PSA of the Day

Today's public service announcement has to do with reading my own blog.  Do any of you bloggers out there read your own blogs?  Well I do. And I realized I sound like a broken record when apologizing for not posting for long intervals.

So here is my PSA:

I'm not sorry anymore.  I will post when my schedule allows it and you will have to deal with it!

I feel much better now.

Cincinnati!

Growing up, we used to take loooong road trips every summer to visit relatives in South Dakota, Texas, etc. My parents would pack the 3 of us kids into the car, with the luggage carrier roped to the roof, and the tv/vcr wired through the cigarette lighter, and we'd be off for 3 days of nonstop driving, bickering, threatening to pull the car over, etc.

After this weekend, I seriously don't know how they did that.

My big sister, Julie, is getting married this July. Since she lives in Texas, it was going to be difficult to make it to her bridal shower.  But luckily her fiance's family is from Cincinnati-which is a little bit closer to Philadelphia... So off we went, my Mom, Dad, sister Laura and me. 10 hours of forced family togetherness. Sigh. And that was only one way!

We had a great weekend in Cincinnati/the surrounding suburbs. Julie's new family is incredibly awesome. And extremely Irish. I mean, with a last name like Flynn you'd think we'd get the clue. But it wasn't until I walked into the house full of 30 people to bagpipes playing and children Irish dancing, and met the dogs named Guinness and Jameson, that it really began to sink in.

We also ate some incredibly DELICIOUS (and high calorie) foods. Thank goodness the hotel had a little gym. We got to try Skyline Chili and Graeters Ice Cream. O.M.G.

Here are some pictures from our weekend:

Skyline Chili. And for the record, this was my Dad's meal!

Mini Ice Cream cones at Graeters, Hawkette sized! ;)

Bridal Shower time!

Favors (Note the familiar initials!)

Beautiful Bride to be!

It was a lot of driving, but it was great to spend time with the family,
and to meet new family!

Cheers to Julie and Shea!

~SG

Nutrition/Exercise Blog (Sorry)

While I don't want to bore you with details of my new healthy eating plan (it is SO much more fun to read about eating chocolate cake, no?) I do want to QUICKLY write about how I'm doing and what I'm doing.

A) This goes way back to like a month after the wedding when I realized wedding stress wasn't automatically deleting calories anymore.  (Srsly. I lost 10 pounds before the wedding, doing absolutely NOTHING. It was amazing.)

B) Now that I'm back to dancing, I want to be able to perform (outside in 100 degree weather) without gasping for air and also not embarrass myself in a tiny little spandex skirt.

So here I am.  I have no clue what day/week I'm on, maybe a little over a month, and I've lost about 5-7 pounds.  And I just kicked it up a notch.

One of my coaches is a nutritionist (WINNING).  She took my body fat measurement with this awesome ultrasound-like machine.  I came in right about where I thought I would.  Which is good, because it wasn't terrible.  But it wasn't awesomesauce either. (mmmmm sauce.)

Something I'm definitely struggling with is eating ENOUGH. I know that sounds crazy because when I'm not watching what I eat, I eat plenty.  But when it comes to salads, carrot sticks, bananas, etc. I have this idea in my head that I'm not allowed to eat a lot.  Which then leaves me hungry. For pizza.

So I'm working really hard on chugging water and making healthier choices.  Which means PLANNING AHEAD.  I should've taken a picture of the kitchen counter the other night after I finished putting celery sticks, carrot sticks, apple slices and blueberries into mini plastic baggies to take to work.

OK and for those of you who are like "Really? Give me a break."  I'm also being careful NOT to restrict myself from eating things like the brownies my sister baked for us as a thank you for coming to her bridal shower. 

The other half of nutrition is obviously exercise.  While I'm getting an AWESOME workout twice a week at dance practice, that leaves 5 other nights where I need to figure out what to do.  So I'm focusing on getting back into running.

If you've ever met me, you'll l know I am NOT an athlete. I have never been an athlete. I'm a dancer....an artist, if you will.  While I wasn't the LAST one picked for the team in high school gym class, I certainly wasn't the first.  And I never ran a mile in under 10 minutes until I was about.....20.

I try though, and I like running races and I even do long races because I like the accomplishment and sometimes you get to wear a tutu.  So Tuesday I decided to try for 2 miles around my in-laws neighborhood (which might as well be a mountainous region).  I freakin did it!!! My pace was probably horrible but I did 2 miles with no walking.  I'm pumped.  Haven't ran that far since.... February of last year.

Sooo there's my nutrition/exercise update for a little while.  It's definitely not easy.  In fact, it sucks.

But you know what else sucks? Being benched.  So let’s hope I get my rear in gear ASAP, eh?!

SG

New York, New York!

Have I been a crappy blogger lately? Yes. Do I have an excuse? I think so.  2 weekends of traveling plus dance team practice and a full time job don't really leave time for creative writing.

First thing's first.  I'll give you a short trip report about our adventure to NYC by explaining each of the photos I gave in my previous post.

Summary: Me, Joey, Warner, and A Love went to NYC to visit our friend, Jupin.

1. No, we did not run out of gas.  But we would have if I hadn't brought the gas light to the attention of our driver, who was completely oblivious.  Our road trip also included a stop in rural Maryland for a bathroom break, er- because our dog, "Ralph", ran away from us.... which ended up being on Federal property so that was probably not good.  We also narrowly missed being smashed into smithereens oh, 397 times.  When we arrived at the train station in Hamilton, NJ we had to run "Home Alone" style to the train.  Miraculously, we made it to NYC both unscathed and before midnight.

2. Pretty good summation of our first night.  We went to a pirate bar called Wicked Willy's.  It was completely decked out like a pirate ship and of course I was in heaven. (Umm hello Pirates4 comes out May 20th! Who's going to the midnight showing? ME.) 

Oh and we also went to 2 other bars that night, one involved a bucked of beer and the other a 30 minute bathroom wait.

3. Well there were a few events leading up to this photo.  Like our failed tour of Chelsea that ended with us drinking at the Biergarten at 2pm.  Fast forward a few hours and you have this, a sink full of bubbles.  I'll leave the rest up to your imagination.

4. While we were in NYC to visit Jupin, we also had a surprise visit from a celebrity.  Good friend Samantha came over from Hoboken to hang out and pretend we were in college.  It was great to see her.

5. No, we were not playing "Harry Potter", although there were a few forbidden curses and "wingardium leviosa"s thrown around... we were at a rooftop bar, in the rain, which evidently meant they handed out red hooded capes for everyone to wear.  Makes sense, right? 

We had a great trip. It took me 2 days to recover. I guess I'm not in college anymore :(  But I did enjoy the brunch, walk through Little Italy, and Times Square.  Jupin has a nice little life going on up there! He might be onto something.... But Joey and I are convinced that we are NOT city people.  So here we sit, in the suburbs, waiting for our house.  Still waiting....

Our Weekend in New York City: The Preview

God Bless America

Today's Headline of the Day is just, well, American.

"USPS used Vegas replica for Lady Liberty stamp"

Also very fitting to this article is that I am headed to New York for the weekend.  Expect a lengthy post of adventures come Monday.

~SG

15 Minutes of Fame

So today I was filling out my bio for the dance team website and it reminded me of a little incident that happened a couple years ago.

I was a Washington Capitals Red Rocker, it was the first season the team was in existence, and I've been known to put silly things on my bios in the past. [Wizards favorite quote: "There are big ships and small ships, but the best ship of all is friendship!"- This one will be making another appearance, if for no other reason than to annoy my bff Peyton.] 

I was going through all the normal questions- name, hometown, occupation, etc. and then it asked me what my favorite book was. Ummm???  It's not that I don't like to read, but that I just don't read that much.  Every time I start a book I have to re-read the first 50 pages three times because I got busy with life and didn't read for 2 weeks and then forgot what happened. It just doesn't work out for me. SO, being witty and hilarious (or at least I think so) I wrote that my favorite book was Facebook.

Fastforward a bit, the site is up for quite a while, and almost a year later I get a message from my friend Dave letting me know that there is a blog about me. So I'm all like, "Cool! Somebody's blogging about
me!".

Thankfully I was able to find it again and turn it into a jpeg so you could all enjoy it. Forever.

And to make matters worse, this wasn't the only one!

Credit to theviewfrom419.blogspot.com

Well, nobody gets my humor I guess. At least it gave the bloggers something to talk about?  I will say that TheViewfrom419's post wasn't really that mean and actually compliments the RRs.  And YES, if they ever google search themselves and find this blog, I WAS JOKING!!

**Also, this is a rant for another post but WHY do people think the H in my name is optional?? Like sometimes you use it sometimes you don't per above?? WTF!

So this time, there is no "favorite book" question, thank goodness. And I guess I didn't learn my lesson because I'm still using the friendship quote. But I say bring it on. If you are so lame that all you can do is sit at your computer and make fun of cheerleaders, then go get a life!  I recall once reading a fanpage thread comment about my occupation (financial analyst at the time) and the person saying something like "Who would trust HER with their money??" And it was all I could do to not make up a screen name and respond with,  "THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT, THAT'S WHO!!!!"

...I guess everybody gets their 15 minutes of fame!

~SG

PS: In my google search for the Facebook blog, I also found this! #13 on the countdown from 25 baby!!! Haha aaaand another favorite book reference. Fail.

Winning

Have you ever been eating something delicious and thought, "Whoever invented this should win a prize!" Or something similar?

This happens to me often because I love food and I eat a lot of it.  Today I was eating chocolate pudding (sugar free!) by Jello and it is just SO DELICIOUS. I've also thought this about peanut butter and jelly (who thought of putting peanut butter and jelly together on bread? A major winner, that's who.)

Another one? Avocados. Who pulled that thing off a tree (do they even grow on trees?) and decided to peel it and eat it? A genius.

I feel kind of pathetic that I just googled "do avocados grow on trees?"...

Moving on. I'm sure there are other inventions that deserve a prize that aren't food. Do you have any favorite food (or non-food) items that merit an award?

Dancing and Jewelry and Roses Oh MY!

What a weekend! As promised, here is a recap of the past few days! 

On Saturday I auditioned for a dance team. I miss performing so much.  I found out about the auditions a few weeks ago from a good friend who happens to be the director. But that doesn't mean I had an easy-in. I haven't danced in 3 years. Though my technique and skills are remarkably intact, my body is NOT in shape. Not even a little bit. I had 3 weeks to look "acceptable" in booty shorts. O.M.G.

So that commenced healthy meals, extensive workouts and a lot of stress and online shopping. I only managed to lose 5.5 pounds before audition day. Nervous doesn't even begin to describe how I felt. But I went in there and I killed it. And I made the team.

I still have to continue with my fitness and healthy eating, but now I have more encouragement. Spandex. WHY are all dance uniforms made of SPANDEX!?! What team? Well, thankfully it is not basketball because I don't think I can watch anymore basketball ever. And no, it's not the NFL either.  This time, it's Major League Lacrosse! Oh yes, lacrosse teams have cheerleaders. So does World Team Tennis, hockey, soccer, etc. But I'm not in this to watch the game, or to get paid. I'm in it to perform and to entertain the crowd. Cause that's what I love to do!

Cell phone pic of (most of) the new team! When I get a better one I will share it....

After the auditions, I treated myself to a (skinny) caramel macchiato and headed to my good friend, Kendayl's house for a Stella and Dot party. This jewelry is SO fun! I got a couple pairs of earrings and
called it a day.

Sunday I got brunch with Amanda (yes, Amanda from the Disney World trip) and she gave me the COMPLETED DVD MOVIE of our Disney Vacation. It is so amazing, but it is 30 minutes long. I'm in the process of convincing her to break it up into chunks and post it to You Tube so I can share it here. 

Then I headed off to a fundraiser for the upcoming Avon Walk for Breast Cancer in Washington DC (donate here!). I enjoyed cookies, cake pops (and took some home too!) and had the opportunity to shop with Pampered Chef, Willow House, Stella and Dot (again!) and CAbi (clothing line) for a 10% donation of all profits to the cause. I left with a few pieces for our soon-to-be new home. Very successful afternoon.

I returned home to these:

Sunday was also our 6 month wedding anniversary. Half a year in the books! Since we are dorks, we celebrated with a nice dinner out (hello, filet!) and came home and watched our Disney Vacation movie 3 times.

Yesterday it was back to work and to my first dance team practice. It was a GREAT practice, but I didn't get home until late and I was so tired today! I need to get back into the groove, and fast!

I hope everyone goes out and makes it a GREAT week!

~SG

This is not a political post!

I think it's always important to comment on current events. Remember middle school? Remember cutting out a newspaper article that you totally didn't understand but that your Mom said was a current event?

Anyway, the point of this post is not to rant about the federal government shut down, but it is more to inform my readers (aka my parents and other people who care) that I will be OK and not to worry about me.

As a contractor, I'm in an interesting situation. But my company is dedicated and has the resources to help us through a [short] shut down.  The Navy Yard will be open, as all military are required to work, so I'll be able to go to work and be paid, just not from my contract. 

My thoughts are with those in military families, civilian government workers and especially those who live paycheck to paycheck- all of whom are going to be affected very negatively by all of this. I really hope things work out quickly and smoothly so everyone can go back to normal as soon as possible!

And that's all I have to say about that.

-SG

PS: I realize there has been a lack of posting and severe lack of pictures. I have some fun weekend plans and hopefully I'll have some fun posts to share next week!

PPS: Wanted to shout out to my favorite Washington Redskins Cheerleaders- Congrats to Lindsey M on her 2nd year and to Kristie on her Rookie season!

There will be no April Fools joke today...

Due to the ever increasing number of people who decide that any time I
am ever excited about ANYTHING where the details are somewhat vague that
I must be pregnant.

This DOES remind me of the time in college that me and my BFF decided we
would call our parents and tell them we got a DUI. Total April Fools
fail. I mean, after my Mom calmed down she actually thought it was funny
and pulled it on my Dad. But in retrospect that's probably not too cool
of a joke to begin with.

Anybody have any doozies?

~SG