Over the hurdle...

I survived the weekend.  In all honesty, it wasn't as bad as I was preparing for.  Sure, it hurt... but I tried to keep myself preoccupied so that I wouldn't sit there and stew about things.  In actuality, I'm really glad I'm over that hurdle.  Now, if we can just get rid of this house, I will be completely free.

It was REALLY quiet in my house all weekend.  I left work a bit early on Friday to get an oil change and stop at the grocery store.  I made it home around the same time I would've had I left work like normal, but at least I got a few errands done.  Saturday was a little more difficult.  I rolled out of bed once Samson no longer would keep quite and we went for our morning walk.  I waited around doing a bit of cleaning and organizing until noon, when I ventured out to get my pool pass and spend some time in the sun.  I lasted two hours before the heat and the crowds dragged me back into the house.  I texted with my mom, skyped with my dad and then decided to take a shower and celebrate my day the way I intended to... by getting a tattoo. 

Before I get to that story...  Saturday was alot better than I expected it to be.  Sure, I cried a few times.  I got texts from my sisters, my parents and my aunt MEM.  I got a care packge of goodies from MEM and Terri and a nice plant from Lindy and the gang.  It was nice to know that people had been thinking of me that day.  I had managed pretty good up until I went to shower.  On my way into the shower, I realized that I actually would've been at the church right then.  That was probably the hardest point of the day.

So anyways, back to the tattoos.  Why tattoos you ask?  Well, this was not my first tattooing experience (how many of you knew that???).  Back in January, when I was really struggling with the break up, I knew I needed to do something for myself.  Something to solidify my "you are independent and strong" attitude.  So after a month or so of debating, designing, checking, and hemming and hawwing, I finally had decided on a tattoo.... ok, I decided on two.  The intent was to get these tattoos asap, as a celebration of myself. 

Of course, one thing led to another and it kept getting put off...money, time, vacation, etc.  Finally, I had decided this weekend was the weekend.  What better way to celebrate my independence on my would-have-been-wedding-day than by getting a tattoo?  So I showered and got on the road, driving out to Wheaton (MD) where the tattoo parlor was.  Surprisingly, at 6pm on a Saturday during a holiday weekend, it was crowded.  So I took the 10 mile - 40 minute drive down to the DC location, right in the heart of Adams Morgan.  Sidenote, I've never been to Adams Morgan before 10pm.... it's different in the daylight. :)

Two hours later, I had both tattoos and was on my way home feeling empowered.

This is the tattoo that was the original idea.  It is a gaelic*/Irish phrase meaning "inner strength".  It is intentional that it is on my ribcage near my heart.  Not surprising to many of you, it took me longer to determine what font I wanted it in than what I actually wanted it to say and where I wanted it done.

*Funny side note: While doing my research and cross-checking my translations to make sure I was really getting a tattoo that said "inner strength" and not a tattoo that meant "green grass" or something like that, I stumbled upon an Irish forum in which one gentleman went on a long tangent about using the word "gaelic".  Did you know that most Irish NEVER use the word gaelic?  They just say Irish.  This gentleman compared using the phrase "gaelic" to an American saying that they speak American.  Seems funny now that you think about it that way, doesn't it?

The second tattoo was one I had thought about getting for a long time and it just seemed appropriate now.  It is a clover because everyone needs a little luck in their lives.  There are many clover designs out there but I chose this one because it looked like watercolor brush strokes.  The necessity of outlining for tattoo purposes sortof takes that away, but the separation is still there.

Sorry about the photos, I took then that night so the tattoos are VERY fresh.  I'm sure plenty of people will think why.... why tattoos as a way to immortalize something you would rather forget.  The answer for me is simple.  I will never be able to forget.  In one way or another, that has changed me... I am a different person. 

And I live with that reminder every day.

a retrospective

Today was supposed to be my wedding day.

It was going to be a day about family and friends and celebrating love.

Instead I will be spending the day alone... laying by the pool, walking Samson, watching movies.  I'm sad to be alone but at the same time, I don't know what my mood will  be like today so it's probably better that way.  The last thing I would want would be to bring my mood onto other people.

This is the first time in a long time that I have just felt completely numb to everything.  I'm looking forward to getting back this weekend.  It's one less hurdle to put this in my past.

Goals Check-in: April & May

Here's my recap for the last two months since I seem to have lost my mind the last week of April.

1. SAVE MONEY, REDUCE DEBT: HA.  Vacation totally screwed me here.  I took a little chunk of money from my savings to help (a miracle that I even had that option btw - that should be noted).  I'm back on the band wagon this month.  Payments to my debt are still happening and I'm not really spending on them, so that's good.

2. GET BACK IN SHAPE:  Oh hey, I'm running a half marathon in roughly 6 weeks?  Crap!  The last three weeks with my conference, sickness and vacation was rough.  This week was my first week to force myself back into it and that was equally rough.  Hopefully as I continue to push myself with the schedule I can get back on the ball.  This week was a test too since it was 90 and humid two of the days I had to run.  Running 13 miles in July is going to be awesome!

That being said, I still feel great.  I plan to continue to do some running in my workout schedule once the half is over.  Probably a mix of the shred workouts and running during the week.

Eating is getting a little back and track and needs to continue to improve.  Thankfully, the summer weather always helps to eat less and grilled veggies are my favorite!
3. STEP OUT OF MY COMFORT ZONE:  hm.  Negative on this one.  I can't recall anything in the last two months that has helped me accomplish this.

I guess looking back, the last two months were not as bad as they seemed, but definitely a step sideways from the direction I was going.  Hopefully this summer will put me back on track.

This weekend I'm going to be doing my best to occupy all of my free time... leaving as little time as possible for me to dwell in my own head.  I will be spending some time at the pool in my community, watching movies, and taking care of Samson.  I also may go buy myself the Michael Jackson Experience game.  I had a blast playing it with Lauren at my parents house, so that should be fun.

the morning plot twist

so a new coworker, one who just started in April, asked me this morning if I would be willing to meet a friend of hers for drinks or dinner.

Apparently, she thinks we would get along and he is only living here temporarily right now.  He is from the midwest and owns a husky.  She also said he was "easy on the eyes".

Not really sure how I feel about this right now.  I know she probably has NO idea about my history.

mood swings

Moods are an incredibly interesting thing.  It could take the smallest little thing to shift a mood from good to bad.  And most of the time there are no predictors.

Yesterday I was in a fantastic mood.  I felt great, I looked great, things were going well at work.  Today, complete opposite.  I'm edgy, irritable and I can feel that downright nastiness just rearing it's ugly head.

Today is going to be a test of my patience.  I can just tell.

God help me.

New Clothes

Am I the only one that really loves the feeling of wearing something new for the very first time?

Several months ago, I ran across this adorable skirt on a blog.  After some back and forth with my mom, it was pre-ordered and shipping to me!  It was a spring/summer skirt, so it was torture to receive it in February/March and have to wait to wear it.  But today is finally the day!

I love this skirt.

*Top - Victoria's Secret, Skirt - Anne Cramer, belt - Target, shoes - Payless

I'm looking forward to finding other ways to wear it!

100

This post marks my 100th post on this blog.  100 posts.... already.  I feel like the last time I wrote a blog it took me forever to reach 100 posts.  I guess that's a good thing right?  I am doing my job at keeping this blog updated.  :)

This blog was originally intended to document my journey post break up and keep me on track with my goals for the year.  While at times I seemed to have strayed from this purpose (um, when did this become a fashion blog?), I think having to keep the blog updated has helped me.

As most of you know, this coming weekend was supposed to be my wedding weekend.  Needless to say, it has effected my mood for the last several weeks.  It's one of the last few hurdles I need to get through to really start moving on... that and getting rid of this house.

I'm not thrilled about what this weekend has in store for me mentally and emotionally but I will be doing my best to just work through it.

I'm glad that I started this blog 100 posts ago, based on a suggestion from my grandpa.  It has given me alot of opportunities to reflect on my attitude and outlook on life.  Do I wish things were different now?  Heck yes.  But at least I know there is progress.  At some point in my future, I will no longer feel like I'm just waiting for my life to start over... it will really be happening.

May 23rd

Today is a busy day.  Today marks the 30th anniversary of my parents, one cousin's birthday and the birthday of a close friend.

My parents are celebrating on vacation in the Dominican Republic.  I hope they are enjoying their trip.

This past weekend was a weekend of recovery for me.  Saturday I cleaned the house... and man was it gross.  I think this coming weekend I may need to do a full scrub down, washing the floors, etc.

Sunday I had to get back on the marathon training and run my 9 miler.  Now, if you recall, up until my trip to Seattle I was doing pretty well with the running.  Seattle was ok.  I ran my 6.5 on the treadmill at the hotel as well as the two remaining runs that week.  Mexico was a bit of a challege.  I was supposed to run 7 miles and due to being sick, only made it about 5.  Then I got one shorter run in and that was it.  The week of my return I did not get any runs in, so I knew this week was going to be super tough.  I mapped out a run on Saturday and took off Sunday morning.  I started out great until about 3 miles in when my hips started to tighen up.  I ended up walking a bit to try to loosen them up and also because the road I was on was not the best.  After that it sort went down hill from there.  I had to run and walk in spurts and then I ended up on two two-lane country roads with no medians.  I didn't feel safe running, so I ended up walking those.  By the time I got back to civilization, my hips hurt so badly that I couldn't run long, so I ended up finishing walking.  It was disheartening, but I'm hoping getting back into the shorter runs this week will help.  Next week I need to find a new route to run.  I was way too far out without an escape plan and no cell phone.

I have a busy day at work today, so hopefully it will go by quickly.  I'm wearing bright colors to force a cheerful attitude today (I don't know how much it is working).

*dress - Ann Taylor, sweater - Gap, shoes - Target

The Mexico Recap

Finally... the vacation recap.  In all honesty, I'm looking forward to getting back to regularly updating the blog.

After getting back from Seattle, I had two days to settle down, unpack, do laundry and repack for vacation.  In hindsight, it wasn't the best idea to go on vacation so soon after my conference, but it was the dates that worked best with everyone.  It was nice to get to relax, but I was still in that "post-conference slump" (Dad, I know you know what I'm talking about...)

I'm so thankful to my favorite brother-in-law for getting up at 4am on Saturday to drive me down to the airport.  I had a stop in Chicago which was where Brooke and I connected and took the same flight straight down to Cabo.  We arrived an hour before Amanda was supposed to arrive, so our plan was to wait in Cabo's tiny airport for her right outside of customs.  And that is when I realized that United had lost my bag.  Now, to be honest, I have never had my bag lost before.  And while there wasn't really anything of super importance in there, it was distressing to not be prepared.  Plus, I wasn't getting the best help in Mexico so that made me even more nervous about it.  Thankfully, I packed a couple of swimsuits in my carry on bag, so at least I would still be able to enjoy the pool.

Once Amanda arrived, we headed to the resort to check in (they upgraded us to a two-bedroom ocean view villa) and then we had lunch and went to the Mega - Cabo's "costco", to get some supplies for our room.  Here is the picture of our view from the room.

Sunday we spent the whole day by the pool.  All of us were not really used to the sun, so we spent a good deal of time under the umbrellas and I tested out the cabanas by the pool. 

It was awesome.  Sometime that afternoon, Brooke tracked down the concierge and found out that my bag had arrived to Mexico (via LA) and would be dropped off to the resort around 6pm.  HURRAY!  We had a low key dinner on Sunday at the resort.

On Monday, the resort holds their big Beach Bash, $37 for all you can eat and drink.  We spent the day at the pool and had some tacos from the taco bar.  Later that afternoon, I got sick with food poisoning... meaning I was going to miss the beach bash.  Amanda and Brooke went and they seemed to have fun, so I'm glad that they were still able to enjoy the night.  As you might be noticing, this vacation had not started out the way I had hoped it would.

By Tuesday morning, I was no longer throwing up and slowly trying to eat some food.  We hit the pool and then made dinner in the room.

Wednesday I was finally back to feeling better, so we decided that we would take our first jaunt out of the resort for dinner.  We hit the pool (are you seeing a trend) and then made our way out to dinner in the nearest town.  We were directed to a seafood place that was small but cute.  The food was excellent and we had a good time chatting during dinner.  After dinner, we walked a few blocks down to the Baja Brewery for a drink.  They were a legitimate brewery, so of course Brooke had to try their beer sampler.  Amanda and I had their raspberry ale, which was actually pretty good.  I managed to take an iphone picture on our way out of the resort and the bartender at the brewery got one more for good measure.

I forgot to mention that on our exit from the restaurant, a local gentleman with a motorcycle offered to call two of his friends with their bikes to come and give us a ride.  Don't worry.... we managed to make it to the brewery and home before he and his friends returned. :)

When we got home on Wednesday we went out to the pool and hot tub to hang out for a while.  We were joined by Amanda's bf (or stalker... depending on how you look at it) Slick Nick.  Dubbed Slick Nick because of his allegedly greasy hairstyle at the beach bash.  The meeting of Slick Nick, the crowning of his nickname and subsequent hot tub chats were all started on that Monday night I was out of commission.  So Thursday was really my first opportunity to meet him.  He certainly loved Amanda.  I managed to get one picture of Slick Nick in the pool with Amanda and Brooke on Friday...  that is his niece grabbing onto it.  Now that I think about it, I never did see him without a drink in his hand.

Thursday was what we were considering our "last night out" since none of us wanted to be out crazy late on Friday night with a fairly early morning check out.  After a day at the pool, we got ready and took the 30 minute cab ride out to Cabo San Lucas, which is the touristy area of Cabo.  We ate dinner at The Office, a well known spot.  I'm not going to lie.  This area of Cabo was like the adult version of spring break.  A few restaurants over on the beach, they were having a contest with random audience participation on the number of sexual positions they could act out in a minute.  The three of us felt like we were definitely not drunk enough to be there and were totally late to the party.  While we were sitting there after our dinner, we were approached by a fine young man who was not at all in any way intoxicated (read: very very intoxicated).  Long story short, he was in Cabo for a bachelor party.  We met the others from the group, a total of five, and were invited by the bachelor himself to join them out.  I'm going to let a few pictures tell the story but to sum it up...

• had dinner on the beach, took a few photos
• lost two of the guys from the party on our way to another restaurant dwindling our group to 6
• very large margaritas at our second dinner
• got lost trying to find Cabo Wabo and ended up at a dance club called "Pink Kitty"

And now, the photos...

 taken before we left the resort... love my iphone photos

 the bachelor said "do something funny"

 this is the guy who first sat at our table.  He was so drunk he lost his shoes on the way to this restaurant... gross.

 the whole group...

 it's the bachelor!

We had a great time out and it was a nice way to round out the trip.  When we got back to the room at 1:30am, Slick Nick was waiting for us.  Seriously stalkerish.

Friday we spent the entire day at the pool getting our last bit of sun in.  Amanda wasn't feeling well that evening so after a low key pasta dinner at the resort, Brook and I grabbed our remaining two bottles of wine and headed down to the beach.  We had a nice chat and enjoyed the wine before we were joined by Slick Nick.  We were back and in bed by 1am.

Saturday morning we chatted with a few of the workers from the resort (while Slick Nick occupied Amanda), received a few "mexican breakfasts" aka Mojitos (at 9:30am) and then packed up to leave.  We got one last picture with the guys from the resort and were on our way back to the airport.  It really was a great vacation!!!  Can't wait to see what we plan for next year.

WOW, this is a long recap.  Good for those of you that managed to hang around the whole time.  :)

Happy Thought #3

Getting to spend a week each year with my favorites without feeling the least bit guilty about it.

busy, busy, busy

So today is my first day back in the office since April 23rd.  I'm not sure I'm super thrilled to be here to be honest with you.

I plan to post about my trip and I also realized I missed my April goals update in the craziness that was the conference.  I'll just double up at the end of May.

While I try to get organized at work, here is an outfit post.  Back to the regular routine...

*sweater - jcrew, skirt - jcrew, belt - target, shoes - Payless (I'm not kidding).

Mexico, Mexico, Mexico...

Tomorrow at 6am I depart for Mexico!

It's 10:25am right now and I have barely even begun to pack... procrastinate much? :)

Today will be spent emptying the DVR so that it will record my shows while I am gone and actually packing.  I don't know why I find packing to be so difficult.  It will take two rounds for me... one to actually set stuff out and one to go back through and edit to get rid of some of what I was going to pack.  I admit I am an over-packer.

I most likely will not have internet until I get back into the US on the 14th.  I will post updates when I get home....

So two whole weeks without hearing a peep from me...  I hope you can make it (MEL) :)

See you post-vacation!

Back on the east coast

Well, after 10 days of being in Seattle, I'm home.  I'm super tired, but I'm home.

The conference was really, really successful so that definitely helps to transition a good mood right into my vacation.  I feel good about my overall work at the conference.

Today and tomorrow will be filled with last minute things to do before my 6am (yikes) flight on Saturday morning.  The only good thing about having two days back is that my body won't really adjust to being back on the east coast before I am back west again.

I'm really looking forward to this vacation.  Not only will I enjoy doing virtually nothing for a full week, but it will be warm and sunny....  I will also be there with Brooke and Amanda.  I am looking forward to spending a full week with them as well.  We don't get to see each other nearly as often as we would like.

A quick moment

Work has been really really busy.... But it's almost over.
Tonight marks the beginning of the end of the conference. It's been long. How do I know?
Because I have 5 minutes between things I need to be at and instead of grabbing a drink, I'm doing this....