Introduction

Hey, I’m Elaina. I started this blog in 2016 journaling my adventures of being a new mom. Now that my son is technically a toddler (he is still a baby to me) I want to shake things up.

Blogging gave me an opportunity and place to be authentic about my experiences and I really loved the support many of my readers showed me! Honesty is refreshing. Many of the women that I talk to CRAVE authenticity. We rejoice when we see it and hear about it. I love hearing about how you can't remember the last time you cleaned your bathroom. I love hearing stories of women finding dirty diapers in the strangest of places. WHY? Because I don't feel alone or so guilty that my home or life doesn't look like a cover for a magazine. When I hear people share those things I am reminded that they don't have "it all together".

We (well maybe not you...but my peeps who get me we) feel the pressure to have "it all together". And yes it is good to clean your bathroom and put diapers in the trash.... (because air fresheners can only do so much). But if you are anything like me, we probably need to breath in some grace on ourselves.

So in the spirit of authenticity I am just gonna say I feel a bit nervous about doing a blog about authenticity. Yes I want to because it refreshes me. But what if you don't like it? What if you think its stupid? Or what if you think I am being fake? Or what if you like blah blah blah this is like every blog out there. Or I'll read this in a couple of months and be like uh why did I write that?

well....I think i just convinced myself to stop this whole nonsense. Courage is not what I am trying to grow in this year.

I literally just stopped and thought about this for a while.

Okay so now to talk myself into this again. Why am I doing this?

-I like when people are authentic, I wanna be authentic, I think I can help people or maybe just one person, my friend Brandi is pressuring me to write more on my blog because she's a writer and a bit of a bully (in the most loving of ways).

So I'm doing this. We will see what happens. 

Background- I grew up outside of Philadelphia.  I studied nursing at James Madison University (J  M  U   Duuuuuukes)  and I have been an RN since 2011. My husband and I met as teenagers but fell in love at JMU and got married after he graduated in 2012. After he graduated we moved to Pittsburgh to work with the campus ministry as part of the Greater Pittsburgh Church of Christ.