Benefits of a School Close to Home

When everyone in my high school was making decisions about where to go for college one of the main criteria was that it had to be "away from home." A lot of people, myself included, wanted to get away and try something new. On the other hand, a solid group of people opted for St. Mike's, UVM, and Champlain, all in or around Burlington and all just a half hour from St. Albans.

When I transferred to SMC and was basically back home I wasn't sure how that aspect of the school would play out for me. Don't get me wrong, I love my family, but at my old school at least I had the freedom to be me and only see them during breaks. Now they could swing by whenever for a quick visit. God knows what state my room would be in or what scene they could walk into in my common room.

As I settled in at SMC I realized all of the freedom I still had and that being 30 minutes from home had more benefits than negatives. I could go home for my brother's birthday and a quick, cheap haircut or I could just stay on campus and go home for breaks like everyone else. The campus doesn't feel like I'm in Burlington, a place I've known since I was little. It's separate from everything I had known and was completely new. I just have the added benefit of knowing all the good restaurants and not getting lost driving through Essex.

I've seen more benefits than otherwise from being so close. This weekend was an absolutely prime example. On Thursday I started to feel pretty sick and by Friday morning I felt like absolute death. All I wanted was to get into bed and never get out. Instead of having to stay at school and fend for myself, which probably would have meant some sickling grocery shopping for oj and cough drops and massive amounts of NyQuil to sleep through the weekend hubbub, I called my mom who promptly picked me up and brought me home. I arrived to chicken soup prepared by my Gramma and a big couch with plenty of cozy blankets. While home i felt like a sick little kid who stayed home from school. My mom picked up a delicious dinner from Mimmo's and I watched tv all weekend. I came back feeling and looking so much better than I left (seriously, I was just short of actual zombie) and wouldn't have had such a quick turn around if I had stayed at school.

The moral of the story of my horrible illness is that while being close to home can be seen as a bad thing in terms of deciding on a school, maybe the stigma isn't necessarily true. Yes, you know the area. Yes, you're comfortable there. Yes, you are close to your family. No, you're not getting away and going somewhere completely new. But when you go to college that's a new enough experience in itself. It's a new campus with new people and new opportunities. I think that if it's a school you absolutely love then don't let its location close to home deter you. I promise that you will find more positives that you might expect.

Happy Birthday, America!

As usual, I've been ridiculously busy. I worked all last week with the Pre-Teens, which was fun. It's nice to be with the older kids and do things that the younger groups don't get to do like going to St. Albans to go bowling on Monday night. A highlight of the week? It was definitely 100% convincing the ENTIRE group of Pre-Teens that another counselor is my half-brother. The clincher was our fabricated childhood story about me sitting on his head. All in all the week went by pretty fast. Then it was Fourth of July weekend, which was marvelous.

Day by day run-down of an amazing Vermont weekend mostly spent on the wonderful Lake Champlain:

Friday - Friday nights at the Tyler Place are great. The younger two groups do parades and get s'mores and whatnot. Juniors and up play Capture the Flag with the famous rubber chickens. (Check it out!) Then comes the traditional Tug o' War match. I got some good action shots as I sat this round out after chasing after one of my Pre-Teens in the woods during Capture the Flag and twisting my ankle in the process! Capture the Flag is quite obviously very serious business. After the kids play Tug o' War against one another they team up against the counselors and a few parents. I'm sad to say that the odds are just too great and the kids ALWAYS win. A few always come complaining that we let them win, but let me tell you, I do not end up on the ground every time just for show!

The action shots

Saturday - On Saturdays we see off the kids in the morning with a good-bye breakfast and then have the afternoon free until the next round of guests arrive. This past Saturday was one of the Staff Boat Dock Days for the summer. From 11-3 the boat dock boys were on duty to bring the staff tubing, water skiing, wake boarding, etc. It was awesome to have a sunny day for once and even better to get to spend that day on the lake!

After the day had ended I made my way down to Burlington to hang out with my friends from my ex-school and watch the fireworks. We worked our way toward the waterfront and ended up with an awesome view.

My fave firework picture of the night.

Sunday - Sunday was my day off. It was also the Great Race Triathalon in St. Albans Bay. I've been doing the thing since I was about 10 and haven't missed a year since. The race is a 5k run, 13ish mi bike, and 3 mi paddle. This year I ran, my dad biked, and we paddled a giant, heavy, ridiculously slow canoe together. Had it been a fast boat we would have had a good time, I'm sure. The run didn't go well, but overall it was fun as usual. My lovely friend from St. Mikes, Coligny, made an appearance and we went to lunch in St. Albans. It was good to see her and I probably won't get to again until school starts back up, but let's not go rushing that.

After the race I went to my boyfriend's family's camp on the lake and had dinner and went tubing in the gorgeous weather.

We then ended up going out on a friend's boat to watch the St. Albans fireworks to finish off the awesome day and weekend.

Heading into the bay to watch the fireworks. Pretty sunset!

Fireworks over the bay. A little blurry with the boat rocking, but still cool.

I'm now in the Playhouse working with some cute little Junior Midgets. We're in the middle of a full on heat wave. I think I'm going to lose at least 10 pounds this week in sweat. For now I'm not quite as busy as I was over the weekend. My biggest priority other than work is staying semi-cool. Wish me luck. It's probably not going to happen.

All Things Water At TP

I've been meaning to put up some pictures from the Tyler Place for some time now, but I haven't gotten around to it. I've "borrowed" a bunch from my Aussie friend and fellow counselor, Brad. I'm making him a friendship bracelet during Pre-Teen hang out time, so he owes me. He had a bunch from one of the first weeks of summer when we were at the pool and at the boat dock/water tramps, thus the title. Here's a look at all things water at TP!

The outdoor pool (aka practically my home last summer) The building on the left is the indoor pool.

The indoor pool - parents doing water aerobics

View of the boat dock

Going to the swim dock and making moves toward the tramps/slide

"The Death Slide" on a floating dock

Jumping off the lake tramps (l to r: Andrew, Emilie, me in the back, and Brad upside down)

Rain, Rain, Go Away...

It's been a pretty rainy summer so far. It's raining as I write this. Yuck.

It's sunny every once in a while, though. I've found time to sit by the pool during the four hour break from work. I've also made it to a couple of dance parties and karaoke nights with the guests.

With some of the girls before DP. (Laura creeping over my shoulder, me, Jeanine, Julia)

This morning I ran in the Run for Empowerment. I happened to run into my boss, Gen, while writing her a note for work yesterday and she told me about it. She and two other girls from TP were also there. It was a fun out and back 5k/10k race (I did the 5k with my mom, my friends Michelle and Alexis did the 10) that started at the Echo Center in Burlington. It was for Women Helping Battered Women, which was quite obviously a worthy cause. The finish had just about THE BEST food spread I've ever seen. I'm kicking myself now because I can't remember the name of the bakery (Great Harvest Bread Co.?? Hmm...) that provided the baklava, apple strudels, spinach and cheese spinner pastry things, etc., but I can tell you right now that it was DELICIOUS. After some awards (yay, I won cookies!) and a great raffle in which my mom, who never wins raffles, was the first to be called and picked out a gorgeous $100 pendant, my mom and I headed up to the mall for a little shopping at our all-time favorite store, Ann Taylor Loft. Is it disgusting that we used up our 2 hours free parking in one store? Oops! It was a successful trip though!

It's been a busy, busy week work-wise, but a lot of fun. I'm looking forward to being with the pre-teens this week. Bowling in St. Albans Tuesday!! At the end of this week we will be 1/3 the way through the season at TP. AHH! AND I'm not even around for the last few weeks because of school. So I'm AT LEAST 1/3 done summer. Scary, scary thought. I'll be enjoying every last second of my last 2/3rds!

Grace Potter on Church Street

I had been trying to switch my days off from Tuesday to Thursday. It didn't work out and I woke up Tuesday morning thinking I'd spend the day doing work for my online class. I was not all too enthused. But in my usual morning routine of checking every single form of internet communication I came across a glorious RT on Twitter. Grace Potter live on Church Street at 5:30. Free. My morning immediately got SO much better.

Grace Potter is a singer/songwriter originally from Vermont. She and her band, Grace Potter and the Nocturnals have been getting increasingly more popular nation-wide. With the band's roots in Burlington, they play multiple shows a year in the Burlington area including an annual new year's eve performance at Higher Ground and a show on the waterfront every August. This year for the Burlington Discover Jazz Festival they played a free show right smack dab in the middle of Church Street. Check out the band's website here. I've linked directly to- the new album, so you can check it out. My faves? "Paris", "Tiny Light", "Only Love", and "That Phone".

I went with Caroline, crown and sash included, to see the awesome show. It was absolutely packed. I think the shortest, most accurate way to describe the event was something Caroline said over and over. "She is just so awesome. I wish I could be her." But seriously.

The first time I heard her CD, Nothing But The Water, which I now have completely memorized, I immediately thought of Janis Joplin, who my brother and I used to rock out to together when we were younger. (Well, ok...and still do. I will always and forever hear Evan singing "Piece of my Heart" when it comes on the radio.) I had always heard that seeing her live was incredible. This couldn't be more true. Her stage presence is ridiculous, her voice is something I will always wish I could have, and her music is so much fun.

Anyway, long story short, I loved it. I will for sure be at the waterfront show in August. After the show Caroline and I made our way (slowly...oh, to be Miss VT and oh so very popular) over to the St. Mike's cow for a pic.

(A post on the cows of Church St. and beyond is to follow this one at some point. Probably when I need a nice filler post because I've run out of things to talk about!) Afterward, I bought myself the new CD, which was released yesterday, and got it signed by the entire band.

I love that even though Grace and the band are only getting bigger as time goes on, they haven't forgotten little old Burlington, VT. It's cool for them to do a free show and stick around to meet the local fans afterwards. During the show Grace said something that really stuck with me and completely illustrated how they feel about their beginnings in VT.

"Burlington, Vermont is the biggest city in the world to us." - Grace Potter

I have a few YouTube vids from the show. They're a little fuzzy and I ask that you please ignore the crazy camera angles and whatnot. It's a digital camera. I do what I can! (They're currently still being processed so I'll get them up ASAP. Check back in a day or so for them!)

Summer Summer Summer

As usual, it's been pretty busy. I've been getting a lot of 9/10 mile runs in lately. This coming Sunday is the Burlington Marathon and I'm doing the half relay with my mom. Wish me luck. I haven't been doing a very good job with the training thing, so it could be iffy. We'll see how it goes. I was smart and took the first leg. This way I can't stop because if I do my mom will never get to run. Smart, no? I'm forcing myself to finish the thing. Ha.

Last weekend I went down to southern VT to watch Evan run the GMR. The Green Mountain Run is a Burke Mountain Academy tradition. The entire school runs the length of Route 100 from bottom to top. Each student, whether alpine or nordic, gets a leg and runs individually for about 4 or 5 miles. Each little section has its own record, so a lot of the runs are not just leisurely strolls to the finish. They all paint the vans the day before (Evan's was painted Ben and Jerry's style). The vans arrive at the bottom of VT early in the morning and the run lasts until about 3 am the next day. No wonder it takes so long...100 miles is a long way to run! It makes my 13.1 look like nothing! It's cool to see the whole school so involved. All the kids cheer like crazy for each of their classmates and everyone runs along for little section of other runs just for support. Not to mention all of the parents that come from all over the U.S. just to watch the run! It would be awesome to get something like that going at SMC.

Nordic and alpine team up to run the length of Route 15? Hmmm...

Evan had promised that there would be pictures up on facebook to steal for this bloggy blog, but apparently the kids at Burke have better things to do than get on facebook. Like mountain bike and run and train and stuff, so obviously they're too lazy to get the pickies on fb. Ugh, those Burkies. I did take these two lovely pictures of southern VT on my dad's phone.

How could you possibly not love VT??

The past few days have been all about Tyler Place. Orientation was busy busy busy. Being a counselor has so much more involved than life guarding. There's the boat dock, the pool, the playhouse, the club house, the inn, the children's garden, mountain biking, countless games and songs to learn, and God knows what else. I'm glad to be done orientation and starting work. I'm with the Junior Midgets this week, which is the youngest group, around 2 1/2 to 4 years old. I've literally never changed a diaper. Potential problem? Ehhh. We shall see.

My camera is dead and I've lost the charger, so while I'd like to promise pics of TP soon, there might be a bit of a wait. For now, I've got the next few days off and some brownies in the oven. Nom nom nom.