Well, hey there!

Thanks for stopping by! I'm Amanda; welcome to my blog. I'm a registered nurse living in the outskirts of Milwaukee, WI. I love to cook (fairly new to the Clean Eating lifestyle, and loving it!), decorate my home, be anywhere in or around Lake Michigan, and spend time with my family. I dream of long-term medical missions and am obsessed with open windows, good music, and twinkle lights. I've been out of college and "in the real world" for a little over a year now and am still trying to make sense of it all! :) 

I've been blessed with a great deal that I don't deserve: a

loving (albeit, unconventional!) family, supportive friends, a good job, healthy food, a comfy house... But, while there are days when I thrive in the challenge of being a single twenty-something searching for new adventure and life's next steps, there are others when I just want to turn around, wrap myself in a blanket, and binge on a frozen pizza and an entire season of "Friends," hoping that the chaos will magically resolve without me.

Here's the thing: I've been a Christian since I was 5 years old. I grew up in the church, went on missions trips, and lead worship and Bible studies through my college campus ministry. I was used to being the girl who had it together, or at least the girl who appeared to have it together. I wasted a lot of time and energy trying to be a perfect role model instead of just being relatable.  It wasn't until I finished college and was rudely awakened by this life-after-college-where-the-heck-did-my-comfort-zone-go-phenomenon that I realized 2 things:

1.) I do not have it all together.

2.) It's OK to not have it all together.

Over the course of the past year, God has been faithful in the face of my faithlessness (say that 5 times fast!). I still mess up on a daily basis, and He remains faithful. One of the most important things I've learned, and the premise for this blog, is the importance of being REAL. What does that mean?  It means that facades benefit no one. It means that it is impossible to grow from a challenge if I fail to acknowledge it by sweeping it under the rug. It means that life is messy. 

I mean, let's be real: if I had never realized my desperate need for Christ, I never would have become His follower. And without Him in my life...well, this blog would be called, "Let's Keep Pretending," because I would be truly lost. Hebrews 6:19 is a much-loved passage: "We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and secure." With Christ as my anchor, I have the freedom to be real, to question, to challenge, to be vulnerable. At the end of the day, no matter how messy or broken or wonderful, I can know that I am grounded in Him, my Hope.

One of my favorite things to do is to create a space in which others feel welcome and at home; my hope and prayer is for this space to be one of raw honesty and vulnerability, that it would bring genuine encouragement and thought-provoking conversation to those who enter it. I want to share the things I learn- whether it has to do with clean eating, nursing, ministry, home decor, or something else totally random. And laughter, lots of laughter. My patients are some of the funniest, rudest, most direct, most observant, most loving, most ridiculous people I've ever met, so look forward to some direct quotes!!

-A