Procrastination...

Hi Everyone!



It's been quite sometime since my last post so I'll try to update everyone. The weekend after Thanksgiving break was spent at NE-10 championships at Southern Connecticut. It was a long meet, (3 days) but the team held together really well and we all had a great time!
Since then it has been a crazy week on campus with papers, and this week being finals week....eeek.
So I'm officially done with the fall semester of my sophomore year at St. Mike's. It's scary how fast it's going. It felt like just yesterday I was pulling in for orientation in August or preparing for my first day of classes. I don't even like to think about it because I'm going to be so sad to leave this place but I have a feeling I'm going to wake up as a spring semester senior and wonder where all the time has gone. But, on a happier note, I do have two years and a semester left, so I'm most definitely going to make the most of it :)
Today, I had my first final, which was varieties of Christianity. A lot of my friends were taking the same course so we had a nice little study sesh yesterday in the library. The library was actually packed yesterday, but I love it because there's always a quiet spot to find and when 8:30 roles around there's free coffee and cookies for a nice little study pick-me-up.
Also, the campus is so alive with tons of holiday cheer!! We had a nice little swim team Christmas gathering on Saturday and we all listening to Christmas music and dressed up. I wasn't feeling the whole Christmas season but now I most definitely am. We also got some serious snow last week which really adds to the whole effect :)
So now I should seriously study. I have Mass Communications and Society tomorrow, then Spanish, and the British Literature on Thursday. And then finally break! I'll keep everyone update on how things are going, and as always comments are always welcomed! Which reminds me...
Katharine left a great comment on my last post about swimming workouts. I'm so happy you're thinking of St. Mikes. First of all you should e-mail our awesome coach, Jim Donoghue and let him know you're interested. He'd love to hear from you...jdonoghue@smcvt.edu . Secondly, we practice from Monday-Friday 3:30-5:30. We ususally lift about two days a week just to keep us in shape. Our workouts can be challenging but they are honestly not hard to get through and we practice as a team so you always have a great support between our coaches and your lane-mates. (hi christine) I can definatley tell you more specifics if you need to, you can IM me mairead330 or facebook me :). Hope this helps!!

Have a great holiday everyone!!

Happy Thanksgiving!! Gobble gobble...

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

I hope everyone had a great holiday and ate lots and lots. I know I did. I made it back to Sagamore Beach on Tuesday night after classes and I'm so glad to be home. Although, I love everything and everyone at St. Mike's, its so nice to take a break from it all and eat delicious home cooked food. My dad is an awesome cook, and looks forward to preparing this meal all year. We had my aunt, uncle, and two cousins up from Maryland, as well as my two grandparents who are making the pilgrimage to Florida for the winter early tomorrow morning. The turkey was delish, and I had been craving my Dad's mashed potatoes for weeks now. Needless to say, my craving was more than satisfied. Here's a lovely pic of my Auntie, my cousin Sarah, and I in front of our dining room table. Which was personally decorated by Martha Stewart. Not really, just my Mom, but could have fooled me :).

Tomorrow, my mom and I are going to the Vineyard for the night. I'm so excited because Martha's Vineyard is literally my favorite place on earth. Yes, even in the winter. Most of the shops are closing, if not already closed, and they have really great deals at some of my favorite stores. I'd rather skip the black Friday madness and head off to an island. Just personal preference.

I know it's been a little while from my last post. So I'll try to recap. Last Friday, the girls and I stayed out in the homeless shack for an hour. And, of course, it was one of the coldest, snowiest days of the year. Excellent. But, none the less, it was fun and time well spent. We all look really great in this pic...not really... but it's still funny.

This weekend was so much fun because we didn't have a swim meet allllll weeekendd! Not to say swimming isn't fun, it was just so nice to actually experience a Saturday. I went to the Varsity and JV hockey games on Saturday with a few of my friends, and hit up Al's French Fries in between. Al's is amazing. You have to go. End of story. On Sunday, I relaxed and did some major homework. And Monday and Tuesday flew by and before I knew it, I was home. Last week, I also did a virtual open house for prospective students. It was so cool to talk to St. Mike's Class of 2013 hopefulls. Maybe I even chatted with some of my readers. Virtual open houses are really fun and all incoming freshman, no matter which colleges you are applying to, should definitely check them out!

Sorry for the lack in postage, I promise I'll let you know how the vineyard trip as well as our 3 day meet in Southern Connecticut next weekend goes. Hope everyone had a great holiday!! Talk to you soon!

Snowy Tuesday

So... as you can see I did in fact survive the 1650 on Saturday. And to be honest it wasn't that bad at all! We lost to Skidmore College, but the boys team won and I discovered the area of Saratoga, New York is really pretty.

In other news, today it snowed all day! Welcome to Vermont! It actually stuck on the ground too so the campus looks beautiful all snow covered and such.

This week is Homelessness and Hunger week. MOVE, the volunteer group here on campus, has a bunch of awesome activities to raise awareness about hunger around the world and right here in Vermont. On the library lawn, there's a small hut set up where students can sign up to spend an hour, or even overnight, to experience first hand what it feels like to have to sleep outside. My friends and I are staying for an hour on friday afternoon. I think its such a cool idea and it will really open up our eyes about the shelter that we take for granted. MOVE is such an awesome thing to get involved in. In alliot, our student center, there's a big decorated board on the right where they have different volunteer opportunities and activities. It's really informal and everyone and anyone can sign up. They have really fun and interesting things like attending a Senior Citizen Prom, running different road races, or different activites such as After School Games or Dream that help out with younger kids around the area. Next post, I'll definatley write about how shoving four girls in a small wooden hut for an hour outside will go...wish me luck.

Tomorrow, the swim team will have a meet at Norwich which isn't so far away. We only have classes Monday and Tuesday of next week then I'll be heading home for the Thanksgiving break :). It's amazing how fast this year is going by. Just today I realized how close the semester was to being over, and how Thanksgiving and Christmas are fast approaching.

So that's all for now! I've noticed there have a been a ton of great questions on the SMC Bloggers facebook group! Let me know if there's anything I can help you with!

(Also, quick shoutout to Bob and Cathy Watt, my roommates parents who seem to be the only ones who read this! love you guys!)

sdjhjdsgh Is it friday yet?

Hi again everyone!

I hope everyone is having a marvelous Tuesday. I'm currently sitting at my computer, obviously procrastinating, and listening to some of the songs on the new Taylor Swift cd. It came out today and I cannot wait to get it this weekend. I highly suggest "love story" or "fearless".

But anyway, yesterday I had dreaded 5:30 am morning practice and then I came back to my room for registration for classes at 7am! At St. Mike's we use a program called "KnightVision" that helps us register for all our classes online, view our gpa and transcript, and it also helps us keep track of the classes we've taken. It's a really cool thing to use and its super convient that its online. So luckily, I got into all of the classes I wanted for next spring semester. I'm taking:

Second Semester Spanish
New Media I
British Literature II
Comparitive Vertebrate Anatomy
Drawing I

So overall, I don't have a class before 9:30, (always a plus) and only one class on Thursdays. This semester I was spoiled with only one class on Fridays, but in the spring I'll have three, but I'll be done by 1 pm. I'm pretty happy with my schedule and spring semester is my favorite by far. The weather starts to get warm and once swimming is over, I have a lot more free time on my hands. Which reminds me! It totally snowed today! Like legitmate flurrys for more than two seconds. It snowed almost all morning... It was crazy, but I started to get excited for the beautiful Vermont winter that's ahead of us :)

This weekend, the swim team will be traveling to Skidmore on Saturday for a meet. I'll be swimming the 1650 yard freestyle. Yes. 1650 = 1 mile= 66 laps of pure death. No, I'm just kidding. Kinda. I haven't done it in a while so I'm a little nervous, but hopefully everything will turn out just fine. haha.

Anyway, I'll be sure to let you know how it all turns out! Have a great rest of the week! :)

yay Monday.

Hi again everyone!

Last week was quite a busy week filled with meetings about the upcoming course selection and also, I've recently decided on going abroad next fall! If everything works out, I'd really like to go to Ireland. Hopefully, either Galway or Dublin. Last week, I met with Peggy Imai our study abroad director and we discussed different options, what I could study while in Ireland, and the overall process of applying. It will be a lot of work and a really big change but I'm really excited and it will totally be worth it. :)

Also, last week we had a day off from swim practice (A rarity in itself) so the other sophomore swimmer girls and I went to see High School Musical 3. Okay, so it might sound a little lame but it was an honestly awesome movie and it was sweet to have a day off from practice.

And, of course, it was halloween weekend! Halloween weekend is one of the most anticipated, fun weekends here on campus. On Friday was the halloween dance, which I was only able to go to for a little while because of my swim meet the next day, but it was really funny to see everyone having a good time and dressed up in some incredibly interesting costumes. On Saturday, the swim team got together and dressed up in our costumes one more time. My roommate and I were 80's excercise girls. One of our friends has work study in an alumni office, so we got to wear some highly coveted "Saint Michael's College Class of 1986" pins complete with spandex, a sweatband and a light up jump rope.

On Saturday afternoon, the swim team had their first home meet at the Ross pool against Potsdam. I was really excited to see how many fans we had! It was our only home meet this semester so a ton of family, friends, and swim fans packed the stands to help cheer us on to our first win. Before the meet, the girls team made posters for eachother and we hung them up around our pool (see picture). Home meets are always my favorite because our friends from school come to watch and the team overall is just really excited and positive. Little things like being able to see your own poster hung on the wall, or being able to play pump up music during warmup, and having all your friends come watch puts everyone in a great mood to swim well. It was a tough week for us practice-wise, but all our hard work is definatley paying off.

But as always, I'd love to hear some of your comments or questions so feel free to say hi! Talk to you all soon!!

Happy Friday!

Hello everyone!

This weekend could not have come soon enough. It was another stressful week here on campus but an eventful one to say the least! On Wednesday, I actually went downtown to Burlington City Hall to attend my first ever town meeting! My Mass Communication and Society class offered extra credit if we attended this meeting which focused on the country's switch from analog to digital television. It was really interesting to listen to the panel of selectmen as well as special guests Bernie Sanders, A Vermont senator, and FCC Commissioner, Michael Copps, discuss the upcoming changes. It was great to get off campus for a night and earn a little extra credit for my class too!

Great things are happening here on campus as well this weekend! There's a ton of socials, which are small get-togethers in our residence halls sponsored by our RA's and res life. Usually they'll show a movie, have some great food and are a great way to meet people in your dorm.

Which reminds me! I promised to write about the highlighter dance last weekend! Needless to say, it was a blast! Here's a picture of my roommate and my friend and I on our way to the dance. *Note the really cool aviators at night.

Everyone wore white tees and we were given highlighters at the dance. The entire Green Mountain Dining room was blacklight-lit and everyone had a great time.

Weekends are so much fun here on campus. Student life works really hard to provide a ton of fun activities to keep everyone busy Friday-Sunday. Every Friday, students receive an e-mail that tells everyone what different socials are happening in each residence hall, sports games, events happening downtown and, of course, the food that will be served. The Res Life staff braves the cold every Friday and Saturday Night to grill us free and delicious food from 11pm-1am in the quad. Tonight it's grilled chicken. I'm pumped.

Anyway, I hope everyone has a great weekend! On Sunday, the swim team has their first official meet at Bentley College in Mass! I'll be sure to let you guys know how it goes! Talk to you soon!

xo Mairead

And we're back...

Okay, so I seriously apologize for the lack in post-age. But, it's been crazy here on campus the past week or so. So much has been going on and everyone seems to be experiencing that time of year when you find yourself in the library more than your own room. This being said, I'm currently in the library right now. I have a big Varieties Of Christianity mid-term tomorrow at 10. (Wish me luck!) So I've been studying, or attempting to, most of the day. Except for a minor obstacle which included locking myself out my room and needing security to come and let me in. Thanks guys.

So this weekend was amazing because I got to go home for a few days during the Columbus Day break. We actually had today and yesterday off from classes which allowed most of the kids to go home. It was most a lot of students first time being home since August, so it was great to see some of my friends from home and, of course, have my lovely mother do my laundry! Thanks Mom! I came back yesterday to find a lonely 3rd floor but today it was bustling with everyone coming back with a slew of baked goods and other little surprises from home. Being away from home has made me realize the little things like laundry, and a good home baked snack that I so often took for granted in high school. I absolutley love living here at St. Mike's but its so nice to be able to go home for a little and just relax with the family :).

Swimming has been going quite well these past few weeks. Drew (you and probably half the world has already read his blog) came back this week to assistant coach! Needless to say, the team was very excited. Our first meet is coming up on October 26th at Bentley College in Mass. so we are all working our tails off. And, coming up next weekend, is the highly anticipated Highlighter dance!! Last year the swimmers were not able to go because of a meet so we are all sooo excited to be able to go this year! Dances are kind of a big deal here at school. Everyone usually goes and I hear they play awesome music and it's a great time! Next post I'll have to let you know how it went!!

I guess I better get back to studying, hope everyone is having a great week and don't hesitate at all to ask questions, or e-mail just to chat!

Mairead :)

And so it begins...

Hi Guys!


So, Monday marked the first practice of swim season. (Dun Dun Dun) Being on a varsity team for such a long season is hard work, but having awesome teammates totally makes it worth while. We practice everyday from 3:30-5:30 at the Ross sports center pool with dryland and lifting twice a week in the gym. My favorite part of swimming is most definitely the meets. It's so great to have everyone cheering for you and competing with other teams. Swimming is more or less an individual sport but ironically, I think we have one of the closest teams on campus. Even though we have a ton of freshman this year, everyone gets along so well and we all hang out with each other on the weekends.

Even if you aren't ready to commit on the varsity level, Saint Mike's offers a ton of intramural sports that are a great way to have fun, stay in shape, and meet a bunch of great people. Last year the girls on my floor threw together an indoor floor hockey team. We basically laughed our way through every game but it was a great way to stay in shape and make fun of my friends. (Just kidding! Kinda...) Just last night my roommate Catie and I stopped by the 300s field to check out some of our guy friends playing an intramural softball game. I think they're on the road to clinching a playoff position so they were definitely in the zone. So whether you enjoy the love/hate relationship of varsity sports, or just like to smack around a few floor hockey sticks, or maybe you're dying to make it to the intramural championship to win one of those coveted t-shirts, Saint Mike's has a ton of ways to keep you active and having fun :).

So on that note I'll include a lovely picture of the girls swim team from last year on our way to the end of season athlete dinner! Hope every one's having a great week and feel free to ask me any questions or just say hi!

First post! :)

Hi Guys!


I'm so excited to be able to share all of my experiences with everyone this year! My name is Mairead (rhymes with Parade) and I'm a sophomore here at St. Mike's. I absolutely love it here and I feel it's the best decision I've ever made. So since this is the first post, I've figured I'd tell you a little bit about myself.

I'm from Sagamore Beach, Massachusetts which is most known for the extreme amount of traffic right before going over the Sagamore Bridge on Cape Cod. I love the beach and I spend a lot of my time on Martha's Vineyard. (The pic at the top of this page was taken this summer at Oak Bluffs Harbor) :). I'm an English major with a double minor in Journalism and Biology. I've probably changed my mind about 45 times this past year but hey, college is all about finding yourself, right? So I think I've finally found a combination that works! *cross your fingers*

I'm on the varsity swim team and I'm also a member of the Celtic Knights irish step dance group. When I'm not swimming or dancing I can often be found, writing, decorating my very pink room in Alumni, taking waayy to many pictures, shopping, watching Boston sports, especially hockey,and doing a varied amount of girlie things.

My two favorite types of music are rap and country (yes, two extremes) and I love Tim McGraw, Lil Wayne, Taylor Swift, Kanye, Dave Matthews Band, and OAR. (I just saw them live at the memorial auditorium in Burlington last friday! They were awesome!) I'm 100% Irish, and my random-ice breaker fact is always, "My name means Margaret in Gaelic", which is the old Irish language.

I'm a big fan of the Jodi Picoult books and a Judy Blume novel called "Summer Sisters". And, of course, my favorite movie is Mean Girls, which you will probably hear me quote at least once a day. (Just ask Christine, my friend, teammate and fellow smc blogger).

As any typical swimmer, I dedicate a large portion of my day to sleeping and eating, as well as centering my nightly schedule around The Hills and significant trips to the Knight Stand cafe. I count down the days until weekends here on campus with some of the greatest friends you will ever meet.

I dislike Mondays, laundry, losing my keys/knightcard, and realizing I've spent more time on Facebook rather than doing my homework.

So all and all, I'm a pretty interesting person and I hope you enjoy my daily occurrences. Please friend me on facebook, email me, or anything at all! I'd love to get to know you!!

Mairead :)