Pelotonia 2015 - a recap

Back in March I registered to ride in Pelotonia. It's a bike ride which really serves as a fundraiser for The James Cancer Hospital at Ohio State. There are multiple routes you can ride and based on the one you sign up for, there is a fundraising goal that goes with it. The catch is that you are guaranteed to give that much money to the James because they take your credit card information during registration. So if you don't raise your minimum through donations, fundraisers, etc, then you pay it. Genius idea so you don' have 50,999 people registering and then no one actually raise anything. Of course you can always raise more!

I was so blessed with many family and friends that donated to my ride and I met my goal the week before the ride! I was even able to give to friends rides and help them meet their goals instead of only being able to give to mine to meet the minimum. The donations for my ride actually exceeded the minimum, so I'm happy to have given more than $2,000 to cancer research!

The Friday night before the race there is the opening ceremony party. We picked up our registration packets, got our goodie gift bags (they are awesome!), turned in our bikes, and enjoyed a yummy dinner. 

There were three of us that registered together - me, Stacie, and Kelly. Kelly and I both work together for the College and advise the student council together. Stacie was one of our students, but since she graduated she's now 'one of use.' Ha. She and I have become great friends over the last few years. 

Emily, Stacie, Brutus and Kelly in our jersies.

At the 'party' they had giant walls where you could write the names of the people you were riding for. I rode for four people. My great-grandma and her twin sister who both survived breast cancer at age 90 (literally, they both had it at the same time. even found it weeks apart), Erin's grandma Millie who passed away 10 years ago from cancer, and Zach Farmer, who passed away just days before my ride after an 18 month battle with leukemia.

These peeps.....all the feels. 

Because I'm me, I had to acknowledge the people I was riding for in some way. I made buttons with their pictures on them to be on my jersey. I didn't have an electronic picture of Grandma and Annie, so I used one of me and her. They were identical twins, so I just looked at Grandma's face times two. :)

We had to be downtown so early - at like 6am. I couldn't even tell you the last time I was up that early. But I was there. Not without drama though. Stacie forgot her luggage tag for her checked bag and we both forgot our water bottles. The struggle was real for about 15 minutes. But luckily it all worked out.

This girl has no idea what's ahead for the next 12 hours!

We're just happy and ready to go!

I think there were around 2,000 people that rode either the 100 or 180 mile route with us. So it was kind of crowded around the starting line but not too bad. We even ran into Senator Portman in line (he's everywhere!) and my back made it into the background of his video about the ride! (Sorry Papaw!)

All the peeps!

The first 10 miles of the ride were through south Columbus, Obetz, etc. Our first rest stop was around 10ish miles. And of course we documented every stop by showing how many miles we had made it. (This was actually a struggle for me to figure out sometimes. Bike brain!)

Mile 10! (5+5)

Mile 25 was the first finish line, but at this point we were still ahead of people that were only riding 25 miles. They started an hour after we did.

Mile 25. 1/4 finished.

At the third rest stop, Mom was waiting on us. This was around 35 miles at Licking Heights High School. At this point Kelly and Teresa had caught up to us, so we would be able to ride the remaining 12ish miles together.

Four CFAES alumni. 

I actually ended up riding most of miles 37-50 by myself since Kelly and Stacie and gotten ahead and I'd lost Teresa. This was also when I realized I was actually really slow because when we got to the 50 split (those that were done at 50 go one direction and those that are continuing on to 100 go another) I was the ONLY one who turned to go on to 100. I was mortified and actually wanted to just quit. I do not like being last. There were other people behind me, I just couldn't see them.

We had lunch at the Bob Evans corporate offices and then we were off for the second 50 miles, aka the longest 50 miles. 

Mile 50. We were so happy, but we really had no idea what was coming. 

"Mile 50" wasn't really mile 50. It was more like 42. So we had 20 miles to go before a rest stop. This part wasn't too bad, but I just kept thinking "Everything I've already done, I have to do again now!" Ugh.

The pomp and circumstance that had been in Granville the morning was pretty much cleaned up by the time we rolled through. But that is a really cute town and I need to get back there to visit.

The stop at 61 had cookies!

61-100 were all out in the country, comparable to Blain Highway or 772. Lots of hills, some of which I had to walk up because my legs were just like jelly.

Mile 85! Just 15 more miles to go! This stop had an air conditioned tent!

There weren't official mile markers anywhere along the route, so it was just all hearsay about how much further we had to go. One man and woman along the side of the road told use we were only 27 miles from the finish, but I know for a fact we rode more than 8 miles before we got to the last rest stop.

Then there was a SAG van that told us we were 3.1 miles from the end. We were elated. I even said "oh, that's just a 5K. I could run from here!" Then about a mile down the road there was a sign in a yard that said "Just 3.8 miles left!" Ummm, hello?

We jammed out to Taylor Swift, Justin Bieber and N*Sync during our last stretch. There were such nice people who had tents out in their yards with water, etc. and then some people who were following others along the route and would give us some of their goodies.

There was just one jerk car that didn't respect the ride and flew by us while screaming for us to get out of the road and then almost hit the people in front of us. If you slowed down behind us we got over as far as we could. But I figure out of all the cars who passed us that day, for just one to be hateful, that was a good percentage.

Finishing was very exciting. On one hand I couldn't believe I was actually finished and the other hand I was sad that it was over! Stacie and I finished towards the end of the pack. Ha! There weren't many behind us. I blame my slow mountain bike. DO NOT EVER ride a mountain bike on a 100 mile bike ride. Ever. Ever. Ever. I didn't realize how slow they were compared to road bikes. They are really, really slow. But at least now I can say that I did it, on a mountain bike!

I'm so glad that I rode with Stacie. She is such a great friend and was so encouraging to me when I was struggling at different parts of the ride (usually hills!). She was always yelling "You can do it!" or "Keep going until you can't go anymore." And she never left me behind.

But we did get a good laugh when we went to pick up her checked bag and because of us forgetting the luggage tags that morning, her bag was in a pile simply marked "no tag."

There were 800 people riding back to New Albany the next day. No thank you!

We turned our bikes in to head back to Columbus, cleaned up and ate dinner at the finish line party. The hamburger I had was delicious. But of course I could only eat about half of it.

Me, Brutus and Stacie at the Finish Line Party.

Saturday was an emotional day for a number of reasons. I was riding in Pelotonia, but back in Piketon, our community was celebrating the life of Zach Farmer.

Zach was the Ohio State baseball pitcher who was diagnosed with leukemia in April 2014. He had been doing well and was even put in remission in June 2014. In early July it was found that the cancer had returned and along with other complications, the doctors gave him less than a month to live on July 15.

That following weekend he and his girlfriend got married and our town had a reception for them in the gymnasium. A few days later I asked if he could be someone that I rode in honor of in Pelotonia and he said "I'd love that". I thanked him, told him the reception was very nice and he responded "Thank you very much." I didn't respond because I didn't know what else to say.

Zach passed away two weeks later on August 4. His funeral was Saturday afternoon from 1-5pm in our high school gymnasium. Instead of riding in his honor, I was now riding in his memory.

So throughout the afternoon portion of the race, by far the hardest and most challenging, I just kept thinking of him, and my grandma, aunt, and Millie. I sometimes would make up little songs with their names to repeat in my head while I was trying to peddle up a hill. "Zach, Zach, Zach, Zach, Grandma, Millie, Annie." Or something like that. :) But every time I would open my phone to check the time, read a text from Mom, or just to see where the heck we were, my twitter app was open to the direct messages, with Zach's "Thank you very much" appearing at the very top. The first time I didn't think anything of it, but then as the day went on and it kept happening, I knew it was a little sign from him and God thanking me for doing this ride and giving me encouragement to keep going.

Saturday afternoon I would have told you that I'd never do Pelotonia again, or at least not the 100 mile ride. But after a few days, I kind of forgot all about how much it hurt at the time and I'm considering doing it again next year. Just not with the mountain bike!

2015 Goals - July Update

It's been a while since I updated on my new years resolutions and how they're going. I would say "eeehhhh...". -_-

1. Be at work on time every day. If I have something I have to be at, I'm there early. If I don't have anything scheduled early, I can never get myself there before 8:30/9. It's pitiful really. Still a goal I have. I had a plan to get up and be at spin class every morning, which would get me up and more likely to be ready to go to work on time, but I've missed all but one of those 5:45am classes. I seriously suck at this. Still a big work in progress.

2. Cut back on 'after school activities'. School's out for the summer! I do need to remember that it's ok to just be home some nights and not be running from one activity to the next. 

3. Sign up for a half-marathon and get to the gym. So Stacie and I have decided that we're going to run the full marathon in October. Oh good Lord what have we decided to do? Except we haven't been running that much. After Pelotonia maybe?

4. No fast food. I've still been doing pretty good at this. I don't eat out that much. But occasionally do go to McDonald's and get a McFlurry and fries.

5. No social media. I'm back on all of it. 

6. Study my Bible daily. I didn't do this every day, but I am doing better. I'm doing a bible study this summer with Marcey and a few girls from my class that focuses on hearing God's voice. Something that I always struggle with because I don't know if he's trying to tell me do something or just me?

7. Be a better communicator. It's going ok. Sometimes I'm a little too bossy and I also worry that by not being an open communicator that I come across as 'standoffish'. It's constantly a work in progress.

Life Lately - Summer and Fairs Week

Somehow it's already the end of July and school will start back up in just 5 weeks. NOOO!

I've been so busy this summer that I'm going to schedule a few 'do nothing days' over the next couple weeks so I can just be at home and enjoy summer.

Molly and I have made it to a few county fairs so far, with plans to go to a few more. Last week we went to Madison County and Kayla came along too. It was really disappointing because the buildings where the 4-H exhibits are were closed (set up for a dog show that wasn't for another 18 hours) and there was a Farm Bureau meeting in the FFA building. So we just kept walking around buying more food. (I see what they did there, marketing geniuses.) But we did get to watch a few classes of the hog show, eventually see the baby pigs in the FFA building (adorable!) and then spent way more time that we should have slow motion filming people on rides. People watching is awesome at county fairs.

We had a smiler while showing.

Love me some baby pigs. (And bacon!)

Fair rides.

Three girls who love fairs.

Bowie likes to snuggle with her mama at night. And mama doesn't complain.

Saturday morning we ran in the Color Run, then headed downtown to the Jazz and Rib Fest. I'd never been, but it was on my list of 101 Things to do in 1001 Days, so I was excited when Molly recommended going. Well it was 840 degrees outside and the lines were ridiculously long. We got some freebies from LL Bean and a few other tents and got a lemon shake up because we were so hot. But buy the time we ate our free rib slice from a sauce company and drank our shake up we were so hot we weren't hungry anymore. So we left.

A free rib from a sauce company. #freeforme

Molly enjoying her free rib. We also got free shots of margarita.

Jazz and Rib Fest selfie

That afternoon Caroline was in Ohio from Nebraska, so she came over for a little bit to visit. Molly and I had an awesome argument about cleaning the apartment about 15 minutes before she arrived (keeping it real). And then after Caroline headed back to Northern Ohio, Molly and I headed south.

We went to the Clinton County Fair, which was not worth the trip. As soon as we got there, it got really cloudy and started lightening. Then all of the displays were gone. No commercial building, no 4-H displays, all of the animals were gone. My biggest pet peeve is cleaning up things before an event is over. So we paid full price admission to get in and there was nothing to see. Ugh. I got to visit with Sarah and her kiddos for a hot second before it started raining.

Clinton County Fair selfie (with the sweet tea too)

We got to our parents late on Saturday night. Their A/C was broken. Awesome. My bedroom has absolutely no air flow and the windows have been painted shut since 1975. It was a sauna. I tried to sleep on the couch for a while, but eventually moved a fan to my bedroom. But first I found this scene...Molly sleeping on the floor, while Posey got the couch. My parents had gotten new couches two days before, so we had four couches in the living room that night. We moved them out the next day.

Sunday we cleaned out the garage and moved our old couches out there. It was the hottest day of the year and we're all in a dirty garage. I was so sweaty and had not brought clothes home to do this in. We found this sweat bands in dad's construction stuff (looked like this) and we had them on our foreheads, our neck, molly and I had them stuffed down the front of our shirts. At one point Molly even had a popsicle in her shirt. It was so hot. If only we had a pool.

We had came home to go to an event for Zach Farmer. I'll talk more about that later, but we spent the afternoon doing that and then spent a few hours at Mam and Papaws before heading back to Columbus. It was an unplanned busy weekend, but that means we had a lot of time to be spontaneous.

Vacation 2015 - Part 1

We did something a little different from our past vacations and added a few days in Savannah to the front of our normal trip to Myrtle Beach. 

My parents also like to take relaxing vacations. And going to a new destination and trying to find new places to stay and eat is not relaxing. Do this means we have a pretty identical vacation every year. Which is fine, but over the past few years Molly and I have had the itch to go and do and see more things when traveling. The problem is we LOVE the beach, so we don't really want to get rid of the beach trip and we don't want to take away a day of beach time to drive or do something else. 

When I'm at the beach I want to sit on the beach for all of the hours of the day and never leave. I do not like to take an afternoon and go to the mall, or the soccer store, or the teacher store, because I only get 4-6 days a year to be on the beach. I want to be out there in the sand, sun and water for all the time I can. Sometimes I don't even go in for lunch!

So for the past few years, she and I have been doing little trips in the spring. We've been to NYC, St. Pete Beach, Disney World, St. Augustine, Savannah, and Charleston all in one road trip, New Orleans, Charleston, Niagara Falls and Canada and we have so many places on our bucket list for future travels. 

Mom wanted to get in on a road trip with us and since she refuses to fly anywhere, the tropics weren't an option. We decided on a few days in Savannah and Mom booked tours and dinners and a bunch of fun things for us to do. Dad got in on the trip too when we all realized there wasn't any other way for him to get to the beach part of the family vacation without going to Savannah first. He was pessimistic about it, but ended up enjoying the tours and the history of the city and already has made comments about wanting to go to Charleston for a few days next year prior to the beach. Yay!

We left early on a Wednesday morning and traveled straight to Savannah. Molly and I took over the back seat and I can't really remember any problems. Molly likes to take advantage of being the baby of the family and take up all the room. Complete with 29,394 pillows. 

We stayed at the Embassy Suits and it was wonderful. So clean, the staff was wonderful, and they had free drinks and appetizers every day from 5:30-7:30pm! FREE! 

On Thursday, we walked down to River Street, looked at the river, visiting a few different shops and had dinner at the Cotton Exchange Tavern (awesome sweet tea, btw), went to a market, etc. About halfway through the walk, Dad headed back to the hotel and we visited Forsythe Square and a bunch of little shops. Some of my favorite shops were Saints and Shamrocks and the adorable Kitchen on the Square. 

Molly being "waving girl" along the Savannah River. 

On Friday we had tours scheduled in the evening. We had already walked a lot, so we rented bikes from their bike share program and rode around town. We went down to Forsytle Square and rode along the river too. We had to make a pit stop for sweet tea back at the Cotton Exchange Tavern. This was probably one of my favorite things we did.

Friday afternoon we went on our Paula Deen tour. I mean, what's a visit to Savannah without eating at Paula Deen's restaurant? The tour took us around the city and the driver/guide told us all about Paula's life, showed us her original home and restaurants and then the best part was that we got to eat at her restaurant at the end of the tour! The food was great. My favorites were the macaroni and the green beans. And then I had her Gooey Butter Cake for dessert. OMG....(insert angels singing here!). It was delicious.

Mom and Molly - sweet tea in hand, of course.

Daddio and me. (Paula Deen Tour - #girldadprobs)

Family Selfie

So much deliciousness on one plate.

Our waiter captured us about to explode after dinner.

After the tour ended Molly and I went back out on the town, while Mom and Dad cooled off at the hotel. It was 359 degrees outside in Savannah. I have never been so sweaty in my life. We visited the birthplace of Juliette Gordon Low (founder of Girl Scouts) and the Forrest Gump bench, which actually isn't there.

A bench in the same park. 

My pretty sis.

Just a random trellis that was pretty. 

That night we went on a ghost tour of Savannah. It wasn't scary at all, it was more historical with a little ghost stories thrown in there. We visited the site where slaves were sold and how no Spanish Moss grows in the square because it doesn't grow were bad things take (took) place. We saw the "caves" where slaves were taken if they were too sick to be sold, and ultimately died. Some of the stories were about socialittes who hanged themselves because they'd blown all their money, but still haunt their old house. There were a lot of cool stories. We never got any orbs or images in any of the photos that we took, but Molly and I both saw something on her screen when the flash went off, but nothing showed up in the actual picture. 

ghosts all around us?

The picture where the 'thing' was, but then wasn't.

Sisters on a ghost hunt.

Saturday was the 4th of July! We went on a river boat cruise for lunch along the Savannah River. It wasn't what I was expecting, but it was fun. The captain told us a lot of history while we were on the cruise, which was cool.

Official Photo

Molly and Mama

Me and Papa

Mama with her girls

After the cruise, we went to Tybee Island beach and just spent a few hours in the sun. The beach was totally different from Myrtle Beach in that it was just a beach - no hotels, no lifeguards, no rules. There were also no waves, so everyone was just hanging out in the water with their drinks and then had tents set up with flags and streamers (so many Georgia Bulldog tents, yuck!).

Georgia Beach selfie.

 We had to leave the beach because it started to rain. So then we stayed in the hotel all evening. I got fidgety because I just wanted to do something. Molly and I eventually decided to walk to this train museum, but then when we got outside and realized it actually wasn't raining, just looked like it, we walked to the river to watch the fireworks. We were so frustrated because we had cute red, white, and blue outfits to wear and we were in Ohio State clothes. The fireworks were nice, we went back to this haunted tunnel where Molly freaked out on me because I wanted to go down the stairs and she was afraid of ghosts killing me, then we went back to the hotel.

Supporting the #1 football team in SEC country is American!

Sunday we drove from Savannah to Myrtle Beach and did a little pit stop in  Charleston. It was an adventure of a drive, and after lunch at Fleet Landing (so good!) and a quick walk around Battery Park, I got to drive the rest of the way to the beach. A real miracle that someone other than dad was behind the wheel. ha.

We also found this fixer upper to buy. For $5.5 million.

The haaaba (harbor) behind us, I do declare.

That's all for the first part of our vacation. The 6 days at the beach were pretty uneventful, but I have a few pictures to share later.