Stamped With A Guarantee To Be Busy In 2023: March

The first Saturday of March was all Olivia at her second dance comp of the season- Energy in Fort Wayne. Jeremy, Isaac, Maw and Sheri came over for all the team dances before heading back home. Grandma Barb rode with Olivia and I and had to stay for the entire day. The best part is Olivia conquered her fear of finally doing the improv competition. There were over 50 girls and she made the top 12, and while she didn't make the top three cut, she sure was impressive. Here is how everything shook out throughout the day.

Jazz -Choreography Judges Award, Platinum, 1st in category, 1st place overall

Hip Hop- High Gold, 4th place overall

Lyrical - High Gold, 1st in category, 5th place overall large group

Acro -Triple E Judges Award, Platinum, 1st place overall

Solo- High Gold

Jeremy had to leave the dance comp early because he was headed to Columbus for the Arnold Pump & Run. The pump and run went great. He went from 203 pounds five weeks ago to 179. So happy he got in the 170’s. Benching he got 29 of 30 reps. Just died on the last one. He said he did as good as he could have ever imagined on the 5k going 26:13. His goal was to go under 30 minutes. Stretch and dream goal was 27 and hit low 26. Got 148th of 771! He loves how this event pushes him to his limits at 44 years old!

Saturday and Sunday Isaac and his Elida 6th Grade All-Star Team basketball tournament at Delphos. During the first day they went undefeated. However, when Sheri/Maw/Paw/Olivia and I got to come and watch, it was a quick defeat. We've decided that we might be bad luck! But we did get Creamery ice cream afterward, so the trip wasn't a total loss.

Next big thing on the docket was me! We scheduled our out-of-state PR industry tours in Charlotte. The companies did a great job showing the students the different opportunities in PR/SM/Marketing. We were able to visit Duke Energy, Lowe's, GlobalLogic, Wray Ward, Husqvarna, and Wells Fargo. We also loved visiting with our alumni students (Joe Clarkson, Blake Lundy, Candace Kaiser and Jeni Kmic) for a dinner on the one evening we were there at Midwood Smoke. It was great catching up with all of them! 

Preparing for our swim championship weekend kicked off with a foot bath and painted toes for Olivia.  Day 1 of Swim Champs at BGSU. The Agozzino’s had a very successful first day of championships!

Isaac:

200 medley relay- seeded 3 and finished 4 and dropped 2.39 seconds!

50 back- seeded 12 and finished 10! Dropped 3.43 seconds. Won his heat and picked out Hawaiian Lei

100 free- seeded 17 and finished 7! Dropped 10.61 seconds. Who is this kid? Won his heat and got those cool sunglasses

Olivia:

50 back- seeded 3 and placed 3. Bad flip turn but gave her motivational for IM. Already qualified for Zones

100 IM- seeded 3 and placed 2! Knocked 0.12 off her already qualified Zone time.

50 fly- seeded 6 and placed 3! Knocked off 1.62 seconds and qualified for Zones(finally!)

We may have left tracks leaving swim champs to drive to Upper Scioto Valley to have Isaac play in at least one game at his basketball tournament. We arrived about 2 minutes into the game, but we got to see Isaac continue his successful weekend from the pool to the court. They won big against Bath, so they got to continue on Sunday. He returned Sunday morning before heading to the pool.

In preparation for Zones, we were at the pool every night during the week with Olivia. I just move into this, even though it took place the following weekend in Geneva, Ohio at Spire Institute. We got to spend the night at Brittney's (first time I've got to see her house in PA) and it was white-out snow storm getting there. We tried eating at three different places before we ended at a Quality Inn hotel restaurant. LOL. Adventures!

Olivia first year at Great Lakes Zones. Zones is made up of 5 states where you have to meet a qualifying time to attend. It’s the best of the best of OH/MI/WV/KY/IN and adding any time to any race usually drops you places. It’s wild. Day 1 wasn’t her best. Didn’t PR in any events. Add 1 second to her IM time and went from being seeded 10 to finishing 18! She was disappointed (while she shouldn’t be- top 30 in 6 events in the Great Lakes region- actually qualified in 7 but can only do three a day). We have her a stuffed dog (she named Gino) to help cheer her up. But Day 2 she reset and came to swim! PR’ed in 50 breast and 50 free and that free… a 3rd place bronze place medal...what?! We are SO THANKFUL for our swimming family at Lima. This is her third year swimming and she has been so happy with how the LIMA YMCA team and coaches have taken her under their wings.

Day 1

100 IM 18/58

50 Fly 29/41

100 Breaststroke 26/52

Day 2

50 Breaststroke 11/70 *PR

50 Free 3/62 *PR

50 Backstroke 23/62

 

Spring break was also March 13-17 at ONU. I had plenty of grading to do, but I also did some things around the house. Deep cleaning and organizing and totally redoing our guest half-bath. There was plain walls in there, but had always been a Disney picture up on the wall since touch ups were desperately needed! I purchased some wallpaper that was peel and stick. I found it tricky to work with at first, but it took me about 8 hours to complete myself and cost about $120 to do the little space. Here are some before and after pictures. Love how it turned out.

Another MAJOR weekend activity this month was Isaac's part in the high school musical Annie! He has been going to rehearsals since January and was so excited to play Wacky the ventriloquist. So proud of Isaac and following his passion for being in the musical. The
name Isaac means “laughter,” and boy did he get to bring it in this part! Elida musicals are amazing! Annie didn’t disappoint. Jeremy and I got to go on Thursday and Friday before leaving with Olivia for Zones, so maw and paw took him Saturday and Sunday. He forgot to put his microphone on Friday night! He also said the prayer for the entire cast on the Friday night too, which he said he loved doing. He hung out with the only other middle school boy, Grant, throughout the rehearsals, and said he loved when they catered pizza in before the shows! I was able to help alter costumes and helped as stage mom on opening night, which meant I got help all the little orphans with their quick changes. It was fun, but didn't get to see the show until Friday night. I did sneak a couple of the photos from opening night from backstage with Isaac. Funniest part is my flash went off on the first one and Isaac was like what was that?! I quickly turned it off and snapped a few more, but he had everyone laughing and I loved it! Another highlight is they showed off the picture they'll be posting in the hallways leading into the theater and Isaac (and Wacky) made the poster. He was tickled pink.

I don't know if it's because February is so short, or because we pack SO much into March, but we are just approaching the half-way point and I have so much more to blog about! So many little things, that if it wasn't just a jammed packed month, I'd be writing more about. But here is a sentence or two about a few more highlights. Ordered a new faucet for the kitchen sink. It's been leaking since this summer, but called Delta and they said since we weren't the original owners, too bad so sad on a replacement. Cool, I'm buying something I like more. So I did. But then it came to the installation, and we all know about Jeremy's handyman skills. Dude, he killed this one! The only issue was the middle hole was half covered with sink underneath and the new one didn't fit in middle hole. So we moved it to the left side and put a spacer in the middle hole. The old set had a sprayer (which is now in the main hose) so we were going to have a spacer no matter what.... now it just sits in the middle instead of the side. No leaks!

The last weekend in March we were suppose to have a dance comp. It got cancelled. Which for our family was a blessing. For a whole bunch more of activities were already overlapping, so all good. Instead Olivia got to go to team bonding party at the dance studio and her swim banquet. This also gave me some recovery time after Friday, which is social media workshop and PR alumni dinner. We haven't had to have either since 2019, but since the world is finally returning to normal, we got to return to this as well. It takes MONTHS of planning for these two separate events. The workshop is a fundraiser for our PRSSA chapter. The alumni dinner is a chance to have many alumni return to campus, while recognizing our PRSSA Chapter members with their awards. This year keynote at both events was Steven Miller (1998 grad) from Disney. He was simply amazing on all accounts. I could write paragraphs about the events, but I just say a couple of things. The workshop was great. We ended up with 80+ attendees who came. All the speakers were fun and informative. The breakfast was catered by the school and cost double what lunch cost, which made me mad. The dinner was magical. Hosted at the Inn, I got to welcome 40 guests and got to see so many special alums who I have not seen in years. I cried at the end- I'm not sure if it was pure exhaustion or overjoy, or a combo of both, but it was incredible to visit with so many great folks. This is year 15 as a professor here at ONU. I've taught some terrific students and to give them a hug, see their face and hear how successful they are, well it makes my heart skip.

Swim banquet was on Sunday at 5:30 pm. We were tasked with bringing food depending on what practice you attended. Since we skipped around, I landed on bringing brownies- plain and buckeye. Since Olivia had dance like normal, we had to pick her up early before heading over. Both kids got certificates for participating in swim. Olivia got her bronze Zone medal and a ribbon for 11th place. Olivia also won the girls 9-10 highest point getter trophy for the team. Yep, I got a trophy from coach too....for helping out. LOL