Three Days in New York: Part III

“I am someone who is looking for love. REAL love. Ridiculous, inconvenient, consuming, can’t-live-without-each-other love. And I don’t think that love is here.” ~Sex & the City
I know how unbelievable this whole story sounds. Smalltown girl takes off for the big city to meet the mysterious man she’s loved for five years, only to be courted and romanced and pampered and ultimately taken to a closed diamond store and have dozens of sparkling engagement rings » Read More

Three Days in New York: Part II

“When you thought you’d be baking pie and living behind your very own white picket fence you’ll find yourself doing something so entirely different you couldn’t have even imagined it a year before. There will be moments when you’ll look around and not even recognize your own life…in a good way.” ~Kate Northrup
On a breezy September night in New York City, I found myself being pulled along excitedly by my Mr. E as he grabbed my » Read More

Three Days in New York: Part I (Excerpt from Never Been to Vegas)

“It’s funny the way things work out. You go in search of one thing and end up finding something else. If I didn’t know better, I’d think it was the Force at work.” ~Hans Solo
One Friday in late September 2011, my friend Whitney and I were laughing about how we wanted desperately to travel to New York the following weekend; both of us for varying reasons. She had friends who were going to be in » Read More

The Return of Mr. E (Excerpt from Never Been to Vegas)

In April of 2011, I finally at long last closed the door on my long-suffering relationship with “Mr. E,” (Mystery? Get it?) my on-again, off-again love of five years…and for the first time in at least that long, I felt FREE. I felt like I had TRULY moved on. I wasn’t thinking about him anymore…I wasn’t crying over him anymore…I felt like I had finally unchained myself from him and his memory for the first, and » Read More

A Girl Never Forgets Her First Love… (Part 3)

“We’ve come a long way, baby!”  Pictured: My cousin Emily, me, my sister Cher and my cousin Niki before the NKOTB concert in Nashville on June 21, 2011 From Part 2:“The New Kids on the Block reunite!” the headlines screamed, and though the teeny bopper in me had long been replaced by a mature woman, my heart stopped and my face instantly flushed as my NKOTB radar surged back to life. I » Read More

A Girl Never Forgets Her First Love… (Part 2)

Yes, that’s me in the pic. I’m on the right of Donnie, my sister is on the left. (The 80’s were SUCH a bad era for hair.) From Part 1: Racing down the ornate staircase to the front door of the hotel, nothing prepared me for the feeling I would have when I threw open the hotel doors and came face-to-face with none other than Donnie Wahlberg.“Donnie….” I whispered » Read More

A Girl Never Forgets Her First Love… (Part 1)

I’ve had the pleasure over the past few days of reliving a very special part of my youth…long before the madness of my Mr. Big relationship…before my first boyfriend or my first kiss or my first heartbreak…when it was a simpler time, a time of innocence and crushes and puppy love…a time when the only thing more exhilarating and exciting and thrilling than the thought of a kiss » Read More

Goodbye, Mr. Big (Part 2)

From “Goodbye, Mr. Big (Part 1) And then something dawned on me…a thought as enlightening as though someone had turned on a bright, illuminating light in the middle of the pitch black room I had been living in for FIVE LONG YEARS. I scooped up my Blackberry and began tapping out a text. “For years I’ve been beating my head against the wall, trying » Read More

Goodbye, Mr. Big (Part 1)

About a week ago, I closed the door to my past and the girl I used to be, boxed up the contents of my life, and marked the end of a very long chapter of my story once and for all. Today, as I sit in my new apartment, surrounded by the boxes of my new beginning, I am struck by how intertwined “The End” and “Once Upon a » Read More

She is…The Single Woman

  She might be the bravest woman I know. She walks the unaccompanied path. She has her own back. She asks for no favors. Not an ounce of independence does she lack. She has moments where she feels as though no one sees her. She feels them LOOK at her, but do they really SEE her? She gets catcalls when she walks down the street…yet she goes to bed » Read More

Something wonderful is on the horizon
Life doesn’t always look the way we want it to look. In Mandy’s upcoming book, Turn Toward the Sun: Releasing What If and Embracing What Is, you’ll find encouragement to live in the moment, sit with your experiences, and trust God with the unknown.
Preorder from Baker Book House for 40% off and free shipping!*
*US shipping only
Something wonderful is on the horizon
Turn Toward the Sun CoverLife doesn’t always look the way we want it to look. In Mandy’s upcoming book, Turn Toward the Sun: Releasing What If and Embracing What Is, you’ll find encouragement to live in the moment, sit with your experiences, and trust God with the unknown.
Preorder from Baker Book House for 40% off and free shipping!*
*US shipping only