About two weeks later and finally getting some time to put together my Glow Retreat recaps for you. I am splitting this into 3 parts, one for each day since I tend to write a lot, but I will try to not overwhelm and bore you. To sum up Glow Retreat in one word though, I would say AMAZING! I am so happy I was able to go (it really would not have been possible if I didn’t live on the East Coast since I drove). A very inspirational weekend and I mostly remained in the present, which is very hard for me to do as a planner and thinking about what’s next all the time. Since I was in the present and soaking up all the time I had with the amazing women I met, I don’t have many photos, but thanks to Powercakes and Heather Waxman for some of the photos.
The trip began Friday morning (Aug 7). I left at 8am to start my drive. I don’t know about you, but I always have to pee 12343466 times in the morning so I stopped for a bathroom break an hour into my drive. When I texted Brian that I was an hour into the drive and stopping he was like “oh boy, another 5 stops.” Not really though, I made it another 3 hours before my next stop. Without traffic, Philadelphia to Hyannis Cape Cod would be 6 hours, but I will tell you that driving through Connecticut was the worst! It took me 7.5 hours for the trip and that was only 3 quick stops. I snacked while stopped in Connecticut traffic at 11am Friday morning. Honestly NYC was not all that bad, it was actually continuously moving, but once I hit that Welcome to Connecticut sign, stopped. I didn’t let it ruin my drive though. I stayed relaxed, I had plenty of time before the 7pm dinner to make it there and it gave me time to snack and enjoy the beautiful day, blue skies and trees along the highway.
I finally made it to the hotel at 3:30pm. Luckily I wasn’t any earlier, because I actually had to sit and wait 5 minutes for my room. At least I got a cookie while I waited.
I was bringing my luggage into the hotel when I saw Kasey and Heather pulling into the parking lot. It took me a minute to recognize them. I mean it’s not like I had met them before, I only follow them on social media and read Kasey’s blog. In my head I’m thinking “OMG that’s them!”. These two women are so inspiring and it’s like getting to meet a celebrity to me, so I was very excited even if I didn’t show it. Plus it would have been weird to just run over to their car, right?!
Anyway moving on, I get to my room and quickly change into my swimsuit as I had some time to check out the beach. During this time, they were placing the last welcome basket into my room for my roommate and Kasey and Heather introduced themselves, immediately so friendly and we hugged and were all excited for the weekend. In that moment I knew the 7.5 hours in the car was already worth it and it was going to be a wonderful weekend. [I should also note, Katie was supposed to be there as well but couldn’t make it due to personal reasons. I was sad that I couldn’t meet her but maybe I will get a chance to attend again in the future if they do another retreat]
I drove the 1.5 miles down the road to find Veteran’s Park Beach and hung out and took some photos. It was a little cloudy but still beautiful. I really must get back to Cape Cod to travel down to the peak and everywhere in between.
When I got back to my room, one of my roommates, Hannah, had arrived. We talked for a while about our jobs and lives while munching on our snacks until our 3rd roommate Kaiti arrived. We all talked while getting ready for dinner. I was excited to wear the dress I got from my Stitch Fix last month.
Dinner was at 7pm in the room around the corner from us. We got drinks and then sat down for Kasey and Heather to make their entrance and give us our swag bags. They did a short introduction and we all got pumped for the weekend and then enjoyed one of the most delicious dinners I have had in a while. The pasta primavera was probably my favorite and then the lemon chicken second.
We ate and talked and once everyone seemed to be done eating, we played an ice breaker game. We each got a question, which we didn’t know until it was our turn, some were serious, some funny. I was so nervous after hearing some of the questions because I didn’t know how I would have answered them, but when it came to my turn, my question was “If you had a superpower, what would it be?” and my answer was teleporting so I could see a bunch of places. I just have that travel bug right now and it also would have been nice to teleport home to see my sister after her accident happened just 5 days before this night.
We then went through our swag bags, tons of snack bars, granola, a shaker bottle and more, not to mention the cool Under Armour bag itself. Then we ate the flourless chocolate cake, which I ate so quickly and didn’t get a photo of, but here is Kasey’s artsy photo with me in the background.
It was so fudgy and delicious! Probably not the best idea to eat that at 9pm because I was just wide awake after that and all the talking.
We moved outside to gather by the fire and play the game Heads up, using Heather’s phone. I was terrible at guessing the actors/actresses, but it was still a blast.
Before we knew it, it was 11pm and time to head to bed. I think my roommates and I stayed up talking until about midnight though. So much excitement from the first night and we had 2 full days ahead!!
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