Planes, Trains, and Running Shoes

Today is my 29th birthday.


This weekend was pretty uneventful. Truthfully, all I wanted to do was hang around the apartment. With The Pilot's birthday and my birthday being a week apart, we never really make Valentine's Day plans, but we went and head a nice lunch at Cava Mezze yesterday and then stayed in and ate cupcakes and drank wine.

Today, I'm copying Kristen's post from her 29th birthday and sharing 29 thoughts for my 29th.

1. I am perfectly fine with turning 30. I don't really understand why people feel the need to remind me that I'm almost 30.
2. I think 20 was the best year of my 20s. Since this is the last year of my 20s, I think that means I need to top 20.
3. Life is too short to skip dessert.
4. Sometimes, running away is the answer. I got over my worst breakup by running off to Europe for a week.
5. I used to be opposed to traveling to the same place more than once because there is so much of the world to see, but now, I realize that that's exactly the point of travel. I've been to Paris three times with plans to go back this summer. I'm dying to go back to Lisbon.


6. Peyton's cancer diagnosis scared me more than I ever thought something like that would.


7. I really want to run a sub-4 marathon before we have a baby.
8. My career looks nothing like I thought it would at 20, 23 or 25, but I like the direction it's headed.
9.  I think being an aunt is the greatest thing in the world.
10. Putting the word 'half' before brother or sister really bothers me. My brother and sisters aren't half of anything. It doesn't matter whether we share one parent or two, I would do anything in the world for any one of my siblings.
11. Even though I didn't complete my 30 day yoga challenge last month, attempting it for the second time this month means I'm now at 33 days of yoga out of 45 days this year and I love what it's doing for me.
12. I hate my new haircut.


13. I sold my first car in 2010. I would be perfectly content to never own another car.
14. When The Pilot and I got married, I took his name in addition to my last name and didn't hyphenate them. I think I want to change my name again and drop my last name.
15. Forty-nine years ago, my marriage would not be legal in the United States. It wasn't until 1967 that interracial marriages were legalized. I think about this a lot.
16. My thoughts on buying a home and having kids are wildly different than they were a year ago.
17. I really hate it when people call me Chris.
18. I hardly ever listen to music.
19. I think that the closing of Blockbuster stores is one of the worst consequence of modern technology.
20. I started college as a double major in Theater and Broadcast Journalism. I graduated with a major in International Affairs.
21. I have really mixed feelings about the 8th Harry Potter.
22. I really want to go back to Africa.
23. I wish I could go to culinary school. I have no desire to work in a restaurant, but I would really love to be better in the kitchen.
24. There is a culinary school restaurant in South Africa with my name. I would love to go there.
25. I would move back to London tomorrow if it was an option.

26. I have my work cut out for me for my 30 Before 30 list, but I think it's going to make this year pretty awesome.
27. I went to three different high schools during my Freshman year.
28. I really want to get my PhD.
29. I've been blogging for almost six years and I love it. I have no intentions of stopping any time soon.

There you go. Musings on my 29th birthday.

Since I started this blog in 2010, I've committed to goals at the start of every year and loved seeing my progress at the end of each year.

I didn't do that last year.

Instead, I said, "I don't want to be bound by a to-do list for the year. I want to be adventurous and spontaneous and I want to learn things and see things and do things."

I made a list of some things that I wanted to work on but didn't really care if I did. Those things included yoga, making more food at home, rather than buying pre-packaged stuff, shopping locally at my local farmers' market, reading more non-fiction, saving money, and exploring more of DC,

I started off the year doing a lot of yoga...and that took a backseat. I've definitely been better at doing yoga at home this year thanks to Yoga with Adriene, but I don't think I get as much out of yoga in my living room (with the dog running around me and the oven preheating for dinner) as I do in a studio.

I definitely tried my hand in some Adventures in Homemade - homemade bread, homemade tomato sauce, pasteis de nata (from Portugal), but I'd like to get better at that, and actually blog about those adventures.

Clockwise from Left: Apple Picking in VA, Hiking in Rock Creek Park, a homemade lattice top pie, at home yoga, "The Bully Pulpit" by Doris Kearns Goodwin

I think I shopped at the Farmers' Market once.

I failed miserably at exploring more of DC. We moved into a new neighborhood and I love it so much, I hardly ever left. I definitely read way more non-fiction than usual and I saved a ton of money.

I definitely had some awesome experiences in 2015. I was finally able to race uninjured and did so at DC Rock 'n' Roll, Cherry Blossom, and finally, Chicago. I traveled a lot.

• I celebrated my sister's 40th birthday at the Sundance Film Festival.
• The Pilot and I visited my sister in San Francisco.
• My mom and I went to Lisbon together, and The Pilot joined.
• We celebrated our 1st anniversary in Hawaii and then took off on an impromptu trip to Dubai six weeks later.
• I spent a few days in St. Louis for work, and fell in love with the city.

The Pilot and I spent more time apart than we ever have. He started the year away in training for a new job for 3 months...and then left again for training with another airline at the beginning of December. He left right after Peyton's surgery and it was tough taking care of her by myself. Peyton's cancer diagnosis in itself was a tough blow but I'm so grateful that we were able to act quickly with the support of some really generous family and friends.

I don't think I was my best self in 2015. I think I was selfish in a lot of regards, but at the same time, I didn't really do anything for myself. I half-assed my way through marathon training, almost reinjuring myself in the process. I spent more time on my couch this year than ever before, I turned down a lot of plans and invitations and secluded myself. I'm not even really sure why.

I'll be 29 in 2016 and lately, I've been thinking a lot about where I want to be at 30. I want to be more committed this year...to everything...to running, to blogging, to my family, to traveling...everything. I want to be my best self at 29 and that means saying "Yes" a lot more, and being the adventurous, spontaneous self that has always made my happiest. I'll be back later this week with how I plan to make that happen!

Five years ago I opened up this little corner of the internet.


I was 23, fresh out of college and living in Boston. The Pilot was my boyfriend of 4 months. I had never run a race before.

I posted a list of 25 things I wanted to do before I turned 25. I didn't do 10 of them. Some of them (like horseback riding and learning French) are still on my list. Others (like swimming with dolphins and doing a triathlon) aren't anymore.


Through this blog, I found my passion for running. When I started this blog, I started training for my first half-marathon. I was immediately connected with the amazing running community in the blogging world. To this day, my closest running friends are all bloggers. With the exception of one person, everyone I know who runs is someone I've met through my blog, either directly or indirectly.


Those people are some of my closest friends. Some of them were at my wedding. I see them regularly. We talk, we text, we snail mail. We've met each others families and have seen each other's houses. The idea that we met them through our blogs is so foreign now. Some of them still blog, some of them don't. We're still friends. They're people who are incredibly important to me and I never would have met them if I hadn't started this blog.

Emily, Andrea & Holly

Writing this blog has also taught me to apply a filter a little bit more closely. There are some things that we just don't blog about. Learning, and remembering, to apply that filter to my blog has helped me apply it in my personal life as well as my professional life.

I love writing. It doesn't matter what I'm writing about, I adore it. It's obviously easy to write about yourself, but my new job that I started two months ago? Writer. Five years ago, when I started this blog, I don't think I ever would have started a career as a writer, but here I am...and I love it.

This blog has also taught me about balance. In reading other blogs and getting motivated to work out and train and eat right, I've learned how other people balance work and family life and marathon training and healthy eating...and I've applied it to my own life. The idea of having kids one day and trying to figure out how to "do it all" isn't scary to me anymore because so many other women do it.

I never thought I would blog for this long. I started this blog out of boredom. I never really knew what it would turn into, yet, here I am...five years later and I couldn't be happier.

To all of you who follow my little adventures, I appreciate you more than I can say. Thank you for reading, for commenting, and for supporting me. So, here's to five years of blogging, and to whatever future might be in store!