A Minneapolis Love Letter {And Some Pretty Big News!}

Two-and-a-half years ago I packed up my car and moved across the Midwest to work as an editorial intern for Tiger Oak Publications in downtown Minneapolis.

Though my husband and I were still in college and not married at the time, we knew we needed to start entertaining ideas around where to live after college. Because our family lived in Indiana we wanted to stay in the Midwest but also loved the opportunities that cities like Nashville and Minneapolis had to offer. My summer internship in downtown Minneapolis was a chance for me to experience the city firsthand and decide whether I could see us living there.

I knew no one in the area, save two contacts: a Ball State alum who had visited the university to speak about life after college, and a Christian writer named Krisi, whom I met through the blogging community. Even though Krisi had never met me she invited me to rent a space in her home for the summer.

As I pulled up to the charming old green house, Krisi and a few other roommates were waiting for me on the porch.

“Need any help with anything?” they asked.

“Sure! Thanks so much!” I replied.

“You must be starving,” Krisi said.

I looked at my watch and felt my stomach grumble. It was 8 p.m. Indiana time.

“No worries,” Krisi chuckled. “There’s a place down the street called Pizza Luce that you are going to love! We’ll take you there once all your stuff is unloaded.”

If my first night in Minneapolis wasn’t wonderful enough, my next morning would take the cake. Something you should know about me: I’m the type of person who loves adventure and exploring new places. It’s part of who I am and I think it’s also one of the reasons why I love blogging and trying new recipes all of the time. So now that you know this, maybe you’ll think me to be less crazy when I say I had planned out what I wanted to do during my first week in Minneapolis almost a month in advance.

On my first morning in Minneapolis I jumped out of bed, laced up my tennis shoes, grabbed my keys and headed to Lake Harriet, one of the four lakes that make up the city’s Chain of Lakes. With the July sun shining bright in the sky I couldn’t have asked for a better first day. Halfway through my run around the lake I stopped at an opening in the shoreline where you could see the skyscrapers of downtown shooting up from the surrounding trees. The beauty of the city and the lake overtook me and my skin became covered in happy goosebumps. I am fairly certain for the rest of my run I had a smile on my face, simply because I could not contain my joy.

When I started my internship the next day, those goosebumps returned as I drove straight into downtown. As I turned the steering wheel to follow Hwy 94 toward the Vikings stadium I heard my soul whisper deep inside, “This is my city.”

And in that moment I knew I had fallen in love with Minneapolis. It was where I belonged. 

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A month ago, if you’d asked me if I would consider leaving the Twin Cities area I would have laughed in your face. After graduating from Ball State University shortly after my internship at Tiger Oak, my husband and I moved here in the middle of an arctic snowstorm (Remember two winters ago when we had an unprecedented amount of subzero temps? Yeah, that’s the winter we moved!) and even that didn’t keep us from turning the car around and leaving the city we had come to love.

Minneapolis will forever have a special place in our hearts. It’s where we became engaged. Where we got married. Where we bought our first home. Where we helped launch a church. Where we spent the first years of our adult life wining, dining and exploring. It’s the best city I’ve ever lived in and the first city to make me feel like I belonged to it and it belonged to me.

But now, almost two years into our adventure, it’s time to say goodbye — onto the next adventure.

For those of you who receive my newsletter you know for the past few weeks I’ve hinted at some big news coming down the pipeline. Well friends, today I’m ready to share this big news with you. Drumrollllll please.

Alex and I are moving to Des Moines, Iowa!

My husband has been given an amazing job opportunity and although it was tough to sell our house and will be even tougher saying “see you later” to our friends, we know Des Moines is exactly where God wants us to be.

You know when you come to a crossroads in life and you don’t know what to do so you pray for peace and discernment? That’s exactly what we have been doing, and God answered our prayers faster than we ever imagined. Within two weeks of finding out about Alex’s job opportunity our house sold in Savage, we found a place to live in West Des Moines and I got a job at The Integer Group. Talk about WHOA. I mean, stuff like that doesn’t just happen; It’s totally God. And I praise Him for blessing us in this adventure.

While I don’t know what this new chapter will bring for Alex and I, I know without a doubt God wants us in Des Moines for a reason and I am so excited to see what’s in store.

We will be moving in the month of November and we appreciate your prayers as we transition to our new home. As always, thanks for your love and support dear friends. I am so thankful that no matter where I end up on a map, this online community will be here. Always loving, always encouraging and always inspiring one another.

XOXO, Lauren