge between the life we’re living right now and the answers we’re waiting for.

There has been a lot of grounding.

A lot of walking.

A lot of practicing with the wheelchair.

A lot of trying to make the unknown feel just a little less scary.

And in the middle of all of that, I found myself coming back to two things: the 300 Wishlist and ditalini pasta.

One feeds the future. One feeds the body. Both, in their own way, feed the soul.

The 300 Wishlist reminds me that I am still allowed to dream. I am still allowed to want things. I am still allowed to imagine travel, ease, beauty, comfort, new experiences, soft mornings, better systems, and a life that feels good inside my own skin.

And the pasta?

The pasta reminds me that joy does not always arrive as a lightning bolt.

Sometimes joy…

This year has very much become my season of surrender.

Not the pretty kind where you release control while wearing a flowing dress while walking in a lavender field.

The real kind.

The kind where you cry, make dinner anyway, fold the laundry, prep the medicine, write the words, and keep looking for tiny evidence that life is still going on.

I can’t promise I’ll do any of it gracefully.

I can’t promise there won’t be tears. (I mean, hell, there were tears today. 🤷🏻‍♀️😂)

But I can promise I’ll be real.

And this week, real looks like dreaming and ditalini.

So much. Seriously. When I give myself permission to dream, I go all in and get really specific. In the townhome, I’ve been focused on making changes that allow me to feel in control of my environment as I move from chaos to calm.

I’ve focused on breaking everything down into categories, as one does. How else do I know if I’m following through on the plan for a balanced life?

My favorite future plans…

I vowed I’d try a new recipe every month so meals wouldn’t get stale.

This month’s recipe is light, despite the heavy cream. Filling, despite the fact that the protein is mostly three types of dairy holding hands and hoping for the best. And versatile, because this is not a dictatorship. It’s dinner.

Want to add bacon? Me too. Try it.

Think it would be delightful with tomatoes or spinach? Do you, boo.

Feel like it needs more cheese? You won’t catch me judging you. I am not the cheese police.

Also, if we’re going to cook together, I should probably give you a disclaimer: I am a nightmare when it comes to copying my own recipes.

Here’s the thing. I start with a recipe, but then I tweak it. And I encourage you to do the same.

Flavor is subjective. I won’t tell you how to make it, and I kindly ask that you refrain from telling me how to make mine.

Think of my recipes as a starting point. Then measure with your soul.

This is why, when my kids try to make my recipes, they complain that theirs don’t taste the same. I joke that it’s because I make mine with love.

But for real?

It’s the measurements.

This is a cozy, one-pan pasta dish that takes about 15 minutes from start to finish and somehow makes you feel like you have your life together.

Will it solve all your problems? No.

Will it make you feel briefly comforted by tiny pasta, garlic, butter, cream, and parmesan?

Absolutely. And honestly, that’s enough.

This is the kind of recipe you can absolutely customize.

Add bacon. Add chicken. Add spinach. Add tomatoes. Add more cheese. I am not here to supervise your parmesan journey.

I served mine in one of my Pfaltzgraff stoneware bowls. I love textured stoneware because it makes even a simple bowl of pasta feel a little more special. You can find this and similar Pfaltzgraff stoneware pieces on Amazon.