Engagement Photos as Promised!

As predicted I am EXHAUSTED today, but surprisingly I was so busy during the day that I barely had time to think about how tired I was! I had orientation at my summer job so I found out who my kiddos I'll be tutoring this year are. They are all boys, yikes! I love boys, but boys will let you know EXACTLY how bored they are and trust me, it can get boring! One of them is a little boy I had last year which is great. I've worked here for 4 years and never had a kid twice. This kid was definitely my favorite last year too. He is a little quirky so at first I was not sure how I felt about him but by the end I loved him! After orientation (actually I snuck out early, which hopefully I will not get in trouble for tomorrow!) I headed to tutor two kids privately, one new boy who is definitely going to be crazy, but fun...and then an awesome second grade girl I've been tutoring for a few months. When I finally got home, it was time for a quick dinner and then off to PT. Whew! PT was actually kind of nice because I got to relax while they were heating me up and icing me. She also recommended a patella knee strap so I bought one of those on the way home. I think I've stumped her a bit because normally this stupid knee problem can be cured with PT and yet, mine still hurts!
So after a totally exhausting day I came home to a sneak peek of my engagement photos from my amazing photographer!!! These are my two favorites:
And...
Haha, don't we look fake in that second one? There are tons of other great ones. To see a few more go to my photographer's blog. These totally made my Monday!

Now I am going to go figure out what I am going to do with my kiddos at work tomorrow and set up my training plan for the week. Luckily it will be a short one because of July 4th!

5 day vaca = over!

I'm back from my whirlwind trip to NYC! We left yesterday morning at 9 am and got back today around 3:30! It was a ton of fun, but absolutely exhausting. It was my best friend's bachelorette party so we did the Sex and the City bus tour in the afternoon. I do occasionally watch the show but usually On Demand while working out, so my trivia is pretty bad. It was still cool to get more of a sense of the city as a whole by riding around on a bus. I have been to New York City four times before this, but I felt like I saw more of it this time because of the tour. Plus we got to try Magnolia's cupcakes which were delicious. Unfortunately I was too busy enjoying every delicious bite of cupcake to remember to take a picture. After a fun dinner at a yummy Italian restaurant called Carbone's, we went out for a night on the town. It was really fun, but let me tell you- I couldn't be happier than bars close in Boston at 2 am...I can't handle the NYC life! We stayed out until FOUR, which could very well be the latest I've ever been at a bar, and let's be honest- I go to bed by 10 most nights, so this was CRAZY for me. If any of this post makes no sense at all, I blame it on my late bedtime last night! This is a picture of me and my fantastic college roommates (minus one whom we missed a lot!). From left, Ash (my direct roommate for all four years), me, Katie- the bride!, Linda and Cristina. Love seeing these girls!!!
And another from later in the night. We forgot to take another 11b picture, but at least I'm not wearing the "Bride to Be" crown that I acquired later in the night.
So now that we are home I have to start up my new summer job tomorrow, ugh!!! I know I am going to be exhausted (have you ever noticed that you are sometimes more tired two days after a late night?), but the good news is the night before I started this same job last year my flight from San Francisco was delayed and I got home at 3 am, woke up at 5- so I figure the first day this year can't be as bad as that. Someday I will start this job fully rested and ready to go. After my job tomorrow I am tutoring two kids (one new one, which is exciting) and then I have a PT appointment. My knee is back to hurting again after walking and dancing around NYC. Ash decided I need to try some serious round the clock Advil for a week to see if that will help with inflammation. This idea sounds much easier to me than the don't work out at all and do crazy amounts of PT exercises, stretches and icing that has been provided to me before so I am going to try it. If she's right about this, I'm hiring her and Eric as my doctors and getting rid of my regular primary care. Hey, in a year she will be an official doctor and she gives me more than 5 seconds of her time, so it couldn't be too bad.
I am NOT looking forward to starting work tomorrow but I am excited to get back on a normal eating routine, my stomach has not been enjoying all this traveling, constant snacking and eating out! Tonight Eric, Ash and I cooked some chicken and potatoes on the grill. Even though the weather does NOT seem like summer at all, the grill makes it feel like summer. Plus I love how you can cook things really plain on the grill but it still has a delicious flavor.

Anyway, I have to go figure out what I am going to teach the kiddos tomorrow and then early to bed. If I have any energy left at all after tomorrow I'll post tomorrow night. I hope everyone had a great weekend!

Getting Geared Up for a Fun Weekend!

Good morning. Thank you all so much for your insight into my many different outfits! Although I ultimately liked all of the outfits, I ended up picking the #1 & 2, pinkish purple shirt and I wore it with BOTH the jean capris and the white capris since everyone was pretty divided on which looked better. I brought both the black dress (the last one) and the blue one (the second to last one) but I ended up only wearing the black dress because I was pretty sick of changing! I am looking forward to wearing the two blue dresses to upcoming summer events because I love them both. I also brought my red sox shirt for a couple of pictures since we want our engagement party to have a red sox theme to it :) It was a lot of fun taking all the pictures but it was so exhausting!!! I don't think I could ever be a model (haha, of course there are a lot of other reasons I couldn't be a model as well!). I will definitely post the pictures for all to see once I have them :)

In other wonderful news, my knee is REALLY starting to feel better. Yayyyyy!!!! I have been doing my PT exercises and stretches like a crazy person and I can feel my legs getting a lot stronger (one good thing to come out of this). However, it has definitely taken doing NOTHING to get my knee to this point. I haven't run in 4 weeks, swam in over a week and biked since last Saturday. Since Saturday all I have been doing is push up/sit up challenge, PT exercises and stretches- that is all. I got up this morning to do to the YMCA to swim. I drove all the way there (it's about 20 minutes away), paid my $5 (you still have to pay if you are a member of a Boston YMCA- boo), and then come to discover the pool is closed until Sunday!!! I tried not to be too mad about it, since it's probably a sign that I should continue to rest and let my knee have a serious break. HOWEVER, if you are going to close a pool at the YMCA, at the very least put it up on your website. I checked the website last night for lap swimming hours and there was nothing at all about the pool being closed. I'm fine with not swimming today, but I would've prefered not to drive 40 minutes for no reason. I did pick Eric up an iced coffee on the way home, so I guess it wasn't all wasted- but seriously. And fortunately they did give me my $5 back.

Today we are driving home from the Cape to pick up Ash from the airport. You may remember (if you are a frequent reader) that Ash is my 4 year roommate from college, and she came to visit a few weeks ago. Normally I don't get visits from her this much because she lives in Chicago but she has had wedding fesitivities in Boston so I benefit. This weekend we are driving down to New York City together for Katie's Bachelorette Party!!!!!! I am the maid of honor in Katie's August wedding and we have been planning this bachelorette party for a long time so I think it's going to be a ton of fun. I have never actually been to a bachelorette party (I know the wedding crazyness really hit me all at once) but I can already tell I am going to like them a lot better than bridal showers, ha ha. Ash is staying with me until Tuesday and my summer job starts bright and early on Monday morning (in fact, I honestly don't know exactly what time it starts- I should probably figure that out huh?). Therefore, my posts might be a little few and far between for the next few days. But I will have lots to report when I return and hopefully I'll be back in the bike & swim grove with no knee pain by then :)

Oh, and one more thing. Part of starting my summer schedule next week means that on Monday and Wednesdays (and a few Tuesdays) I will be going from one job that ends at 12:30 to another that begins at 1:00. It takes 20 minutes to drive between the two, and about five to walk to my car at job #1. Therefore, I will have to eat lunch on the go, literally- in the car. So, I am on the search for any lunch ideas you have that I can eat in the car. My only idea so far is to bake a batch of healthy muffins and eat one of those maybe with some Cheerios or pretzels. Any other ideas or healthy muffin recipes?

Fashion Show!!!

Okay everyone, tomorrow Eric and I are taking our engagement photos tomorrow evening. I just decided yesterday to start figuring out what I am going to wear for them. This meant that I forced Eric to stop at the outlets on the way down to the Cape today. Then I forced him to take pictures of me in each possible outfit so you guys can help me decide what to wear. Yup, he loves me right now.
So here are the options. My goal is to narrow it down to 3 if at all possible. We will be taking one final set of pictures with jeans and Red Sox shirts for our engagement party invitations. So this will mean 4 outfits total. Hopefully that's not too many :) Sorry in advance about my clear lack of effort on my hair and no make up what so ever. I promise not to look so washed out tomorrow (oh and I'm hoping to get a small bit of a tan before this as well). Okay so here they go:

Outfit 1:


Outfit 2: (same shirt, white capris this time)
Outfit 3: (same jean capris as #1, new shirt)


Outfit 4: (white capris, new shirt)

Outfit 5: (white capris, new shirt)


Outfit 6: Dress time!


Outfit 7:

Outfit 8:


I have some favorites in mind, but I'm interested to hear what everyone else thinks. I'd like to go to at least 1 dress and at least one shirt/capri combo. So, which ones do you like the best?

Light from Within

STOP RAINING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Sorry. I am just so sick of raining I might cry.

But actually I'm in a shockingly positive mood. Well, probably it's positive because tomorrow is my last day of school and then I have the rest of the week off before my summer job officially begins. I have big plans to hang out with friends from work tomorrow night, chill at the Cape with Eric for the rest of the week and then go to NYC on Saturday for a fabulous bachelorette party. So basically despite the rain, I am very happy right now.

Today was the end of the year concert, kindergarten slideshow and then "picnic"- of course this year the rain did not make for much of a picnic, but oh well. At least all of that is over, so all I have to get through is a half day with the kids and then cleaning up the room (which I am mostly going to make the kiddos do anyways).

As for triathlon training, things are up and down for me right now. As of this weekend I was thinking I should not do it at all. I was also going to stop swimming and biking for a bit to see if that helped my knee. Now today, I am really doing well with my PT exercises and I am just not ready to give up yet. I was thinking that there is no way I could bust out a 5k after swimming and biking without training, but now I am thinking that the worse thing that happens is I have to walk. Yes, I probably will then finish last but at this point I'd just be happy to be able to do it, even if I am last. I'm not saying I am definitely going to do the triathlon, but I am going to go with option #2 (I think it was #2...the one where I continue to train and see how things get a bit closer). Of course I say a bit closer like there is not only 3 weeks left! So that is where I stand right now. Thanks everyone for the advice on what you think I should do, I think the general consensus was to keep training, but be careful and I think that is ultimately what I am planning to do.

On one final note of excitement, last night we went to my parents house for Father's Day and my mom's birthday (which is tomorrow). I forgot that we hadn't really gotten around to celebrating my birthday because of my brother's graduation and an overall crazy month of June. My mom surprised me with a very KELLY cake.
As we all know I have lots of annoying dietary restrictions and one of them is I cannot really eat cake. Sure I have a bite here and there, but if I eat a whole piece of cake I feel very sick after. One thing I can eat is Edy's 1/2 the fat ice cream. So my mom found an Edy's ice cream called "Take the Cake" and molded it into a cake shape. We found these awesome candles at Christmas Tree Shop on Memorial Day weekend but I actually thought I had the one that said my name- apparently not though because it was sitting on top of my awesome cake. I ate almost the whole thing and it was absolutely amazing (don't worry, there was a normal cake for everyone else).

I leave you with... "People are like stained glass windows. They sparkle and shine when the sun is out, but when the darkness sets in, their true beauty is revealed only if there is light from within." I know it's a bit dramatic, but I need some light from within right now, because there certainly is not any outside. I hope it's sunny and beautiful where you are! (and also, can you tell me where you are so I can get there?)

Beautiful View, Yummy Breakfast

Good morning all! It's rainy again here but I am in a great mood because I only have to make it through 2 days of school this week and then I have my very short summer vacation until my job starts next Monday. I made it through the bridal shower yesterday and it was a lot better than I expected. It was in a gorgeous location in Mattapoisett.
That's the view from the porch where the shower was held. Gorgeous. It was quite a hike to get down there, but it was also interesting because I went through a lot of towns that I had heard of, but never knew where they were. Not as interesting on the way home but that's why I called Jen and she entertained me for that part of the trip :) The bridal party did a beautiful job with the shower as well, and they did serve alcohol- yes!!! Also, I had thought I was only going to know the bride and one of the bridesmaids (who I figured would be busy with her duties) but when I got there I remembered that she invited a girl who worked with her a few years ago, and I knew a little bit when she still worked at our school. We sat together and chatted the whole shower so that was really good. Also, Mel did an AWESOME job speeding through presents. It was not a long process at all, even though there were a ton of people there. And finally, Mel's best friend from work who is one of her bridesmaids (Erin) made an adorable video of Melanie's students giving her "advice" for being married. HILARIOUS. One of the little girls who I had in my poetry class said "When you get married, you should tell each other everything you have done before you met each other" haha- WHERE would a kindergartner get that idea?!? So funny. One of the other kids said, "Love is when you kiss on the lips...EWWW" and then burst into giggles. That was definitely hilarious. So, here are a few more pictures- me and the future bride, aka my classroom neighbor :)
And Erin's beautiful centerpieces. I really may have to hire her to do my wedding.

This morning I woke up, did not feel like swimming at all, so I decided to make myself a really yummy different breakfast. I got the idea from Nutritious is Delicious and changed the recipe a bit so that I could eat all the ingredients without hurting my yummy (and what I happened to have in the house). I used:
1/4 cup of flour
2 tablespoons of oatmeal
1/4 cup of soy milk
1 egg white
1 teaspoon of baking powder
1 teaspoon of sugar
1 teaspoon of cinnamon
*Mix all together, put in a pan (I sprayed the pan with Pam first). Place pan on stove. Cook one side, then add some sliced bananas. Turn over to brown the other side. Then I spread some almond butter across the top.
It came out delicious. It was fun to have something besides oatmeal for breakfast (even though I do love my oatmeal!). You can also see I was lucky enough to get to keep one of the centerpieces from the shower yesterday and it is now the centerpiece on my dining room table :) I usually eat in the living room but with such beautiful flowers on the table I decided I would actually eat there!

Today is going to be a busy day. It's my best friend's birthday, but I don't get to see her but I will be calling her AND next weekend is her bachelorette party, yay! It's also Father's Day obviously, so I have to finish up my gift to my Dad (and it also works as my mom's birthday present which is in 2 days). I made them a DVD picture slideshow of our family trips to Ireland and San Francisco. Eric and I are going to run some errands today and buy more presents for people (something about June I feel like all I have been doing is buying presents!). I still need to get presents for my classroom aide, my 2 room parents and we need to get Eric's dad a B-day and Father's Day present. Then, we are going to go visit his Dad and go eat dinner at my parents house. It feels good to know that everything is basically done for work though so I can focus on seeing people I want to today :) I hope everyone has a great Sunday!

Saturday Ramblings

Good morning everybody! I am exhausted today because for some weird reason I could not sleep last night. For normal people this would not be bad since I didn't have to wake up this morning, but of course my internal clock went off at 6:30 and I tossed and turned until 7 and then just got up. I'm glad it's the weekend though.

Last night I had a retirement party for a teacher at my school who has worked there for 30 years! Wow! This guy is a fabulous teacher. It was quite an inspiring party because he is the type of teacher that you want to be like. If only I could stop being driven crazy by kids, I swear I'd be that type of teacher, haha. I need some more patience.

On Thursday night Eric and I hit up our favorite hole in the wall Chinese restaurant. Normally I do not eat leftovers because I figure I shouldn't have unhealthy food multiple times in a row. This time I really wanted leftovers so I decided to add some summer squash and mushrooms to make my leftovers healthier. Made for a delicious lunch :)
Yesterday I also tested out my newly improved work out space. Eric got me a TV for the treadmill room for my birthday and it's all set up and ready. I can't run still, so I decided to walk on the treadmill.
This morning Caroline and I went for a bike ride. I was struggling a bit because of the lack of sleep last night. We biked for 58 minutes and did 12.46 miles. So that's about an average of 12 miles per hour...too lazy to do the math out. That basically means that even though I felt like I was barely moving, we were going about the same speed we have been doing on our other rides.

So the triathlon I was supposed to be training for is less than a month away and I have no idea what to do. I can't tell if PT is helping or not, I thought it definitely wasn't but it does seem to be improving a little bit. So the way I see it I have a couple of options from here:

1. Give up on doing a triathlon in July immediately. If I do this, I will probably take a few weeks off biking as well and see if that helps. I don't know what cardio I will do?

2. Continue to train biking and swimming and see how the knee is a couple of weeks before so I can maybe start running again and still do it.

3. Continue training biking and swimming and start running again. I know this seems like a bad idea, but I would obviously be very careful about it. Plus if stopping running is not helping at all, what's the point?

Would love to hear any opinions on which of these you think I should do. I have a ridiculously long car ride today by myself to think about that, 3 hours total for a bridal shower. I don't think I've ever mentioned on this blog before but I am not a fan of bridal showers. I know girl time is important in life, but so many of my friends are not friends with each other, I'd appreciate being able to bring Eric so I know one person. Plus, that would make this car ride a lot less painful! The other thing I don't like is that they don't tend to have alcohol at them. Now I actually don't drink a lot at ALL, but if I have to go to a party where I don't know anyone- at least give me a glass of wine. That doesn't even begin to touch on how boring it is to watch people open presents haha. But, the girl who this bridal shower is for has definitely helped me get through 3 years of teaching kindergarten, so she deserves an hour and a half commute there and back. I am sure she'd do it for me. Plus she hates bridal showers too haha, so at least I know she is not enjoying torturing me. She promises to have an assembly line for the present opening so things move quickly, but at a 120 person shower, who knows!
I'll be back tonight or tomorrow, have a great weekend :)

Wacky Wednesday

I had a great swimming work out this morning. I was at the Y and the Master's swim team work out was on the white board so I thought I'd try it out. Turns out I completely forgot how to do the butterfly stroke since I was in middle school. Also, I should never do the back stroke while sharing a lane. Plus I could not make it through all the laps they were supposed to do. It was not a total failure though because it changed things up and a bit and made me go at least a few extra laps.

I had a PT appointment this afternoon and I convinced her to tape my knee, we will see if it helps. Also, my kiddos were amazing today! They must have known I was looking for new jobs online while they were at gym. I rewarded them with a run through the sprinkler at the end of the day and a ton of extra recess. According to the 10 day forecast it is going to rain every day for the next 10 days. If that happens, I may cry.

Since it's hump day I decided to do one of these fabulous surveys. I used to do these in high school when you e-mail them to everyone. I don't know why I love them but I do. And it's not just that I enjoy talking about myself, I genuinely enjoy reading other people's! I got this from Carissa's blog.

What is your current obsession? Blogs! I have a majorly obsessive personality, I am always obsessed with something, usually computer related.

What is your weirdest obsession? Probably the color pink. I know it doesn't sound that weird but I make some irrational decisions based on things being pink. For example, I'll buy something not as good because it is pink haha.

Starbucks or Peet’s? Starbucks

What’s for dinner? Tonight I actually had oatmeal because we had a breakfast at work today and I don't do a day without oatmeal (okay and I had no food at the house). Normally I try to have chicken or fish, potato, rice or pasta, some kind of veggie...

What would you eat for your last meal? Ooo! Since it's my last meal I don't have to worry about my stomach at all, or getting fat (ha ha!). So, lets see a lobster roll on San Francisco sour dough bread with a LOT of pringles. Since it's my last meal, I think I'll eat even more...chicken with mashed potatoes (and these would have TONS of butter on them). I would finish it up with some dessert, probably Coldstone Cake Batter Ice Cream. Or maybe even an ice cream cake. Can you tell my stomach issues have deprived me a bit?

What was the last thing you bought? It was a present so I can't tell you at the moment. The last thing I bought for myself was my running Garmin.

What are you listening to right now? The Red Sox game on TV

What is your favorite ice cream flavor? Cake batter or Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough
What do you think of the person(s) who tagged you? Actually I just found her blog today via Amber's blog and so far I really like it. She didn't actually tag me, she said she was tagging anyway one wanted to do it haha.

If you could go anywhere in the world for the next hour, where would you go? Probably Australia and visit with my friend Kirst who I met while I was studying abroad there. I may consider going somewhere I've never been...so maybe she'd meet me in Fiji?

Which language do you want to learn? Practically definitely either Korean or Chinese since tons of my students speak those two languages. However, I suck at languages so there is no chance of me learning a language with a different alphabet. I think Spanish would be good or Italian.

What is your favorite quote (for now)? I am a huge quote person, I don't think I could pick just one. Maybe, "Remember, no man is a failure who has friends."

What is your favorite color? Bright pink and green.

What is your favorite piece of clothing in your own wardrobe? Big fan of this dress at the moment, but I'm basically in love with any dress I have that is comfy.


What is your dream job? I debate about this a lot. Every job has down sides. I think I'd be a writer of some sort though. Or maybe a teacher with a PERFECT class every year. Hey, they said dream...

What is your worst habit? Eric says leaving a trail of Cheerios every where I go. I also pick at my nails which is not great either.

If you had $100 now, what would you spend it on? Either a really nice dinner, a new bag ( I love bags) or a new dress.

Do you admire any one’s style? Lots of people...can't think of any to name though.

Describe your personal style. I would say a bit preppy, casual, PINK. I mostly shopping at The Limited, Ann Taylor Loft, Express...

What are you going to do after this? Read some more blogs and then go to bed.

What are your favorite movies? Love Actually, and any and all chick flicks

What is your favorite fruit? probably strawberries, but my stomach prefers mango and bananas.

What inspires you? People who overcome a lot and still have a positive attitude, teachers who work hard to reach every child in their classroom

What is your favorite book? I can't think of a favorite. Right now I am really into Jodi Picoult books. My favorite by her in The Pact but that book also made me really sad so I am glad they are not all as intense as that.

Do you collect something? Haha, maybe purses.

What is your favorite smell? The smell of food cooking

What are you most proud of? Being only 25, 3 years out of college, I have: got a full time teaching job, received tenure!, and got my masters in reading. Can you be proud of being engaged to the best guy in the universe? Or is that considered a matter of luck? I also think I have surrounded myself with really supportive, amazing friends and family members- but again, this could also be seen as luck.

How many times do you press the snooze button before you get up? NEVER! I hate the snooze button. If I can sleep later, I'll just set my alarm for later. Once I get woken up, I am up.

Cats or dogs? Dogs- but to be honest, I'm not really a huge animal person. Don't tell the little second grader I tutor, she loves animals and I am fooling her well!


Complete the following: Love is…when you don't mind farting in front of each other :)

What do you like best about yourself (can be a physical characteristic and/or a personality trait)? Isn't it funny how much easier it is to think of bad things, when in reality I actually like MUCH more about myself than I don't like. I like that I am a very hard worker. I like that I can get along with almost everyone. I like my curly hair (almost always).

What do you dislike about yourself? I've become too structure oriented. I used to be much more flexible. If something changes unexpectedly, I want to be able to roll with it. I also seriously dislike my stomach.

Okay, I am officially tagging anyone who would like to do this. If you do it, please leave a comment so I know to go read your blog (since I mentioned I love reading these). Also, when you do it, you can add one question to the end :)

Starting to Enjoy Biking...

I didn’t blog yesterday because I have been in a very bad mood for the past few days. I hate blogging when I am in a bad mood because I feel like I am just complaining! My bad mood was caused by a combination of kids driving me crazy!!!!!! (teachers out there- do you ever REALLY hate your job, because sometimes I do…and I don’t know if that’s a bad sign) and the fact that my knee is hurting more now that I have started doing all of this stuff and I’m just so frustrated with having yet another illness (or injury) where doctors really have no idea what they are talking about and just want you to try this, try that, and nothing will really help. I might not mind this so much but this is what I’ve been dealing with for my stomach for three years and frankly, I’m sick of it. End complaints here.

Anyway, in typical Kelly fashion I have taken it upon myself to try something new- a knee brace. When it comes to medical issues/injuries I am very big on logic. If my patella is out of line, it makes sense that keeping it in line would be helpful. So I used my knee brace for the first time tonight while going on a bike ride with my sister. I did the same bike ride as Saturday, and went slightly quicker (11.9 mph on Saturday, 12.4 tonight). I also decided not to bike up my giant hill today even though I can now do it, because I'm afraid that might be pissing off my knee as well. Then I came home, did my stretches and just finished icing my knee. Too early to tell if the knee brace helped at all but I definitely hope so! I am going to ask my PT tomorrow about taping because Caitlin was diagnosed with the same thing as me and that's what they have her doing- AND they told her she can run! So I want that doctor!!!

In other good news, my neck did not bother me at all when we biked today and my hand did not fall asleep at all. Thanks you guys for all your advice. I changed up my hands as much as I could and tried to keep my neck and back straight. I'm not going to lie, my crotch still hurts...but it does seem to hurt slightly less every time so there is definitely hope that I will bike pain free very soon. Biking is definitely growing on me more and more every day. I genuinely think that even when I can run again I'll still make as much time as I can for biking. Thanks again for all the biking support, it has certainly been a learning experience and I'm sure it's not over yet!

Sunday Eats

Even though I have a bit of "food blogger" in me, I don't usually post what I eat every meal because frankly- I eat the same thing all the time. You would be incredibly bored reading the same thing every day! But every once in awhile I try some new items, so I am going to try to do a full day food post every once in awhile. Today is the lucky day! Keep in mind that because of my stomach I avoid too much insoluble fiber- which is actually great for most everyone else. So if you are wondering where my veggies are- I swear I am trying!
Breakfast: Kelly's Fabulous Everyday Oatmeal
1/2 cup of Quaker Old Fashioned Oats
1/4 cup of raspberries
1 cut up apple
lots of cinnamon :)

Snack: Pretzels

Lunch: 1/2 cup of Trader Joe's Greek Yogurt (plain)
1/4 cup of strawberries
1 pita
1 tablespoon of raw almond butter

Snack: Green Monster!
1/2 a frozen banana
1 cup frozen mango
1 cup soymilk
1/2 cup of spinach

Dinner: 1/2 cup of couscous
1/4 cup pinto beans
1/4 cup chopped tomatoes
1/4 cup chopped carrots
3 grilled scallops

Dessert:
My FREE birthday Coldstone Cake Batter Ice Cream with Butterfinger Mixed in. Join Coldstone's Birthday Club and you will get a free coupon for an ice cream when it is your birthday!

Overall my food today was yummy, particularly that yummy Coldstone ice cream. I was not a huge fan of my dinner. I'm not sure if I just don't like couscous (I haven't had it in years!) or if the tomato/couscous combo was not good. But needless to say, I think I will eat the rest of my scallops tomorrow with sweet potato french fries instead. Plus Eric made a ridiculously nice smelling tomato sauce tonight that I will have to enjoy sometime this week.

In training news I went swimming today. I did 30 laps or 750 yards. Not horrible but I have to get my butt to the pool more often so I can build up some endurance. I am starting to worry about the "open water" aspect of the triathlon- I really need my little "break" at the wall every 25 yards! I still have some biking questions, so if you bike at all please check out my biking questions from yesterday :) I also bought myself a knee brace today. The doctor and PT did not tell me to get it, but if my body is not holding my patella in the right spot, logically I think I should help it along! I am going to wear it for my first time on Tuesday for a bike ride so I'll let you know how it goes. Basically, my knee is still bothering me even after just biking so I am looking for a solution other than giving up biking. I REALLY don't want to have to give up running AND biking. Ah!

On a completely random note- Eric and I are planning a trip to Washington DC for the beginning of August. We are debating between two hotels- one is near the Capitol and one is near the Dupont Circle Metro Stop. Does anyone live or visit DC often? I think anywhere near the Metro would probably be okay...but would one of these be a lot better than the other?

Detox Day

Whew! I am exhausted. Now that I am 25, I find it much harder to drink and stay out late multiple nights in a row. Just kidding, I found it difficult at 24 too...and probably always. The Brad Paisley concert last night was a ton of fun. I love hanging out with Eric's brothers...it's always crazy fun debauchery and a million funny stories always come of it.

Today I had to recover from the past two nights. I'm a total wimp when it comes to losing my sleep. I woke up this morning and made myself a nice giant bowl of oatmeal with raspberries and apples. This always settles my stomach no matter how mean I have been to it (well, within reason, but I wasn't that mean to it). Then I went for a nice long bike ride with my sister again. I'm a little bummed that my summer weekends are going to be really crazy and probably not allow for a lot of sister bike rides. I tried out my new Garmin today so I could tell Caroline how far we were going and how long we had been biking for. We were a little slower than last week, but I blame it on the fact that it was the first nice day in nearly a week so everyone was on the bike path this morning.
So, we went 13.39 miles (well actually that's how far I went, Caroline and I have to meet in the center of town so our mileage is a little off). It took me 1 hour and 8 minutes. That pace on the side was my current pace as I was taking the picture, not my average for the whole time haha. When I was going fast it said my pace was about a 4 minute mile, so that's pretty good. But like I said, there were definitely some slow parts. Overall it was a great bike ride.

I have some questions for the bikers out there who read my blog. I just learned how to work my bike pump today so I clearly still have a lot to learn.

1. This is more of a plead than a question- Please tell me I am going to get used to this bike seat. It's so painful! This is going to be too much info, but it literally hurts when I come home and pee!

2. This week my neck really hurt after I rode. This did not happen last week. Am I sitting wrong? Maybe hunching forward too much?

3. How can I keep my hand from falling asleep? For some reason my left hand always falls asleep at about mile 6.

When I got home, I did my knee stretches. I thought I'd share them with everyone because I wish I had been doing them long before I hurt my knee!

1. Calf Stretch
2. Hamstring Stretch
3. IT Band Stretch- I realize it's impossible to see what I am actually doing in this picture. Basically you cross one leg in front of the other, bending the front knee a little bit. Keep your back leg straight. Then reach your opposite arm across to touch the back leg. This stretch also works your hamstring.
4. Quad Stretch- This is like the normal quad stretch where you told your leg, but I am resting my leg on my dining room chair because it's better for your knees.

I am supposed to be doing these stretches twice per day, holding each side for 30 seconds. The 30 seconds is the biggest thing for me. I was RARELY ever holding any stretch for 30 seconds. Even now, I have to check my watch to make sure I really hold it because when I do what I think is 30 seconds, it's usually about 10 or 15. No wonder I am so tight!

I also have my new favorite torture device foam roller that helps me loosen up as well.
It looks small and not intimidating, but do not let looks fool you, it hurts a LOT. But I figure it's all worth it in the end if I can run without my knee hurting a lot. So far I am not seeing a huge improvement in my knee pain, so hopefully that is going to come soon. Anyway, I know it's about 9:30 on a Saturday night but I think I am going to call it a night- I told you I was a total wimp with no sleep! I hope everyone is having a great weekend so far.

Shoulda Woulda Coulda

Today I gave myself one final birthday present. I told Eric last night I have to stop giving myself birthday presents because I already bought myself a bike and a garmin, along with all the other gifts I got from others :) However, this is my one final gift to myself. What is it, you ask? Well, I'll give you a clue. It's 9:10 am and I am blogging, so what did I skip today? WORK! wooooooo!

I know, I know, school is out in less than 2 weeks, couldn't I just push through? The answer is no. This year I only have 3 days off between my job and my summer job, and it just so happened that fun things I wanted to do were last night and today/tonight so I decided to take my second personal day ever in three years of teaching. Not a horrible record I don't think. I love the kiddos (usually) but sometimes Ms. RedSoxCap has to have a life!

Last night I began the celebration with my first ever Red Sox vs. Yankees game!!! And what a game to go to! The Sox were ahead, then they were behind...then....
the RALLY caps came out!!! Don't mind Eric's absolutely ridiculous face in this picture haha. Also, take note of my winter jacket and scarf, thank you mother nature for making it freezing in the middle of June. Anyway, the Sox came back to win it and it was a blast to watch. And for once I didn't even mind that Red Sox/Yankees games go way longer than any other game because I wasn't going to work in the morning!

Also on tap for my day off- finally getting my hair highlighted. My roots are getting ridiculous but I haven't had a spare minute for the long process that is dealing with my hair. Then, heading down to Mansfield MA for the Brad Paisley concert. Hopefully we are going to get some serious tailgating in, but the rain of this week doesn't seem to be cooperating with my plans to have nothing but fun!

No worries though. I have a lot of serious work/training on tap for the weekend. I am going to finish my slideshow for my kids, go on a long bike ride with my sis, and blog about knee stretches and my new torture device- oh sorry I mean "foam roller." I also have a ton of errands too. Does anyone else feel like their life is sometimes taken over by errands? No sooner have I made the trek to Target that I think of another thing I need there a few days later and I have to go back. Then I remember, oh wait I need to go to the bank, and the pharmacy etc etc etc. This must happen to others besides me. Is it a girl thing? Because I swear Eric does not seem to ever have as many errands as me. I swear I don't do them for him! Maybe he just doesn't complain about them as much? That's a definite possibility. Anyway, enough rambling about errands and time to go actually do some of them. I hope everyone has a great Friday and a good start to the weekend. Cross your fingers no rain for me!

Sweet Potato Risotto- Delish.

Happy Hump Day! Considering my record for this week, I'd say it's time for the school year to be over:

Number of Kids I've Made Cry: 3
Number of Parents I've Made Cry: 2
Number of Kids I've Sent to the Principal: 2

So basically successful week all around.
Plus they basically told me that PT that if I don't give my knee "a long time" without running, it's just going to come back when I start running again. I was kind of hoping to start next week or so, but they basically laughed at me. I am going to keep triathlon training (biking and swimming) because those are good for my knee anyway, but I think it's unlikely I'll be able to do the July one. Boo.

In good news, Eric and I decided to take on the 100 Push Up Challenge and 200 Sit Up Challenge. It wasn't too shocking but I was pretty bad at both of these on my initial test. I got 20 Push Ups and 30 Sit Ups. Of course gym teacher Eric made sure I was touching my thighs with my elbows on my sit ups and as a result I was in the "POOR" performance category- go me! I'll keep you updated on how this goes. Has anyone done it? I find it a little hard to believe that I'll ever be doing 100 push ups and 200 sit ups, but hey!

Finally, the Sweet Potato Risotto Recipe, created by Eric!
Ingredients:
1 1/2 cups of Arborio Rice
1 1/2 boxes of chicken stock
1-2 sweet potatoes
1 onion
olive oil
1 tsp garlic
1/2 cup of white wine

Directions:

1. Place 1 ½ boxes of chicken stock or beef stock in a pan and heat over low to medium low heat.

2. Cube 1-2 sweet potatoes into about ½ inch cubes after peeling the potatoes.

3. Finely dice 1 yellow onion finely

4. Coat bottom of large skillet or sauce pan with olive oil

5. Sautee cubed sweet potato until the pieces are caramelized and look a medium golden brown color and add a pinch of salt.

6. Pull potato pieces off and put them in a bowl for later

7. Lightly coat pan again with olive oil and add onions and a pinch of salt at the start. Sautee until they are almost see through

8. Add 1 teaspoon of garlic and cook until golden

9. Add rice on top of garlic and onions and toast until you smell a nutty smell (should not be really brown but maybe a light gold brown color).

10. Pour ½ cup of white wine (I usually use pinot grigio) into the pan and stir into rice onion and garlic mixture.

11. When the wine is absorbed and the rice starts to moisten add 1-2 ladles full of the warm stock and continue stirring.

12. Keep stirring until rice becomes thick enough that it will not run back together when you stir and then add another ladle to a ladle and a half. Keep doing this until all the stock is gone and the rice is plum and has a soft texture with a little bite.

13. The risotto should be thicker than a soup but still runny.


Optional: Add a tablespoon of butter and ½ cup of parmigiano reggiano cheese and stir in until it is melted (I don't do this step).

Season with salt and pepper as needed.

Enjoy :)

Congrats Jake!

I have to start by saying a great big Congratulations to my little bro who graduated from high school on Sunday!!!
I look a little unhappy about the sun in this picture, but Jake looks snazzy in that cap and gown, huh? I am very proud of the last member of the Winn fam to graduate from LHS!!! For those of you who have not had the experience of my high school I will say, it is no easy task to make it out of this place alive. And Jake has made it through with style (and many ridiculous adventures). I can only imagine what college will be like for him. But as long as he is safe and happy, I will be too.

It's that time of the school year again where I start to get all my pictures together to put together a slide show of all of our pictures from the year. I just spent the past 3 hours organizing pictures, figuring out how to add music and then watching the slide show as it is now. In one of the pictures, you can see RIGHT up one of my girl's skirts- so obviously I need to take that one OUT. Of course now I can't find it, so I am going to have to watch the whole 20 minutes again to try to find it. I was going to keep working on it tonight until I finish it, but when I was googling song lyrics to find one more song for the slide show, all of a sudden porn pictures started flashing all over my screen. At that point I decided to take a break for a day or two and come back to it.
So now here I am watching the Red Sox and blogging. I am supposed to be going to the game on Thursday, so I hope the weather people are all wrong about it raining all week :)

I went to my second spin class this morning! I am a true expert now. Okay fine maybe not quite, but I felt a little less lost about the whole "take it up to 5, now 6!" talk. I did get slightly more bored today, but I think part of the problem is the GIANT clock at the front of the room. I cannot avoid looking at it, which makes time go by SO much slower. When I was doing yoga last summer I used to position myself so that it was near impossible to see the clock. I like to be able to look at it once or twice during the class, but staring at it is basically like slow torture for me. Still love spinning though, and it's going to be my new best friend this week because of all the rain!

I think I was doing reasonably well with the whole "no running" thing, however I am starting to get bored, annoyed and anxious!

Bored- of doing everything except running!
Annoyed- that everything else seems to take so much more effort to actually do than running (as in I actually have to drive my butt to the gym at 5:30 am instead of just running out the door or hopping on my treadmill)
Anxious- that my training plan says I should be running 4-5 miles and I am not running at all. How am I going to be able to do the running part of this triathlon?!

I am going to ask at Physical Therapy tomorrow how much longer I have to "rest". My knee does appear to be improving a bit, but I'm not sure if it's mainly because I am not running or because it is actually getting better and I can maybe run again. There should be a rule of the world that if you are willing to put in the effort and do exercise, you will not get injured!

For tonight I have to go because my mom has decided to call to discuss wedding dresses (which is probably my least favorite topic when I am exhausted and stressed at 8:45 at night), but coming up in Kelly's blogland: Sweet Potato Risotto Recipe created by my amazing chef fiance Eric and Kelly's stretches to keep your knee injury free so you don't end up like me!

Quarter of a Century Old!

If this post makes no sense, I blame it on how exhausted I am right now. But I really wanted to post so the blogger will say "June 7th" because today is my birthday : )

Yesterday was an amazing day. It started with a bike ride in my new HOT bike shorts.
You laugh now, but trust me my butt never would've made it through my ride on my new bike without those shorts on. My new bike was absolutely amazing, I loved every minute of it, except for the butt pain. That is going to have to go.

I will say though, I had a biking buddy again this week (my sister Caroline, yay!) and we did in less than an hour, what it took Ash and I a LOT longer to do last week. I'd blame it on the mountain bike but Caroline still has one, so maybe I am just slow on a mountain bike. I've said it before and I'll say it again, biking is SOOOOOO much better with a buddy. I'm so glad Caroline is home from college for the summer so I can harass her into bike riding often (and steal her clothes occasionally!). Well plus I get to hang out with her more, which is also fun!

The bike ride made me a lot more confident about the biking portion of the triathlon. I easily could've gone for a run after yesterdays ride, except for that I'm not allowed to run. Glad to be confident about biking as my running ability slips away...

After the bike ride, I got all showered and ready for KELLY FEST.
Yup, it was a party held in my honor to celebrate: my birthday (25 today!), getting my master's and getting engaged (6 months ago, but it hasn't been formally celebrated yet!). The host was my best friend Katie who I have mentioned before. I know everyone probably thinks their own best friend is the best best friend there is, but I can promise you that I would win the contest if their was an impartial judge. In fact, I personally think that I would win the contest that ALL my friends are the best friends there are. The great thing about Katie is, I am the kind of person who would definitely feel bad that someone worked that hard to get in touch with everyone, organize, plan, cook, buy food etc for a party just for me. But with Katie, she just has a way of making it seem like there is nothing in the world she would rather be doing than baking me a cake, facebook messaging all my friends and cleaning her apartment for a party. I'm sure she was probably quite stressed about it, but all week she kept telling me HOW excited she was. She even baked me this absolutely crazy fun cake that I had no idea how to cut :)
It was even delicious too! She also had a beautiful spread of food, including little notes about which chips were my favorite and which were Eric's :)
And...Gerry (another amazing friend of mine) got us pink and green (my FAVORITE colors) m&ms (definitely my top candy at the moment) that said our names on them!!!! I ate too many of these.
Can you see the Kelly and Eric on them? So amazing. And Katie "chalked" the wall.

The thing about my friends is, most of them are not really friends with each other (or at least they would not all hang out without me). When I was younger I used to get worried about things like birthdays because I did not know how everyone would mesh and get along. Now I don't even worry about it any more. Every single one of them is so social and great at just talking to whoever. It's gotten to the point where they all sort of know each other because of me and everyone gets along so well. I know they only do it for me, so I appreciate it more than they know. They are all so important to me that I love that they can be together and look happy about it. I really love them.

It's close to my bedtime so I can't really get into today (which is probably better, yesterday was way better and I'm going to pretend that was my real birthday). But, I will say- I got an amazing present from Eric. I've been complaining about my hatred for the treadmill and how boring it is. I've been plotting how I can somehow get a TV and cable into the room that it is in, but I hadn't figured it out yet. Eric got me a huge, beautiful, big screen tv and the proper cables so that I can have a TV in the treadmill room now. YAYYYYYYYY!!!!

So basically I am the luckiest person in the world and you probably hate me just reading this post. I leave you with a picture of me and Katie, the bestest friend in the world. I love you Katie!

Bikes GALORE!

I finally did it. I tried a Spinning class.
I absolutely loved it! It was 100 times more entertaining and a better work out than sitting on the stationary bike for 45 minutes! I loved how you were constantly supposed to stand up, sit down, go up hills etc. Plus the music was a perfect addition to it. This may sound dumb, but the other thing I like about it is that I am not horrible at it. Lately the only classes I have been doing are yoga, and lets face it- I do not have any talent as far as yoga goes. I know it's good for me and I enjoy it, but as my physical therapist reminded me the other day- flexibility is not my strong suit. When I go to yoga, they always have to correct me and it's always so clear how much better everyone else is than me. Normally I don't really care that much but it was refreshing today to go to Spinning, not even have the instructor pay any attention to the fact that I was new, and easily keep up with everyone :) Of course, spinning is also good because you can just casually turn down your resistance at any moment and no one really knows haha.

Speaking of resistance, I need some help from any spinning experts out there. The instructor kept saying, okay- go up to 8, already take it back to 5 etc. I get she was talking about resistance. But, there were no numbers on the resistance knob. Now, I get that it is probably a scale of 1-10, so 5 would be in the middle but you had to turn it around several times to get from 0-10, so I didn't really know where the middle is! My sister and I were discussing this later today and we speculated that maybe they meant your own 0-10...10 being the hardest you can work. But I have no idea, so please enlighten me on this. I was totally making it up today and it was obvious because people were like barely moving around and I was happily spinning away.

In other amazing news, I BOUGHT A ROAD BIKE!

I actually bought it on Tuesday but I got to pick it up today. It is SO amazing and I love it. I hope I continue to love it because it was probably the most I've spent on anything that I didn't really *need* (such as, a house, rent etc haha). I didn't buy a really fancy one, but I am just getting into it so the people at the bike shop seemed confident that this bike would serve my purposes. I am going to try it out for my first official bike ride on Saturday morning, so I'll let you know how that goes.
Of course I made sure it had as much pink as possible. I can't wait to try it out. Anyway, I hope everyone has a great Friday!

Trader Joe's Giveaway WINNER!!!

Hi everyone, I picked the winner of the Trader Joe's Giveaway! I had 71 entries and I used the random number generator (thanks to everyone who recommended that, much easier this time!). It picked number 11 which was.....

AMY!!! from Will Run For Fun

So Amy- please e-mail me your address at RedSoxCap10@blogspot.com
I will try to send out the package tomorrow or Friday at the latest!

Everyone else- Thanks so much for entering. This was really popular so I'll probably do it again, especially because so many of you don't live near a Trader Joe's and I can walk to one- I have to spread the wealth! For all of you Canadian bloggers~ You can absolutely enter, I'm sure it costs a bit more for me to ship but since there are so many of you I can't possibly leave you out :)

In other (less exciting) news, I tried my FIRST green monster yesterday. I had read enough about them I had to try it. I was skeptical that I would not taste the spinach, but I actually like spinach so I figured it really wouldn't be that horrible if I could taste it.

The Kelly Green Monster consisted of:
2 handfuls of raw spinach (I know, so scientific, but I didn't measure it)
1 frozen banana
1 cup frozen mango
1 cup of soy milk

It was delicious. I could not taste the spinach at all. Unfortunately, my stomach was less than thrilled, probably because spinach is full of insoluble fiber. I felt a little sick to my stomach all day after that. So Green Monsters may not be in MY future, but they should be in yours because they are SOOOO good. I think I will try to make one again, later in the day with a lot less spinach and see if my tummy can handle it. Oh, and the other thing- I really am not much of a smoothie person because usually they have enough calories for a meal but NEVER fill me up. I was completely full until snack time just like I am with oatmeal, so I found that amazing as well. Seriously, try these, you will not regret it.

Sorry my work outs/training this week are so non-existent. I have been mostly resting because I cannot run, and I was scared to swim (I have a cold, and I thought clogged up ears may equal ear infection!). I have also been spending so long doing my PT exercises every day, I barely have a moment to get in some cardio. I am going to try really hard to go to my first spinning class EVER tomorrow morning. Hopefully I will do it...and not die in the process. Wish my luck :)