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. 

one year

the day of surgery

so a year ago i was living in charleston and enjoying my weekly kickball game when i was running and ended up tearing my right ACL. yup - i tore my ACL playing kickball. and it was almost deja-vu. 9 years prior i tore my left ACL playing field hockey.

it took me a while to realize but 10 years ago tearing my ACL was one of the best things that happened to me. because of my injury i ended up finding a sport in college i loved, and through rowing i was able to gain so much confidence and meet some amazing women who were my rocks in college and i still  consider these women some of my closest friends. so only a year after my second injury i'm seeing the blessing in disguise much sooner. by being in nj longer i was able to see some friends more and got to help twin with wedding planning and got to spend more time with my nj zetas! but i think the biggest thing was i ended up going back to working conferences and in august i ended up getting a full time position and moving to virginia! i'm a big believer in things happening for a reason - so while at the time it really screwed up a lot it is good to see the puzzle pieces starting to come together.

my hey lets see how swollen i am

looking better!

4 knee braces!

double knee braces!

finally allowed to hike! june 2012

 and at times it was a rough recovery - had some pt issues and a lot of hassle with insurance. i hated not being able to do things and having to be so slow.  i wasn't allowed to start running until april. but i've worked hard to get myself back into shape and this weekend i'm running 13.1 miles through the streets of philly! so i'm excited to see how everything continues to turn out but i can say tearing both of my ACLs has taught me a lot about myself and that sometimes you need to experience something kinda shitty to figure everything out. and hopefully it will all make sense one day!

so i'm ready to rock out to 13.1 miles on sunday with my knee brace along with me!

end of november

so november was not a very blog worthy month for me. just not a lot going on in my life, being at home and not really doing anything this month. but december should be better as all my weekends are busy with traveling to see friends. so that makes me happier that i have things to do. as november was a hard month for me.

so everything is going ok. i've subbed a few days which is always interesting. and i have a little rant. this is mostly aimed at high school teachers. please leave lesson plans. i don't understand how you don't have emergency plans somewhere, so i can keep your 27 crazy juniors under-control. or at least email or call a co-worker and say hey can you give this to the sub... seriously how hard is that?!? last year in my department we all did it - i would email 2 of my co-workers my plans if i was sick and i'd text one of them as well. i just wish teachers had to sub for a few days to see how crappy it is when you don't leave plans. uuughhh!

ummm, had a good thanksgiving. it was the usual family at my aunt's house, nothing too crazy.
went out to dinner with some good friends from high school which was fun. we try to do it every year around thanksgiving, as who knows where we all are. we totally drove our server crazy, as we were pretty chatty and took a while to order and then after desert talked for a while. but it wasn't crowded and there were other people there, so he wasn't waiting on us.

my high school friends :) 

i also finally joined the 21st century last week. i got a droid! i am loving it so far. i'm still figuring out what apps are good. any you recommend? 

and the gym is going well, trying to get into a routine. but omg, do i sweat. after 30 minutes on the elliptical i'm bright red and gross. and i'm wearing shorts and a tank top. i have no idea how the girls who are in perfect makeup, sweats and a hoodie do it. 

and i've been reading a lot. i've read 15 books in november. and i'm starting today "confessions of a prarie bitch: how i survived nellie oleson and learned to love being hated" the title sparked me to grab it at the library and it is a autobio of the girl who played nellie oleson on little house on the prairie. 

so earlier this week my friend emily sent me a link to a sports illustrated article about rowing. that i recommend to everyone. it is one of the most inspirational things i've read and just shows why i absolutely love rowing. plus the article does a great job of explaining what a coxswain is (which is what i was on college) and i shared it with my seniors and coach. you will need a box of tissues though!

so happy tuesday!

chestertown half marathon!

so i was able to cross off another 30 before 30 goal this weekend!
i ran 13.1 miles to complete my first half marathon!
YAY!

last may 2 of my college friends and co-captains on the crew team were talking about running in the first chestertown half marathon as a fun thing to do... and i've kinda been wanting to run one so i told them i was interested in running with them. so we signed up and said it would be a fun little mini college reunion weekend!

so i attempted to train this summer and before i knew it the weekend was here! i was kinda freaking out on thursday & friday, because my longest training run was 10 miles and the last week i wasn't running as much as i should have... but after training on friday i jumped in the car and drove back to one of my favorite places on earth. driving to ctown this way was interesting - it made me feel as i had just gone to annapolis for the day and was coming back after shopping or something, not 3.5 years after graduation and almost a year after my last visit. i met up with jeanne and we went to our favorite pizza place in town and caught up on life since last may. and then walburn met us at the hotel and we chatted the night away.

saturday morning we were up bright & early because it was race day! i was super nervous but wanted to have fun and just not think. and before i knew it we were at the start line and we were off!

yay! for running 13.1 miles

i ran with jeanne the first mile and looked at my watch and saw i ran it in 8.30.... ummmm, waaay too fast! (i had been training at like at 11 minute mile pace) so i slowed down and miles 2/3 kinda sucked. but once i got into my rhythm it went better. miles 4-9 kinda rocked. i was feeling good and positive. then i hit mile 11. and my happy yay! running went. i hit the wall. and then the ipod gods intervened. i have a cute little green ipod shuffle (the one that is like 1"square) so i really don't have any control over my music. mary whipple came on my ipod and coxed me through mile 11. now for those of you not up to speed with your US national team coxswains - mary whipple is my rowing idol! she is the US national team coxswain and won a gold in 2008 and silver in 2004. and when i was in college, i used her recordings and such to help me train. and so i have a favorite recording and i put it on my ipod and so when i hit the wall - mary was there coxing the US to gold in 2003 at milan at worlds and it was just what i needed. (yes, i know i am weird... it is ok) and then mile 12 - i was running along the chester river, along where i spent so many hours rowing and it was awesome. plus i only had a mile left to go! so i finished 13.1 miles in 2:11.56 which i was super happy with!  going in my goal was to finish and run the whole way - and i would have loved to run under 2:15. so i was excited! and i ran an average of a 10:05 mile. so YAY!

at the bird

so the rest of the weekend was fun! another girl we rowed with came to cheer us on so it was great to see jones at the finish! and then the rest of the day was spent in chestertown - meeting up with the team's captains to talk to them about their goals and such, walking around revisiting one of my favorite places and also seeing coach and catching up with him. and then going to dinner along the river with many of my favorite people and watching the sunset along the river and then going to the bird - for a bit of college fun where in true bird fashion some locals bought us shots. so it was a great weekend of running, seeing friends, going back to a place i love and just having fun.

my legs are still in major rebellion - like i touch my quads and they say "haha" but other than that i'm good!

the river

how was your weekend? what is the furthest you've ever run?

new bike

can't believe it is thursday again the last week has seriously flown by. and i have had so much to do for work and i have been so tired, that i feel i haven't gotten anything done, and my to do list is never ending. ahhh, it is totally getting closer to the end of the school year!

last weekend in connecticut was exactly what i needed and now i really can't wait for the summer. two nights of grilling, drinking beer, sitting out with the fire, playing ladder ball, saturday night was a bit of a celebration for amy's birthday complete with funfetti cake and flip cup. where i was a flip cup champ, like flipping my cup first or second time almost every round. i'll be auditioning for the 2010 national team. and saturday we went for a little boat ride, where i was taught how to drive a motorboat. which was a ton of fun. and then sunday was some sailing, which i'm totally getting better, and this summer i should get a lot better! and then i went with some friends to the premier of the pbs film - into the deep: america, whaling and the world and it was pretty awesome. and i got back home to jersey pretty late, but it was worth it.

pretttty view

monday i picked up my bike - and i love her! i went for a quick ride on monday after i picked her up, but i've been busy this week so i haven't gotten to go for a longer ride. i'm hoping sunday to go for a nice one. i'm excited to check out some of the trails in my backyard (as i live in a state park) but here she is. any ideas for a name? and i also got a sweet rack. haha!

help me name my bike!

and things with work are still uncertain and still will be for the next 2-3 weeks. just keeping my fingers crossed and hoping for the best. but other than that, things are going well. 5 more weeks of classes, and lots of work. my juniors keep me laughing and are just fabulous, my sophomores make me work, but i'm having fun with them too. and i'm teaching some pretty cool stuff right now, so i love that.

this weekend i'm headed down to philly to see my love jclark and have a crazy night tomorrow night. and then saturday watching some rowing at dad vail's and cheering on my college crewies and jumping on my favorite assistant coach. yay!

any fun plans? ohh, and i'm curious to see what happens with the uk elections and with everything in greece.

happy weekend!

where in the world.... chester river

It's Wednesday and that means it's time the lovely Jess over at Classy in Philadelphia's , Where In The World Wednesday!

If you participate, please take the button the fabulous Feris made to use in your post!

The idea of WITWW is to post a picture of you in someplace in the world...it doesn't have to be somewhere foreign or tropical. Just a picture of you somewhere that you consider traveling.

this week i am at one of my favorite places - the chester river. i spent 4 glorious years on the chester river for crew practice. some days in the freezing cold and rain others in the sun, at 6am or 6pm seeing gorgeous sunrises and sunsets and meeting some of my best friends on this river. finding a sport i fell in love with and helping to make college something i loved so much. here are a few of my favs from senior year.

rowing in the casperson cup with my 8

my fav picture from senior year with my senior loves

taken after graduation - i love this shot of the river

about to push off the dock at practice

so participate with where in the world wednesday and go over to Jess's blog - Classy in Philadelphia and share your link :)

one year

last year i was boarding a plane in shannon and flying back to new jersey on march 24th. i have been back in the states for a year now and what a year it has been. the last 365 days have been pretty incredible and i've decided to write a post summing up the fabulousness of the last year rather than a post about the sadness of missing ireland.

quick note for all the new readers - i lived in cork, ireland from september 2007 to march 2009 and had an absolutely amazing time doing my masters in history, working & traveling.

so since i landed at newark liberty international airport at 11.30 am i have:

-bought a new car - colby my 2009 chevy cobalt who i just hit 18,000 miles on yesterday

-moved to connecticut with my college roomie 5 days later

-started teaching middle school students about whaling, maritime history and working on a ship and loving it

-my college loves and i reuniting in providence/boston and ct multiple times

-making some bad decisions with gator...

- cheering on one of my best friends as she ran the boston marathon

-danish ghosts at work

-seeing a good friend of mine catie and going to a bruce springsteen concert!

-crazy drinking in connecticut. between margarita nights, saturday nights and parties...

-applying to a million and seven teaching jobs

-helping amy coach rowing

-being super sad to leave connecticut

-home in jersey for a few days

-some kitty drama with scarlett being eaten and lillian being attacked but surviving and putting alice/trixie to sleep

-moving down to nova/dc for the summer to work at a high school leadership conference

-having the best summer roomie, crazy 7-11 runs, lots of tswift/kclarkson/mcyrus,

-team westpark and the happy hours

-dating the boy for the summer

- fun times with high school students in dc/nyc for 7 weeks

-getting a teaching job in nj

-enjoying the month of august in the jersey shore,hiking,lots of pa, nyc

- a crewie reunion in maryland

-joining my sorority alumni chapter

-a crazy fall pretty much spent at school but loving my co-workers and some great students

-seeing my first crew regatta in 2 years

- a redic halloween in connecticut

-going back to wac/maryland for the first time since graduation

-meeting friends in nyc whenever i want

- a first thanksgiving with my family in a long time and the parade in nyc

-started coaching the ski team

-a nice christmas with my family

-a quiet nye with erin

-started seeing matt

-seeing friends for dinner

- still loving my teaching job

-an awesome trip to kansas to see patricia

-waaaay too much snow

- putting puppy to sleep :(

-riverdance!

and here i am today... it was a pretty awesome year, full of the unexpected. because when my plane landed i knew i was moving to connecticut until june and then the unknown. and i have been so lucky that it was a positive year and so many incredible things have happened. i've met so many amazing people, made new friends and had a few crazy adventures.

my heart will always be in ireland and i am so glad that i had the opportunity to live there, but i really have been happy with my decision to move back to the states and everything i've been able to do this year.

where in the world.... cocoa beach, florida

It's Wednesday and that means it's time the lovely Jess over at Classy in Philadelphia's , Where In The World Wednesday!

If you participate, please take the button the fabulous Feris made to use in your post!

The idea of WITWW is to post a picture of you in someplace in the world...it doesn't have to be somewhere foreign or tropical. Just a picture of you somewhere that you consider traveling.

so this week is many college's spring break. whoooohoooo! and for 4 years i went to cocoa beach, florida with the crew team for our training trip. and it was hard and exhausting, but ammmmazing! 6 hours of being on the water and rowing with the manatees and dolphins. and bonding with the team. here are a few of my favs from my final trip senior year. also it was the last day of this trip i got the email letting me know i was accepted into the grad program and would be headed back to ireland!

last practice after the underclassmen throw in the seniors

rowing... one of the few i have of rowing in florida

jumping in the pool after the last practice and totally soaked from being thrown in

after the juniors gave us our presents - i still have mine!

so participate with where in the world wednesday and go over to Jess's blog - Classy in Philadelphia and share your link :)

screensaver

so over the last few days i've been spending a lot of time with my computer. i should have been typing up notes for my classes, butttt i found myself distracted and my computer would keep going to screensaver. and my screensaver is my photos. and as you may guess, i have a lot of photos, so it is always fun looking at what photos pop up and what memories they bring back. i can just watch my screensaver and be entertained for hours. haha!

here are the first 5 that pop up....

this was the day we got our crew jackets. it is a big deal to finally get your crew jacket and at the end of your 3rd semester (fall of soph year) of crew right before the last race in the fall we get jackets. here are all my fellow sophomores getting our jackets at the spaghetti dinner. sadly i was not there that night because i had class :( and out of that picture there would be 8 of them and me left senior year.

my roomies senior year after playing project runway for an anything goes but clothes party

view from the rialto bridge in venice feb 2009

one of my favorite days ever. a gorgeous hike along the cliffs at slieve league in donegal, ireland in april 2008. we sat along these cliffs in the sunshine for a good hour. with my friends karen and emer

the statue to michael collins in beal na mblath in county cork, ireland. this is where he was killed in an ambush during the irish civil war. this is from august 2005 - when i took a irish history class when i studied abroad in ireland and we had lots of fun field trips.

anyone else love their screensaver as much as i do?

love

the eastern shore of maryland is where i belong.

an AMAZING long weekend full of the chester river, wac, friends and memories.

life is fabulous, so was being in one of my favorite places, catching up with friends, many who it has been over a year since i saw them last and just remembering the best four years of my life and knowing that chestertown will always be home.

on the river for practice

love this place

and this man

george, george are you ok?

brand new dining hall!

home

sultana

along the river

cac from the new theatre

brand new theatre

now back to the crazy of life, but the first marking period is over! and i'm teaching two things i love right now, antebellum america and world war II. and i talked about the fall of the berlin wall today in all of my classes because well i could and i thought it went well and i love berlin. but it is crazy to think that it has been 20 years since the collapse of the soviet union...

from november 2005 in berlin (can't believe it has been that long!!)

philly love

yesterday was the 20sb blog swap and i was paired up with the lovely emily so go check out my post on making the best out of life and not worrying about greener grass :)

so this weekend was amazing. i drove down to philly in the yucky rain friday evening and it was mostly dark. there are 2 things i don't like to drive in the dark and the rain. but i rocked out to taylor and she made it all better. it is a easy drive down to jeanne's she lives outside the city near media. so we spent the evening catching up on our lives and teaching/school psychologisting and everything while enjoying some wine. also laughing at travis, who kept falling asleep on the couch! jeanne's boyfriend is kinda an extension of our group, the 4 of us would always go visit him in college. we then watched two episodes of greek, as i was behind. so that was great because it was jeanne who got me into it :)

saturday we were up early and into philly along kelly drive for the head of the schuylkill. enjoyed looking at boathouse row :) and then walked along until we found the team's trailers and boats. saw a few girls on the team who we knew, it is crazy the only people we know on the team are now seniors! eeeeek! made me feel old. saw ashleigh and jumped on her and we sounded like we hadn't seen each other in 2.5 year (oh wait i haven't seen her since may 20,2007) so it was AMAZING to see her. even if we didn't get to talk too much since she had her boys to coach. saw our coaches and they gave us big hugs.. met the new men's coach who i apparently emailed back in 2005 about the chestertown tea party when i was doing a paper on did it really happen. (i just went and found the email! haha!) and also coxed two boats off the trailer for the novice teams. and the weather... well it could have been better, but it could have been much worse! it was low 60s and of and on rain. but it was nice to be at a race and just to cheer and have fun! and after work travis joined us, and we watched a lot of the races from the strawberry mansion bridge, which was a cool viewpoint. it would be even better for 2k races! and then at the end of the day it started to pour! we were there from 9.30 to 4.30 and soaked! so we went back to their apartment with the plans to change and then go out in philly, but on the way home we decided to just stay in media... and after a few minutes at home and it raining even more, we ordered in, drank more wine and we were falling asleep at 10pm! so much for my crazy night in philly, but it was still so much fun!

sunday we walked around media and then i hit the road, so i could go meet a zeta sister to talk about advising a college chapter and then get home to do some work! so it was fun and i can't wait to see her more often. we are about 2 hours away from each other, so we want to make plans to meet halfway for dinner more often. and then i'm super psyched for this weekend in connecticut! YAYYAYAY!

so i've decided i really like philly. i had never been until this summer and the more i go the more i love it. i still need to do most of the touristy things - i've only seen the liberty bell. so yay for new adventures and hopefully getting to explore a fun new city which really isn't too far away!

how was everyone's weekend?

looking up the schuylkill towards the start

boats racing down the course

jeanne, ash and i

john kelly.. one of the best rowers ever... kelly drive is named after him

we hid out under the bridge for a while and watched races!