Happy Birthday, America!

Hi friends and fellow Americans!

If you've been a loyal reader, you know my obsession with the 4th of July. It's one of my five favorite holidays (My Birthday, Christmas, Thanksgiving and Groundhogs Day are the other 4 in case you were wondering). If you didn't know, please see past posts here and here.

Two days prior to Independence Day, I celebrated one year at my job! It's crazy how long ago that seems and how it also seems like it was just yesterday. In celebration of Independence Day, my one year anniversary with my job and because I've been just so darn stressed, I turned this past week into a 3 day work week.

The Outfit

On the 4th, I headed down to Colonial Heights to spend the holiday with the family, which turned out to be the best idea ever. Instead of the typical hamburgers and hot dogs on the grill, we had steak and salmon -- yum!

The Food

After letting all that good food settle, watching (and playing) Jeopardy with the family, and introducing one of my uncles to Duck Dynasty, we headed out to Target to shop and watch the fireworks! Just like last year, my niece who is now 21 months old loved the fireworks. In fact, she mentioned that a couple of times. 

The Fireworks

All in all, it was a great start to my long weekend, which you'll hear about soon! Stay tuned!

How do you celebrate the 4th of July?

Off Balance

I'm going to write about something that has been weighing on my mind for quite some time. In fact, I thought I had already written this post months ago, due to the fact that it's been a struggle for me for that long. What is it?, you ask. 

Work/Life Balance.

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And the simple fact that I have no balance. I have been in an awful mood lately. I've been letting the stress of work get to me and not leaving it in the office. That makes it hard for me to be myself outside of work when I'm always pissed off at work things. 

I've decided to make a list of all the things that I can do to improve my work/life balance. I'm open to any suggestions you may have as well.

• Exercise --Exercise produces endorphins, endorphins make you happy and happy people don't hate their jobs. 
• One of my coworkers and I decide to go to the body combat class every Monday. So far, it's been great. Mondays are one of the worst days of the week for me (who does like Mondays?!?) so getting to sweat it out at the gym after work totally makes me feel better after a long day of work.
• Also, I recently relocated to the city (yay -- more on that later!) and everyone here is so active. At all times of the day, there are people of every shape, age and size running the streets of Richmond. I put my shoes to the pavement and ran 1.25 very flat (my favorite) miles down the road to see my sister at the gym on Saturday morning. I felt so great after that.
• Relaxation -- This weekend, I decided I was going to really focus on myself and get myself back to me center. I spent time just being alone, listening to music and reading. There really is nothing else like getting lost in a book. 
• Get your zzz's -- Being in a new place was not conducive to my sleep. Trust me, I was much more irritable when I hadn't been getting in sleep, which made the stress of work a lot worse. 
• Friends -- Sometimes you really just need to vent to a good friend who won't judge you. I hadn't talked to my best friend in awhile and talking to her on the phone about how stressed work was making me made me feel a lot or better.
• Leave work at work -- Or on the other hand, don't vent. I have tried to stop talking about work when I'm not there. I had this really bad habit of checking my work email when I was at home. Then I would stress all evening about things I couldn't take care of until the next day. 
• Hobbies -- Work has been draining me; however, sometimes you just need to remember to do the things you love. I'm excited about the warmer weather because I want to take my camera out and get some good photos of my new surroundings!
• And when all else fails -- use those vacations days you've got saved up. 

How do you balance your work life with your personal life?

Happy Autumnal Equinox!

Happy Autumnal Equinox, everyone! Saturday was officially the first day of Autumn. Now everyone knows that I am totally a Spring and Summer girl but even I am excited about Autumn this year. Why, might you ask? Let me list the reasons! :)

Football - NFL Football, College Football. What else are fall Thursdays, Saturdays, Sundays and Mondays for?

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Fantasy Football - As you know, a couple of weekends ago I drafted this fantasy football team. Also, I Patti drafted a fantasy football team for my office. I look forward to defending my title and for making a name for myself in my office league.

Fall Fashions - I spent the last two days shopping. There will be a whole blog post on the fashions of fall that I am excited about! Don't you worry!

Road trips - I didn't do that much traveling this summer due to my getting adjusted to my new job. But don't you worry, I am all set to make up for it this fall. With my season tickets to JMU football, I am set for at least 4 more trips to Harrisonburg. Also I have a couple more trips up my sleeve. Stay posted!

Thanksgiving - I love food! I love my family! Enough said.

Cooler temperatures - So remember how I do not have AC in my car? With the onset of cooler temperatures, I don't have to worry about nearly dying during my 40 minute afternoon commute home from work!

What are you looking forward to this fall?

These Shoes Were Made For Walking?

I wish I had Barbie doll feet. 

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As you know, I recently got a new job! My coworkers are much different than those I was working with when I was substitute teaching. I am working with a group of people that are much closer to my age and very business professional. The girls that I work with dress way cute so I've been trying to keep up with them by doing a lot of shopping. 

It seems as of lately with all my professional shopping I've been doing, I'm starting to become a "shoe girl." I've never really been a "shoe girl," especially not with heels. I have always owned a ton of flip flops and other comfy shoes like my Sperry's and my Converse's. 

I've always been comfortable with my lack of height. In fact, I pretty much cannot wear heels. My mother says I walk like a chicken in them (I know, I know, my family loves me). She got mad at me when I chose to wear flats to my high school graduation.

However, again I am short. So usually my dress pants are very long; therefore, it is necessary that I wear heels. So I'm slowly getting accustomed to buying and wearing heels. I haven't fallen on my face yet...there have been about 3 close calls though.

I accidentally wore my heels for about 17 hours last Friday. Worse idea ever. My feet were hurting for two days straight. I don't know how Barbie does it. It probably helps that her feet are just made for heels. 

These are scary high heels for me. My sister laughs at me...
By the way, $14.99 on clearance at Target!

What are your thoughts on heels with professional wear? Are heels absolutely necessary in the workplace? What color heels are staples to every working girl's wardrobe? How tall is too tall?

I wish reading was cool...

I wish reading was cool. Back in my day, it was. Or maybe it's always been cool to me. Now every day I go to work and I'm surrounded by teenagers who would rather watch Jersey Shore than get lost in a good book as I so often spend my nights. 


My sisters and I were the kids that got in trouble for bringing books to the dinner table. I've had a library card for as long as I can remember. At this moment, I have 3 different library cards in my wallet. I'm an avid patron of the library. Last time I was on vacation in the Outer Banks, my sister and I convinced the library down there to let us borrow books while on vacation.

Library books!

Recently I've been sitting in on an 8th grade English class. These students don't know the meaning of words like distinctive. Their teacher urges them to read because that is a way they can expand their vocabulary. These students complain about having to read a novel, a whole novel, in two weeks. Some nights I read for a couple of hours at one time. 


These students live in a world where books are pop culture. They turn books into movies all the time and then these books become popular. They'd rather pay 10 dollars to see the film rather than read the book, then see the film. If they both read the book and watched the film, they can discuss the process of changing a book into a movie and the elements that sometimes get left out. 


Don't get me wrong, I've had several students, mostly high school boys, who will pull books out of their backpacks when they are done with their work. I always tell them I'm glad they like to read. 


I think we should work on bringing reading back. There's nothing I like to do more than escape into a really good book after a long day. I just forget about everything going on in my life and I'm absorbed into the words on the pages. 

My Kindle, Kendall.

So if you haven't lately, pick up a good book. Recommend one to a friend (or to me!). 


The last book I read was Reinventing Mike Lake, which was actually published by a friend of mine I know from my college town. If you need something to read and you have a KIndle or a Kindle app, try it out. It's only 2.99! 


What have you been reading lately? What kind of books do you like to read? 

True Life: I Get to Visit My Alma Mater for Work

About this time two weeks ago, I received a phone call in the middle of fourth period.

"Tiffany, I'm sorry to bother you during class but I wanted to see if you were interested in doing the school a favor," said the voice on the other end of the phone, that belonged to the athletic director/director of student activities. 

(FYI, I am not retelling this story verbatim.)

"The Forensics Coach is unable to attend the State Forensics Competition due to a family emergency and we need someone to go in her place. It'd be a Friday/Saturday trip."

At this point, I am thinking, "Why is work trying to cramp my weekend as well as my week?"


Then the magic words.


"I know you don't know anything about Forensics but the competition is up at JMU. It's being held at Harrisonburg High School."


My love of the gold and purple is well-known in my workplace. My answer: "Yeah I'm interested. Let's sit down and talk about the specifics after school."


That's how I ended driving to Harrisonburg on Friday (the 23rd) afternoon to act as the Forensics coach for the DHS Forensics Team. As acting Forensics coach, I was in charge of our three young ladies who made it to States. Except all of their parents were going, so I really wasn't in charge of them. 


I met them on Friday night at the hotel. Yes, the hotel. It was weird staying at a hotel because Harrisonburg feels so much like home to me. However, the hotel was super nice.

 After we went to the JMU Opera, I attempted to sleep in my amazing hotel room; but I just couldn't. I was nervous that I would oversleep for the competition that was slated for early Saturday morning. 


Saturday was an eventful and long, long day. We were at Harrisonburg High School for 12 hours! 


For those of you who are unfamiliar with Forensics, it's a competition made up of 10 individual events and 2 duo events. Each student on a team competes in one category. The young ladies I accompanied were participating in Humorous Dramatic Interpretation, Serious Dramatic Interpretation, and Storytelling.


Luckily, I got to see each of the ladies perform and I am glad I did. These girls had performed their pieces with such poise and precision. I was truly amazed by all of them. One of our students made it into the finals and took home second place in her category. (She also found out two days later that she had been accepted into James Madison University.)


When I was finally released from my duties as Forensics coach. I had less than 24 hours left of my weekend. What were my first priorities? 


Food and sleep! 
Jeremy cooked me dinner and let me crash on his couch.

The rest of the weekend, I spent shopping at the mall, the bookstore, and the outpost with Jessica and Jeremy. I visited with Beau and Josh for 15 minutes. Then I headed east and southwards back to Dinwiddie making a stop at the Green Valley Book Fair on my way home!


All in all, it was a busy, eventful weekend and I was glad I had the opportunity to attend.