The Kitchen Ghost

There is a ghost in my house, mostly in the kitchen. We think the ghost came with the house, and there are limited possibilities as to our ghost's identity. My house is a mid-century modern, flat-roofed model a la Eichler (but designed by a local architect named Donald Honn) built in 1955. We are only the third owners I believe. We bought the home from a widow lady, and have always supposed that the ghost may have been her husband.
From the time we moved in to this very day, we have heard our ghost in the kitchen. But we never hear him when we are in there, we always hear the noises from the kitchen when were are sitting at the dining table or watching TV in the den. The noises are not associated with the stove, fridge, or dishwasher; but we have never been able to tell exactly what causes them. So, we just smile and say "Kitchen ghost!"
My husband and I have also both seen things that are odd. No apparitions or ectoplasm, nothing "Ghostbusters" or anything, just odd things. Like things seen out of the corner of the eye, when you think someone is standing right there and you turn to look and no one is there. More times than I can count, I'll see movement and think Hubby has poked his head into the room but he will be back in the bedroom and the kids will be sound asleep. He has the same experiences and thinks that I am looking in on him.
I don't scare easily and I'm not superstitious; and I'm not going to go all New-Agey and start yelling "Go to the light!" If my ghost wants to stick around it's ok by me, after all it's "lived" here longer than we have. But I did have to have a talk with the ghost this morning about some things that have happened the last couple of days.
Last night while I was getting new school clothes ready for the laundry, something came into the den. I was standing facing the fireplace when a little white column of vapor floated in front of me. I saw it enter the den through the doorway, float in column form to a stop right in front of me. The base of the column was wispy and hovered above the floor about 6 inches; the top was rounder and "stood" about 4 feet tall. It stayed stationary in front of me, and as I stared in surprise, just vanished gently away. I shrugged and said aloud, "Huh, the ghost is pretty active tonight." Told you, I don't scare easily.
This morning after my husband left something else happened. Every morning I iron a shirt for him then put the iron on a silicone hot pad on the kitchen counter facing the wall so I don't accidentally get burned, then I lock the baby gate behind me when I leave. Hubby had already left for work and the kids and I were watching "Yogi Bear" when I heard a noise in the kitchen. Just a small thud, no loud clattering, no crashing. Both kids were with me, so I didn't worry too much. Later, I walked into the kitchen for a drink and found my iron face-down on the floor. Now, I had set the iron firmly on the counter away from the edge and a drawer was open right under the spot. To fall to the floor, the iron would've had to bounce off the open drawer, making a terrible noise all the way down. But that's not what happened. The iron looked for all the world like it had been set on the floor. While it was still warm, no less. It stuck to the linoleum when I picked it up, luckily the floor wasn't damaged. I called my husband to confirm that he hadn't knocked it the floor, he hadn't.
So I talked directly to my ghost. I told him he was welcome to stay (does he or she even have meaning when discussing ghosts?), after all, he had been here longer than we had, I wouldn't try to make him go to the light, but  please, just don't scare the children.
This is not going to set me off on some mad search to "find" my ghost; I will NOT be having any seances and I don't own a Ouija board. To me, having a ghost is part of the charm of living in a 50-year old house.