26.2 Miles. Done.

Y'all, I did it. I ran a marathon. 26.2 miles. Not a 5k, 10k, or half marathon, but the full thing. The real deal. It's still hard for me to wrap my head around it. It was exciting, tiring, hard, cold, sweaty, windy, and incredible! The crowds were amazing and the sights were breathtaking. Maybe I didn't run as fast as I thought I would, but I don't even care. I did it, and that's all that matters right now. 

It's almost go time...

By the time you're reading this I'll probably be packed into a car full of marathon gear with one other crazy runner headed to D.C. for the Marine Corps Marathon. It's hard to believe that a little over a year ago I was beginning to train for my first half marathon, and now here I am crazy enough to do the full 26.2 miles.

These past 5 months of training have certainly been a whirlwind. There have been good runs and bad runs, HOT runs (gotta love training in the summer!), and rainy runs, runs by myself and runs with people that I otherwise never would have met before. And although this training has sucked up my social life, I've been able to gain an incredible running partner and now friend! Kind of awesome what running does.

Throughout this process I've had many people ask me why I want to run all 26.2 miles of a marathon. And honestly, sometimes I find myself asking the same question. What was I thinking signing up for this thing?! But now, when it's all said and done (well, almost) I think this training period was just what I needed at this time in my life. A few months ago, at the end of August, I left my internship that I'd had for 2 years. I was a recent college graduate and there were no full time positions at the time, so it was time to move on. (Spoiler alert: after a little over a month of unemployment I got hired back at the same company, just in a different division. I start November 1st. Woop woop!) I was kind of excited about this unemployment period. There were a lot of things on my "to do" list that I wanted to get done, and what better time to do them than now? Turns out, this unemployment came at a perfect time during training too. Just as runs were getting longer and more intense, I found that I had more time for running and recovering (read: naps everyday).

During this time of unemployment, I think that without running I would have gone crazy. I've been in that "what am I doing with my life?" period and I've had quite a few stressed out moments trying to figure out what exactly it is that I want to do. This time could have been a time when all I did was lay around the house, depressed and confused and sulky. But instead, I think that this marathon gave me something to focus on and really put a lot of my time and effort into, when I didn't have much else during the day. It's been an incredible goal and just training for one and running up to 20 miles has been a HUGE accomplishment. So, when people ask me what I've been doing with myself during this unemployment, I can proudly say that I've been training for a marathon. Having this to put basically all of my time and energy into has been wonderful. I believe that this unemployment and this training were perfectly timed and now I can see why this unemployment happened when it did, and that it was meant to be all along. It's kind of God's wonderful way of saying, I believe in you, you can do this...now here's your chance to focus on this goal and accomplish this dream. And then, 4 days after the race I'll start my new job and a new chapter in life! Pretty wonderful how things work out.

So the hard part of training in the dead of Summer is over...now it's time to run my little heart out in 3 days with 30,000 other crazies in D.C.. I can't wait to (God willingly) accomplish this big goal in my life and call myself a marathoner. :)

And then...REST!!!

Flashback to the Bahamas

Forever and a day ago my family and I went to the Bahamas. And when I say forever I really mean forever. As in I was still in high school when we went. My brother still had braces and long hair. Actually...the majority of my siblings still had braces. No one was away at college yet, no boyfriends or girlfriends, no better plans...just the family! It was so much fun.

I stumbled across some old pictures from the trip from the underwater camera on my moms computer and I just had to share. We were all such little babies! I hope you enjoy this trip down memory lane as much as I did... :)

This would be my little brother's self-portrait. I think he was 14 at the time. He's now 20.

My step-sister Lisa and I snorkeling!

Both of my step-sisters, Rachel and Lisa.

Such happiness. You can check out our sweet catamaran in the background.

Parasailing!!

My step sister and I up high over the ocean. See? We were such babies!

The platform that we "took off" on. Those little specs are our family.

Lisa's toes and my legs, flying high.

Looking back it's kind of freaky to see that this little rope held us up. But I'd totally do it again...

Myself, mom, and Lisa

Roger, Rachel, and Michael

SO LITTLE.

This was always one of my favorite pictures from the whole trip.

I'm pretty sure it was my myspace picture. Yeah I went there.

Lisa and Rachel

More views from parasailing! 

[The pictures uploaded out of order, sorry I'm too lazy to fix it...]

And now I want to go back and play in the sun!

I'll have to find the other pictures from this trip, that were taken on the normal camera, and maybe post some... :)

Happy Tuesday!

Birthday!!!!

Today is a very special day. Know why? It's my BIRTHDAY!! Wahooooo.

I don't really feel like hashing out some super awesome blog post for the day though, so for now just enjoy some birthday iPhone pictures :)

1. Birthday celebration with friends on Friday night :)

2. Finished my first ever crossword puzzle! With some help from family and the Internet...

3. Spent a gorgeous Saturday afternoon enjoying some time outside with my camera and family!

4. Birthday flowers from the farmers market from mom!

5. Went out for a drink with some friends at one of our favorite Monday night spots, Flying Saucer :)

6. My first happy birthday text!

7. Went for a little walk on the paths at work...it wasn't too hot in the shade, it was beautiful!

8. One of the BEST cakes I've had so far at work! Chocolate + mint = my dream dessert, I'm so in loooove :)

I've had an amazing time celebrating my birthday so far!

Between going out on Friday with friends, celebrating with family (including dad who came in town!) on Saturday, lunch with co-workers on Monday, drinks after work with some friends Monday night, and some time with more family and friends today...it's been quite the wonderful birthday week. ;)

I'm so thankful for all of the amazing people in my life!

Happy TUESDAY!!

B.Hines

4th of July

A few snapshots of my 4th of July this year...

Hope you had a great one as well!

Happy Friday :)
B.Hines

all photos copyright Brittany Hines

That one time I met Hines Ward... :)

Oh gosh, where to begin?

How about we start from the very beginning?

It's Tuesday morning, I'm sitting in my office playing around on the internet before anyone else is here, when I see this...

You see, last year when he came to Charlotte I was out of town in Alaska with my dad. So I missed him and was heartbroken!

That wasn't about to happen this time. Charlotte is only a short drive from Raleigh and I was determined to make this happen. I immediately text my cousin (in Pittsburgh) and ask if she wants to fly down for the weekend just to see Hines. Unfortunately she has to work and can't make the last minute trip. So next I write this on Hillary's facebook wall...

After some texting back and forth, Hillary and I decided hey...what the heck? Let's go! We got two tickets for his autograph (happy early birthday present to me!) and a hotel and there was no looking back.

I was ECSTATIC. As you can tell from our conversation above. Hillary was equally excited too, as you can see. (She really could care less about the Steelers or the NFL for that matter...)

Friday afternoon rolls around and we hop in the car and head on out to Charlotte! We had only been once for the bowl game, so decided to head down the night before so we could explore downtown a bit. I really liked the city! It was super clean, and the atmosphere was really neat.

After an interesting night out (no need to get into details about that) we woke up bright and early to get ready to meet HINES!!

Hines Ward (and some other Steelers players, can't leave them out!) were signing autographs at the mall in Charlotte. The mall opened at 10am and Steelers would be there at 1pm and 3pm. Hines was scheduled to be there at 1pm. So what do Hillary and I do? We get there before the mall even opens because we were just so uber duber excited (aka: paranoid about long lines).

There were absolutely zero lines. I don't know what I was thinking, but I was super far off...

We walk into the mall, head to the area all set up for Hines, and wait. Lots and lots of waiting. At 10:00 we're able to get up and turn in our paper receipts for real tickets. So I do that. Then I sit back down and wait and wait some more.

We even recorded a video but I won't bother to waste your time with that :)

After about 2 hours of waiting (in comfy chairs!) we decide to go ahead and get in line, where we can wait another hour and a half for Hines. We were the third people in line for Hines which was pretty sweet, especially because eventually the line filled up pretty fast. Unfortunately they had a separate line for "VIP" people who bought tickets to get autographs from all of the players, and they got to go first so we had to do even more waiting once Hines actually arrived. But whatever...I'll do as much waiting as I need to if it means that he's just a few feet away :)

Around 1:15 Hines Ward finally showed his pretty smile and I was completely THRILLED! I was shaking, I felt like I was going to throw up, I was nervous and excited all wrapped up into one. It was such a huge adrenaline rush!

All of our waiting finally paid off and we inched our way up to Hines Ward...

But first, we passed Mike Wallace along the way :)

And then.....

"Hey, I'm Brittany!"
"Nice to meet you Brittany!"
...aaaaaaaaaaaaah, I'm dying.

Our conversation could have ended right there and I would have died a happy girl. But it didn't, it only got better...

So here I am, standing in front of Hines Ward with my two things that I want signed and I just start talking away. I never talk that much! But apparently nervous Brittany just can't control it. He's signing away and I'm talking to him about everything under the sun...my last name (it's relevant), Pittsburgh, my bamie, my family and how they love him, if he's having a good day or not, Raleigh....etc. Way to go, Brittany. I mean, I was just trying to keep the conversation going....he was surprisingly quiet...

Our time is nearing an end so we both turn to Hillary (who has been snapping off pictures left and right, she's amazing!) for a posed picture together. I lean over the table, he leans in, and I notice that his hands are kind of overlapping each other and you can't really see his Super Bowl ring. Not acceptable! So I say...."Gotta be sure to show off that ring!" and he responds... "Well why don't you wear it?" WHAAAT?! The only way I know how to truly describe this situation: ASLKGJSLKGJALKGJA!!!!!! :) :) :) That's basically what happened. I was stumbling over my words, trying to put this MASSIVE ring on, while on the verge of crying big fat happy tears! I was in complete shock! I mean, I won't lie...the thought crossed my mind while I was in line waiting - maybe I'll ask to wear his ring! ...no way, Brittany, he would never let that happen, that this is worth more than everything I've ever owned combined! - Oh but it happened. And it was wonderful :)

After uttering out a big huge thank you, I was finally forced to leave the wonderful moment and head home, back to reality.

But my heart is left feeling super happy and my week life has been made significantly better :)

And that's the story of the greatest day of my life!

Happy FRIDAY!! 

Stay cool this weekend...

B.Hines