bracket time!

So one of my favorite times of the year is upon us! MARCH MADNESS! This year has been hard as I haven't followed college basketball as much as I usually do with the last few weeks being crazy with work. And the fact that my beloved Tarheels aren't doing too hot this year doesn't help. The few games I've watched have made me cringe - though we did have a decent run in the ACC tournament. 

But the hardest thing was having my boys loose to Kansas in the second round. I really hope they win and completely screw up my bracket but a girl has got to be realistic when there is a year long bet with your dad riding on your bracket! So my final 4 are Louisville, Kansas, Ohio State & Indiana.

Here's to a great month of sports! And to of course working 60+ hours during the opening weekend of March Madness!

Do you do a bracket? 

rocked it!

So it is a week post-PIC and I think I've finally adjusted. It was absolutely amazing experience and I am so proud of my team and what we were able to do. It was crazy to see 2000 high school students all at once, train and work with a staff of 108 plus the 15 people on my team running it all and just survive on minimal sleep. I'm glad this only happens once every 4 years. 

So I run leadership conferences for middle & high school students and we run one for the Presidential Inaugurations. Since I started my job in August I've been almost primarily focused on this conference at work and since mid-November was pretty much all I was thinking about. Last time I posted I was about to head into the 10 day stretch of staff training and conference. So mostly in pictures here is my experience. I don't have any photos from training but it was fun to bond with my team, meet the 108 staff members we hired and train them for the conference. After the 12ish hours of training - between set up and meetings/re-set for the next day I ended up hanging out with my fellow PCs and just laughing so much at the inside jokes we created and really just hoping things were going to go well. And it was so fun to see so many people I've worked with in the past all together! 

giving one of my two program overview speeches on arrival day - the second one had over 1000 students in the room!

Got to meet Condi!! I planned all our student interactions with our speaking events - room set up/seating,  photo opportunities, asking questions during events. It was really awesome to see it all come together during our speaking events! Plus I also got to meet Bob Woodward (I LOOOOVE Watergate), Nick Clooney & General Wesley Clark!

Bob Woodward & Nick Clooney during their panel! I need to find my picture with them!

My roomie and i on Inauguration morning. We had the Air & Space museum prior to the Inauguration and totally had McDonalds at 9:30 am when the staff opened it up just for my team! I had been up since 3:45 so it was totally lunch time!

I didn't go out onto the Mall until late-ish 10:30 so we were around 10th - the 7th street entrance had already closed. But still pretty cool!

Washington Monument behind us!

Out of the 1 million people on the Mall what are the odds I run into my 2 super good college friends?  Linds, Em and I lived together all 4 years! 

heeeeeey Anderson! 

My Inauguration buddy - Kaley and I!  And yes - if you saw anyone on the mall with a yellow/blue scarf they were a staff member for our conference!

My roomie and I stretching during a coordinator meeting - yup, we like to keep it professional after standing all morning for the Inauguration. Sadly this wasn't too weird when it was just us coordinators!

The student's final event was at the Udvar-Hazy Air & Space Museum - the big one that holds all the planes. It was a awesome time!

Roomie and I being all official at the dance! And yes - due to getting 13.5 hours of sleep in 4 nights I wore my glasses almost the whole conference except arrival day & inauguration! 

Survived! Susan and I at the staff party after all the students made it home! She was with the middle schoolers all week.

PC partner love! 

Sums up the week! 

 It was absolutely crazy in the best possible way. The weather gods were upon us with amazing weather on Inauguration Day and somehow all of our students got out on departure day. And it was just crazy to see 39 busses for 2000 students. Plus 13.5 hours of sleep in 4 nights. I was on an adrenaline high the whole time. I did have one minor freak out - about 2 hours before Condi and I was finishing organizing everything and saw the room set up was wrong and had emailed who I needed to make a switch, when my directors did a quick touch base - as soon as they asked how I was doing I burst into tears (I know, right!, when I'm stressed I get real emotional and I tend to cry when asked how I'm doing, plus I had only 2.5 hours of sleep the night before) but it was a good moment to remember to ask for help as I can't be in 3 places at once, teamwork and that the event was going to be awesome. I knew all the little details, but the 2000 students didn't so don't fret the un-important things. I am still just so happy I had the experience  with our speaking events and that my directors let me do that because it was so far from the usual things I do with curriculum. But I learned a lot about logistics and it will only make me better at what I do! But overall I was so proud of myself and my team for what we did with this conference and how much we rocked it! Wooooo!

keeping it classy with Michelle

The days after were a bit crazy. We had an all staff party on Wednesday night and it ended up with me bringing a cardboard cutout of Michelle Obama home - and somehow she ended up in my bed that night... and then continuing to drink and laugh with my coworkers Thursday, Friday, Saturday nights and a mimosa fueled brunch on Sunday.

Finally getting normal sleep patterns back! Woooo! But that is just a start to the crazy. We start our training on Monday for 5 days for our spring conferences and then I'm off around the country!

So never boring in my life!


What is everyone up to? I've missed blogs!

december

I've never been this bad about blogging before - but I guess I'm just going through a funk. So here is December in pictures. It was a busy month between work, friends, the holidays and everything! 

caramel pretzel making fun with patricia & mary jo!

little blurry - but jeanne & i at walburn's annual holiday party.
 it was a fun night in baltimore with 2 of my favorite college ladies! 

i had another historical moment - going to the 150th anniversary of the battle of fredricksburg! i've gone to 3 civil war 150th's this year! i was able to see a re-enactment and also went to a great talk on the battle by the NPS.

the civil war lover i am - i went to fredricksburg for the 150th anniversary of the battle! there was a great re-enactment! and the first one i've seen! i was standing up on the top of the hill next to the confederates - all those down on the ground are union soliders. 

union troops marching away after the battle. 

I was a promo girl at a Redskins game - when they played the Ravens. With my sorority sisters I handed out some flyers on the new NFL clothing line for women before the game and got the sweet jacket we are all wearing and a ticket to the game! My dad was so mad! He is a huge Redskins fan and it was the 2nd game I was able to go to this year! We had a blast - plus when 4 of you are walking through the parking lot after the game wearing the same jacket you get so many hilarious comments, plus some great self esteem boosting!

with my ZTA sisters at the Skins game! 

It was an amazing game! They came from behind to beat the Ravens! 

Went to my college's alumni holiday party in DC! Saw many of my DC WAC friends all in one place! And saw my kindergarden boyfriend who I went to college with - who now lives in the nova as well!

jackie, katherine, me, kaity & linds

On the way home from the party - Linds & I stopped at the National Christmas tree at the White House!

We also enjoyed seeing all the state trees as well! 

I wrote a post about this - but Linds and I went to Arlington to participate in Wreaths Across America where we placed wreaths at Arlington Cemetery.

wreaths at Arlington

Patricia, Mary Jo & I had a fun night at Zoo Lights! The National Zoo has all these lights and light up animals all over the zoo and we went and had fun walking around seeing all the lights!

Mary Jo and I 

My roomie and I hosted a holiday party for our co-workers! It was a fun night where I made mulled wine and we had a dvd exchange! And lots of our usual laughs!

susan, paul, me, shane, sarah & albert

amy came into town to do research on her thesis! i haven't seen her since august! we had a fun few days - on wednesday night when i picked her up we went to see the capital christmas tree! and then on friday night we did my favorite monuments at night! and saturday before i took her to the airport we went to the portrait gallery!

capital christmas tree 

the often overlooked - george mason memorial, right by TJ

MLK at night

my fav - TJ!

my boy GW at the portrait gallery! we also saw a great exhibit on art during the Civil War! 

I was lucky to to be able to take the whole week of Christmas off. So I went home to NJ on the 22nd and have been enjoying my week at home. I'll be heading back to VA on the first. I had a great holiday with my family.

the annual Christmas Eve - drive around to look at lights! 

Right before we opened presents on Christmas Eve! My parents got me clothes, new boots and a great book on Civil War Art - which was really funny because I just saw the exhibit at the Portrait Gallery! And from my siblings I got kitchen things!

my sister and the fluffy kitten deep in conversation

my parents and i went in to NYC to see the tree and all the decorations!

the rockefeller tree! it is from flanders, nj! which is just down the road from my parents house!

parents and i at rockefeller center 

tree at bryant park! 

momma and i at rockefeller center

So I've been on a BIG national park kick this fall. I've been to a different National Park site every week since October 13th! That is 13 weeks in a row! A few weeks I had multiple sites!  And if you include since moving to DC it would be 16 of 20 weeks. To say I'm obsessed would be an understatement! So I needed to do one while I was home and there are 2 local ones I haven't done yet. So on Thursday my momma and I went to Thomas Edison National Historical Park and Patterson Great Falls National Park!

One of the newest National Parks - #397/398

National Park #59 for me!

 Alexander Hamilton first saw the falls and wanted to use them for industrial power - this was a hub in NJ industrialization in the early 1800s! 

wooo national park #60 for me! 

edison's workshop

 So it was a great December! I'm ending the year with a fun night in NYC with a few HS friends. We are keeping it low key - drinks at Suz's and then dinner and ending it at her apartment with more champagne! And then on the first I'm back to Virginia where things are going to just get crazy with work!

Hope you have a happy end to 2012 and a great 2013! I still need to write my 2012 post and look at my goals for 2012 and figure out what I want to achieve in 2013!

philly half

all ready for the race!

so this weekend i went up to philly to see two of my lovely crew ladies where we had a mini reunion and ran in the philly half marathon!
it was a great time and we had fun catching up and talking about running and the college days.

i took the train up saturday and met jeanne and chelsea at the expo. we also quickly met up with a sorority sister of mine from college who was also running and chatted with her for a while! yay running bringing people together!

so after the expo where we picked up our bibs and everything else we headed back to jeanne's and carbo loaded at jeanne's favorite italian restaurant - which is delish. i've eaten there so many times! and then we continued to chat about life and everything while watching movies and being lazy before going to bed at 9:30. haha! wild saturday night! but hey, we were getting up at 4:30 to go run 13.1 miles!

favorite picture from college

so i know i've written about it before. but the 5 ladies i rowed with in college are just amazing and such an inspiration to me. i ran my first half marathon in 2010 with 2 of them in the town we went to college. we are all off doing some amazing things in our lives and while we don't see each other that often when we do it is great. so running the half with jeanne & chelsea, and knowing a 4th was off in kansas running a full marathon. so we still push each other 6 years later!

so we were up bright and early and made our way downtown to run. we hit a ton of traffic going in but still made it in time to to wait in the porta potty lines and get to our corral no problem. and since we got there kinda late we weren't standing around too much before! here we are before jeanne left to go to her corral, since she was earlier than we were! wooo pre-race!

ready to run!

jeanne, chelsea and i pre-race! wooooo!
 

so chelsea and i made our way to our corral and took off our throw-aways. best $5 i ever spent on sweats! and then got in line to start!

you can see the start line!

favorite sign of the day! this was right before the start! 

chelsea and i right before we started!

while the race started at 7 - our corral didn't start until right around 7:30. so i was all ready to go! my race plan was to a)finish and not walk b)wanted to finish under 2:30 c)goal of 11 minute miles which was a final time of like 2:24. so i grabbed a pace band at the expo and had the 2:15 & 2:30 ones and after thinking used the 2:15 one and also wrote in the 11 min mile times under. and that was the smartest thing i did. so chelsea and i ran the first mile together and i was at a 10:45 and feeling pretty good. i wasn't too fast and right where i was comfortable. and i just continued running, i didn't see a mile marker for 2 and that kinda threw me off. but when i did pass 3 i was running just over 30 minutes. ummm, so i was going a little faster than i wanted. i tried to slow it down, but miles 4-6 i was right on for the 2:15 finish. so i figured why not try for it. 

running by independence hall! woooooo! i was so pumped to see this and think about the constitution!
yes, i know i'm crazy. 

and the great thing about running through philly was the people cheering and the fun atmosphere on the streets. it really does help! i loved laughing at the signs as i ran past! so around mile 8 it had a slight incline and this was where i started to feel it. and miles 8-10 were a bit rough. this was a bit of the hilly part of the half course and where i get tired in a race. so i started to slip on my times. but as long as i was hitting under the 11 minute miles i had written in i was happy! so after i hit 10 miles, right by the please touch museum, i was like ok. i got this. 3 miles. 33 more minutes. and so i continued to push through. and i never saw marks for 11 miles - so i had no idea on my pace. i was just hoping i was where i wanted to be! and then i saw 12 and i was happy with my time. and for mile 12 you ran along the waterside of boathouse row - which made the rower in me SO happy! i needed that little push - plus running it with 2 of my rowers made it great. and so there is a coxswain recording i used in college the mornings of races and i keep it on my mix - it is mary whipple - my idol coxing the 2003 worlds and it is just great. so i put that on for mile 12 and just had her voice while running the last mile. and when i got to the top of the half marathon/marathon split i pushed it even more, and then i went into a sprint for the last few little bit to cross the finish line! woooooo!

 i was so happy when i saw my time. i finished in 2:22:10. so i ran 10:53 splits. i was sooo happy! my mom had been getting my texts while i ran so i immediately had one from her and i made my way through all the lines to see how my friends did. i met up with jeanne who finished with her goal of sub 8 splits! woo! and then chelsea came in right after me at 2:26 and she beat her goal of under 2:30! so we were all happy!

wooo! finished the 13.1! 

so after we headed to an early lunch and the walking felt soooo good! but i wasn't feeling too well after the race - my stomach was killing me. so i wasn't feeling too great after. and then we all headed back to jeanne's house to shower before chelsea and i headed back home. i had a bit of a wait in amtrack station before my train, but it wasn't too bad. the worst part was when i got into dc i had just missed the metro, so i had to wait 18 minutes for the next one. uuuugh! i was so sore and tired. all i wanted was my bed!

and today - was rough. i was so sore. my legs were killing me! i don't remember hurting this bad last time! and i don't think being at work all day at my desk or in meetings helped! but i was so happy that i did such a kick ass job!

the 3 of us were talking about doing the pittsburgh half in may! so adding that should be fun! we've decided it will be a fun tradition to keep up with. trading our oars for running shoes! i need to email our coach to let him know about our run this weekend!

so i'm proud that i finished my second half marathon. that 11 months after knee surgery i was able to run 13.1 miles and not only run it, but be successful. i didn't hit my pr and i'm ok with that because i knew that wasn't going to happen. and i love that i'm now running with girls i rowed with in college. and that we continue to push ourselves after college.