Well as many of you know MLK weekend was the yearly DGSC weekend which was held here in sunny Wilmington, NC. Maybe I'm biased but I believe it was the best one yet. My wonderful friend Sarah Clark deserves a shout out for allowing us to invade her apartment to accommodate my 9 guests - you are fantastic! We nick named ourselves DGSC - hawks for the weekend which was often followed by a "caw" sound by Makesha.

My dear friends also came out and supported my YMCA basketball team in our second victory of the season (we have since gone on to win our 3rd). Let me tell you, you think the NCAA tournament is intense, come to the Wilmington YMCA on a Saturday at 11 and you'll see intense. We have won our last two games in the final 5 seconds by one point. It has been incredibly intense and if it continues I may or may not need blood pressure medicine. My team is awesome, what can I say? I've got some rockstar players, one in particular who scores on average 16 of our 20 points in a game, Amani. She is a machine. I also have a player that is literally bite sized who has been lifted up when a player has tried to steal the ball: Ella aka sidepony. Overall I am really enjoying the team and coaching and would like to give a shout out to my friends who are teachers. I'm not quite sure how you do it every day. 2 hours a week is plenty for this girl.

This may or may not be when I told them they needed to play the best defense of their lives!

Overall it was an amazing weekend with the girls. They have decided I need to start identifying a DGSC girl of the month so I will start with the one who suggested it, Miss Angela Damiano:

Name: Angela Damiano
Birthdate: August 9th
Vocation: rockstart at ITT (are you with me?)
College: JMU (go Dukes)

Top 5 things I love about her:
5. She claps and laughs when I make an idiot of myself in public
4. She is always hooking a sister up ;)
3. She stays up late to have life talks with me on school nights
2. She comes from a loud obnoxious family like mine so she gets the guid in me
1. OBVIOUSLY  her love for changing the words to songs and performing. (Have you seen the latest DGSC performance "Plus Sized Dream"

I have nothing but love for Ms. Angela Damiano. Here are some of my favorite pics :)



Dancing at the No Doubt concert - summer 09

 




visiting this summer :)





being obnoxious at a DGSC dinner. Summer 07

Final thoughts....I am currently watching my family's favorite TV show on  Netflicks: American Dreams

For those of you who weren't captivated by this show in 2002 on NBC it's a show about a family in the 60s. The daughter Meg (who the late Peter Mancuso may or may not have had an infatuation with) dancing on American Bandstand (each episode a contemporary artist **including NICK CARTER** stars a a 60s music act). Basically the family experiences life in the 1960s. The show is one of my all time favorites but also reminds me of some great memories with the Mancuso clan. For those of you who knew my dad, you know how into using movies/tv shows to teach Peter, myself and whoever would listen about history and society and American Dreams allowed for that, some good music and overall a good hour show a week with my family.This tradition continued into Tabb Hall when I got to Longwood freshman year with my girl Lauren Kennedy who also had a love for the show.

I did however in researching come across some devestating news...NBC only released the first season on DVD, therefore after I get through this first season (I am on disc 4 of 7 right now) I will be unable to watch the show. So this is my cry for help...does anyone have any idea how I could potentially find episodes online somewhere or, if you work for NBC please put me out of my misery and release the other seasons. Thank you. Peace and Blessings.

Time for shout outs?

- Happy late birthday Mr. Adam Tate ... thanks for always checkin' my blog

-Happy early birthday to Mr. Sam Brown who probably doesn't read my blog but is clearly a celeb in my life

-Shout out to the Shanleys- thinking about Gram this week xoxo

-Good luck to Petey and PKT with spring recruitment

-Congrats to Adam Best and other Steelers fans excited about the superbowl

-Congrats to my big and Brian on building a house in Fredericksburg!

-Thank you Sarah Sunde for always being available for my student affairs freak outs

Tag Team Back Again...

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

I feel as though I need to start by apologizing that it has been so long since my last blog post. I was consistantly reminded over the past few months that I had not blogged but life got a little busy with the holidays and end of the semester... I know EXCUSES. I vow to be much better in 2011. Hmm...how to begin. Let's start with the Top 10 best parts of 2010:

10. 9 weddings. Congrats to all my wonderful friends who were married in 2010: Colleen & Ben, Jason & Rachel, Carolyn & Hoss, Kat & CJ, Mike & Christina, Angela & Chris, Lucy & Keith, Katie & Clay and of course Ashley & Craig

9. Opening Ceremony Game night/ John Mayer concert weekend with my CSPA crew in February

8. Graduating from James Madison University with my M.Ed in May

7. Being selected as the ACE Advisor (aka getting the BEST job ever!)

6. Massive snow days at  JMU filled with Wii Bowling tournaments, board games, going down the hill, portfolio and more girly movies than one thought was possible :)

5. Tons of visits from great friends (post my move to Wilmington): Mrs. Shanley, Kelly & Adam, Annie, LK, Angela/Katelyn/Audry/Kelly, Jimmy 0., Ashley & Brian & Jenny

4. Petey turning 21!!

3. DGSC weekend 2010: Washington, DC

2. Oh yea, there was that time I went to ITALY!!!

and the number one thing I will remember about 2010...

1. Moving to Wilmington, NC and starting an amazing new life with the most wonderful friends :)

So overall, 2010, a great year :) Now, as for 2011 there is a LOT to look forward to.

- DGSC 2011 in Wilmington (next weekend!)

-Reuniting with my JMU loves the first week of February

-My first Homecoming at UNCW

-The ACE Spring show: Friday, April 1st

-My 25th birthday :)

- NKOTBSB concert in June

-Weddings! Weddings! Weddings! Caitlin/Alex, Caitlin/Chris, Kelly/Adam & Kathleen & Mark

-Did I mention Kelly Ann Shanley is getting married... a sweet bachelorette weekend is the making

-Moving in with Ms. Sarah Clark

-much much much MORE!

Currently I am at home for a snow day. Yes in fact it is snowing in Wilmington...as you can imagine it's not snowing but so much but clearly here in the South we don't have the equipment to handle such a thing so you know. This is funny to me b/c as many of you know I was stuck in NJ at my grandma's for the snowpocalypse of 2010. This involved hearing the same stories 10 times, playing the same card game over and over, watching whatever movies were on TV and listening to my mom read aloud people's facebook status updates off her phone. Needless to say Peter and I have NEVER shoveled so quickly in our lives.

For those of you who haven't heard I am coaching a youth girls basketball team for the YMCA this season. The girls are 8, 9 & 10. I am proud to report that my team won 18-6 on Saturday and I must say I was VERY proud. I'm a little stressed that due to weather our practice is cancelled today and we could use some practice doing some offensive imbounding plays but ya know the Coach K in me needs to pipe down. I am really enjoying coaching and playing with the girls. They constantly are making me laugh and testing me. My favorite was last week at practice while we're stretching one of them asks "can we each say our favorite Christmas present" I was hesistant but said yes. The girl who asks starts with "I can't decide between my ipod touch and my new coach purse". WHATTTTTTTTTTTT! Why do you need a coach purse at 9!! Clearly I was floored. All in all I'm so glad I'm doing it. I really like working with them, playing sports again and a role model of mine always told me/showed me how important adults are in youth athletics so I felt like it was something  I should do. Especially because I am one of two female coaches in the whole YMCA.

Finally, I need to share that I saw Country Strong on Saturday and what a great movie. Do I think it's like Academy Award worthy, well the acting is great, but no. However I did LOVE IT. It had all the pieces I love about movies: love, good soundtrack, drama, suspense and cute actors :) If you haven't seen it, I encourage you to. The soundtrack is also pretty great for all you country music fans. Here is my favorite song from the movie (DISCLAIMER: on the soundtrack it's the Faith Hill recording):

Give Into Me

I suppose this is the longest entry EVER and therefore I should stop. I will end with this, I vow to be a better blogger in 2011. :) Thank you for reading.

Shoutouts:

-Happy first day of classes to those JMU Dukes

-Happy snow day GA and the Carolinas :)

-RCs aka Essential Employees of UNCW - thanks for working hard today. If anything you all deserve the break. Love you <3

-Safe travels to my DGSC girls who are traveling here this weekend. I am looking forward to a GREAT weekend.

-Thanks to JoJo for a wonderful holiday. She really rocks at the Christmas/New Years thing.

-Thank you to Ms. Sarah Sunde who sent me a very much appreciate late graduation present last week that I loved (thanks to all of you who contributed).

-Happy (late) 21st birthday to Jacob Roed who turned 21 yesterday.

-Welcome back to my amazing students I am so excited to see all of you.

-Congrats to my pledge sister Kathleen on getting engaged

-Go Auburn (shout out to Sarah).

-Happy late Birthday to my daddy who would have been 56 last week <3