This weekend marks one year back in Pittsburgh. Last August, I declined all my full-time business school acceptances, resigned from my job and moved back to Pittsburgh to live with my parents without a solid plan. Since then, I’ve found a job in Pittsburgh, started working on my mba part-time and brought a condo. After spending my high school years wanting to get away from the place that made me, I spent the next ten years trying to find a way back via Rochester, DC, San Francisco and Boston. The ride has not been smooth – countless interviews and rejections, working retail during the holiday season and using up some of my savings fast, but was been worth it. While being in the same city as they grew up in is a crazy thought for some people, I love it. I love meals with my mom, taking my grandma shopping, Sunday night dinners with my dad and annoying my sister in-person. Its been fun rediscovering old places and finding new favorites.

While my life is not exactly how I pictured it would be at 28, its pretty darn good. For once, I feel like I’m exactly where I’m supposed to be and in a place where I belong. A lot can change in a year and I can’t wait to see what happens next.

I start night classes again next week, so all my free time will be consumed with accounting (booo!) and marketing (yay!) school work. I thought, wouldn’t it be a great idea if I could make some nutritious snacks that I could eat on the go, like granola bars?

Enter this Pumpkin-Almond Butter recipe from Simply Savor. I did not have pumpkin butter, so I decided to substitute it with chunky peanut butter. Bad idea. Its not the same consistency and didn’t exactly form bars. Opps. Now I have a batch of nut butter covered oats that I will use in my overnight oats, so its not a complete fail. Granola bar attempt #2 this weekend!

My other almond and chunky peanut butter creation tonight turned out much better. If you haven’t made Angela’s Nut Butter Crusted Parsnip Fries yet, you must. With some roadside brought corn on the cob, I had the best side dishes to go with dinner.

Now, if anyone has any good, easy, nutritious granola bar recipes, please send them my way!

Another week of marathon training in the books. This week’s marathon training went like this:

Sunday: At home strength training
Monday: Rest
Tuesday: 4 miles
Wednesday: 7 miles
Thursday: 2 mile warm-up and speed session
Friday: Rest
Saturday: 12 miles

Saturday’s run was not so great. I’ve ran half marathons faster than than I completed my 12 miler. I’m having a hard time coming to terms with that I’m not really getting faster. There are a few reasons why – I didn’t take my training seriously enough early on, for one. A tiny part of me is hoping that it’ll just gradually come back. I’ll peak in time for the race, I hope. But, I know I’ve got to get this mentally sorted out or I am going to have a nervous breakdown at mile 18 on race day.

The 12 miler was brutal. At more than one point during the run, I asked myself, how can this be uphill – I just ran this part uphill? I did an out and back and I never really noticed how hilly my trail was. But seriously, it was uphill both ways. Maybe I was imagining things at that point and just wanted the run to be over.

I ran with my fuel belt for the first time in ages since I needed more hydration and it was somewhat annoying. Not having the typical run shotbloks, I substituted a Lara bar, which I wasn’t used to. All the little things were just not working for me that morning.

When I took my socks off, I noticed I rubbed all the nail polish off my toes, which has never happened to me before and I got blisters at the top of some of my toes around the nails. Not painful, just annoying.

I was looking thru my e-mail and came across an e-mail from my old running group and it reminded me that if you have a bad run, its JUST a bad run. Nothing more, nothing less. I’m not going to internalize or dwell on it and I’m looking forward to the 14 miler next weekend.

What’s your strategy for recovering from a bad workout?

This marathon training thing is really official now, long runs are in the double-digits from here on out! I did 10 miles this weekend all by my lonesome since my running buds were either biking 150 miles or at the beach. I woke up feeling a little under the weather, but figured the run would cure what ailed me. It was probably one of my slowest ten milers ever, but I gave myself some slack since it was hot and I wasn’t feeling in tip-top shape. It was hard to stay motivated and keep running, but made sure to take a lot of walk breaks. I was so glad to have it done and have the rest of the weekend free.

I thought I’d share some of my favorite long-run essentials and love to hear what you take on your long runs!

First up, the Bondi Band and dorky sunglasses. I’ve had this Bondi Band since my first marathon three years ago and its the only thing that actually stays on my head and doesn’t move. The sunglasses, I picked up at an expo and these too stay on my head. While they are not stylish, they keep the sun out of my eyes and are pretty light weight.

Next is my beloved Garmin. If you have bony wrists like I do and dislike the feel of the rubber strap, wear a sweatband on your wrist. It keeps the Garmin secure and doesn’t hurt my wrist. I also carry an Amphipod handheld water bottle that I can refill on the run. The shape of it allows me to carry it comfortably and the pouch is the perfect size for my keys.

Lastly, I have my iFitness belt, which is a new addition to my running gear. I picked this up at the half I ran in the spring and I must say I am in love. I usually throw my gels and my phone in here and it stays secure during the run.

I didn’t receive any compensation for this post – these are products I use and love and wanted to share. I’d love to hear your long run or exercise essentials!

Where do I even begin to describe BlogHer? Overwhelming-crazy-fun-inspiring. Here’s the short and sweet recap in photos. I wish I had more photos, but I left New York with a promise to myself to get more comfortable with my camera and take more photos. I was going to link to everyone I met in this recap, but it would take me days to do that and this post would never get published.

The fun kicked off on Thursday night with the Schick Intuition Plus K.I.S.S & Tell party featuring a performance by Gavin DeGraw.

Gavin, call me, okay?

I also got to see one of my favorite people from RIT, Chris. Chris jetted off to North Carolina the next day, so we didn’t get to hang out much. Sadface.

On Saturday, I got to meet Tamera Barney from Real Housewives of the OC. She was nice and super skinny in person. The OC season does not start up again until the new year thanks to the DC and Beverly Hills versions of the show. I also saw Bruce Jenner walking down the street and the first words out of my mouth were, “That’s Kim Kardashian’s stepdad.” Clearly, I watch too much reality tv.

Saturday night was all about the parties. Things started off with a 20-something bloggers happy hour and then moved on to parties involving unicorn cake, dancing, drinks and cheeseburgers.

Photo from Katelin

It was so weird to be at a conference and not working aka running around like a crazy person for 12 hours for clients like I’m used to doing at conferences for work. I was lucky to volunteer and got a free pass to the conference in exchange, so I’m grateful to the organization for that. The downside of this is that I didn’t get to go to all the sessions I wanted to see due to my volunteer duties, but will be reading the recaps and listening to the podcasts.

I had a great time, but for me I didn’t really feel completely comfortable at the conference until mid-day Saturday. It was a bit overwhelming with over 2,000 attendees, countless sponsors/swag, a variety of events and multiple floors.  I’m shy and reserved (people who know me in real life are scratching their heads right now) when around strangers even if they are super nice and welcoming. It definitely took me a while to warm up and combined with my slight cold and a new brand of contacts I was wearing –  I didn’t feel 100% like myself at first. But, I did come away inspired and wanting to do more with this little blog of mine to work my creative muscles. I learned a lot and had a ton of fun with the people I met. I think Round 2 would be less overwhelming since I know what to expect. I need to recover from this one first before I can think about next year.

I’m sad I didn’t see as much of New York as I wanted to and see more of my NYC friends, but I’ll be back in November!

This is all mish-mash bullet style because I’m a bit frazzled about putting full sentences together.

• I somehow broke two brand new contacts this a.m. and they were my last ones. Opps. Made an appointment with the eye doctor and he commented on my large pupils. I hardly ever need eye drops and I learned the drops for pupils called belladonna drops, which is Italian for beautiful lady. So, my large pupils are beautiful since I don’t need drops to enhance my eyes. : ) Also, my prescription went down so I guess all this healthy eating over the past year has helped!
• I’ve been feeling under the weather and seemed to have caught that weird summer cold. Think I’ve kicked it for good though, but I hate that I lost two good workout days because of it.
• I’ve changed my marathon training plan again. Wasn’t feeling the one from Runner’s World so I decided to go with Hal Higdon. Sixteen weeks, oh boy.
• I leave for NYC on Thursday and cannot locate my suitcase. I don’t think I moved it from my mom’s house, so I’m hoping I can find it tomorrow. Otherwise, I am checking a garbage bag.
• Somehow passed my economics class. I was so worried that I was going to fail one of my first grad school classes because the final was so entirely different than what I was expecting. Did awesome in my other class and mailed off my books for Amazon credit. Which will then be spent on my $140 accounting book.
• I am in love with overnight oats. I have no idea how I managed to live the majority of my life without eating oatmeal. Speaking of, its time to go prep tomorrow’s breakfast.

The process of making my condo mine is a long and slow one. I am very indecisive and not so handy. Luckily, I have a wonderful dad and stepdad who have remodeled their own houses themselves and I’m counting on their skills to help me! But, I’m starting with the small stuff like window treatments.

I finally got rid of the old lady drapes, can we say blah?

And here is the new or shall we say the in progress?

I added 2-inch white wooden blinds and got rid of the vinyl blinds. The curtains are Vivan from Ikea. I think it looks better, but something is a little off. I think the curtain rod needs to be longer so the panels cover less of the windows? And possibly a bigger support bracket? Since I had to outside mount the blinds, the top of the blinds sticks out a lot and the rod is not the same depth as the blinds if that makes sense. If anyone has any advice, I’m all ears!

I also need to get lamps, a rug and floor mirror, hang artwork, refinish a bench and make a headboard. Maybe I’ll be done by Christmas.