it's election night!

It's finally here! After a long and intense campaigning season, America headed to the polls today to VOTE for the President of the United States. I woke up and put on my Mitt Romney for President tank and sticker for the big day!

Being my first presidential election, I have had a great time getting involved in campaigning by volunteering at the Romney Rally in Roanoke, making calls at the Blacksburg Victory Office, and sending in my absentee ballot a few weeks ago!

Now it's just time to tune in and watch the results stream in! Praying America made the right decision. I am so excited and anxious to see where the country will be headed after the announcement of our President! 

color me rad

Last weekend I participated in my first ever 5K and one of the most exhilarating races I can think of. The COLOR ME RAD came to Blacksburg, VA!!

Alpha Phi created a team and a bunch of us met up on Sunday morning in our all white clothing, ready to take on the COLOR! Kelsey, JFrad, and Emmet were also in town for the weekend and signed up for the run.

After listening to some sweet mashups and techno jams and jumping around with color in the air, we were ready to start the run! Lucky for me, Alli had stitches in her leg still so she needed a walking partner. I am NOT a runner, so this worked out perfectly. We ran a little bit to keep up with the crowd, but walked the majority of the 5K. We made sure to get LOTS of color in the color explosion centers too!

I loved that the Color Me Rad was not so much a race, as it was a celebration! We weren't racing to be first, but racing to get more color!! We weren't running FROM from anything, but running FOR something. We were all just running (and walking) for the heck of it! Not to mention a portion of our registration fees went to Special Olympics.

Thank you, Color Me Rad for coming to Blacksburg! Life sure is better in COLOR.

happy halloween!

It's that time of the year again...it's Halloween! Time for tricks and treats, spooks and scares, pumpkins and ghosts. Virginia Tech celebrated Halloween last weekend, so today doesn't even really feel like Halloween but I am still trying to keep the holiday spirit alive! Here's how we celebrated this past weekend...

On Friday afternoon, Alpha Phi participated in the annual Oak Lane Trick-Or-Treat. Families and kids from the Blacksburg community went from house to house in Oak Lane to trick-or-treat. The Alpha Phi house had cookie decorating, face painting, Casper playing on the TV, and of course, lots and lots of candy! I always love getting to see all the kids' costumes and how excited they are for Halloween. As college students we really do live in a bubble consisting of just young adults, so branching out to the community and participating in this event is something I look forward to every year!

Friday night was Alpha Phi's Black Widow date party. JFrad and I went as Miss Frizzle and Bill Nye. We had a great time with everyone at Thomas' apartment and then at O's Lounge for the date party. Here's to science!

On Saturday, Kelsey, Christina, and I got dressed up again to go downtown for the night! I was a cat, Kelsey was a devil, and Christina was Ryan Williams. I am so glad I got to spend the night with my Oakton girls.

It was so great having Kelsey come down from UVA and JFrad and Emmet come up from Clemson for Halloweekend. I had a full house, but we had lots of fun in Blacksburg celebrating Halloween. How are you celebrating your Halloween?

join the terminello tribe!

It's official! Homecoming campaigning at Virginia Tech is well underway. This past week Alpha Phi started spreading awareness of our campaign, "Join the Terminello Tribe, Vote Christine for Queen!".

I went to classes and organizations to speak, blew up our social media channels, launched my website, distributed almost all of the Terminello Tribe t-shirts and wore them everyday on campus, painted cars, and even launched this awesome YouTube video!



I feel so lucky and proud to be representing Alpha Phi and Virginia Tech on Homecoming Court this year. Every day of campaigning has gotten better and better and I am having SO MUCH FUN!

Yeah, homecoming is a lot of work. But when it comes down to it, this is such an awesome honor and opportunity and I am just going to continue having a blast and giving the Terminello Tribe all I've got!

ROLL TRIBE!

bring on the lasts

This weekend was really the first time it's sunk in that annual events that I have attended and loved for the past 4 years are winding down and becoming a "last". On Friday, I went to my last Alpha Phi Red Dress Gala as an Alpha Phi collegiate member. 

My parents came into town on Friday afternoon and we scurried off to Squires Commonwealth Ballroom for the Gala. This was my Dad's first time attending Red Dress Gala, and I was so happy to have both of them there to celebrate my senior year with Alpha Phi. 

We had never held Red Dress Gala in Squires before, but it ended up being the perfect venue! The decorations looked great, the food was delicious, the band was awesome, the silent auction was on point, and of course, everyone looked great in their red and black dresses.

I think everyone in attendance had an amazing and unforgettable night, and we even raised over $10,000 for the Alpha Phi Foundation. 

The next morning started off at 9:30am with a classic Johnson tailgate. My family and I all went over and enjoyed the delicious spread of tailgate food and drinks. A bunch of Alpha Phi seniors and their families were there and we hung out before the Hokies played Bowling Green at 12pm.

Of course my Dad loves to get to Lane Stadium early, so we left the tailgate around 11am to head over to watch the pregame pageantry. Although we had a rough start to the game, the Hokies took over and killed Bowling Green, 37-0. Not bad!

I feel so lucky to have had my family here with me this weekend to celebrate my last Red Dress Gala and Alpha Phi Parents Weekend. Why do we have to grow up so fast? I wish I could be a freshman and do it all over again. But I wouldn't want to change a thing!!

life is a highway

So last night I made a somewhat spontaneous 2 hour road trip up to Charlottesville for my best friend, Kelsey's, 21st birthday. We had been discussing this plan since summer, and luckily it all came together last week so that Katie and I would be able to meet up and stay with Kelsey at UVA for the night of her 21st.

Although the trip was short, we had an amazing time celebrating with Kelsey and her friends! We hung out at her apartment for awhile before heading to "the corner" to celebrate in true UVA fashion. And of course, we ended the night with cheesy bread. Katie and I were just so glad Kelsey had such a good night!

The true test of the trip, however, came this morning when I woke up and headed to the parking lot to get my car and hit the road back to Tech. As I was pulling out of my parking spot, a woman stopped me to tell me I had a flat tire. I had no idea what to do. I was in Charlottesville. Katie was already back at JMU. Kelsey was in class. So it was just me and the parking attendant.

Although this all may seem to be completely unlucky on my part...especially as a Hokie in the middle of Hooville, there was a lot of positive and good luck in this unfortunate event. Luckily I was warned of this flat tire before I got on the road. Luckily Jesse (parking attendant) was willing to help me change my flat tire. Luckily I had a spare tire in the trunk. Luckily I wasn't in a rush to make it back to class.

I do not want to point fingers or put blame where it may not be deserved, but there is something suspicious about my car's front tire going flat overnight in a UVA parking lot when my car is clearly marked as a Hokie girl's. At first...I'll admit it...I was furious. Why would this happen to me? Why today? Who did this to me? But I gathered myself and my frustrations, and Jesse (a UVA graduate might I add) changed my flat tire despite his preconceived "I don't know how I feel about doing a Hokie a favor" attitude.

And before I knew it, I was ready to head back home to Blacksburg. As I started driving, I got to thinking about all of the good I had already seen today. Sure enough, there are nice people in Charlottesville, and all over the world for that matter, that are willing to help without recognition.

The more I though about it, the more I realized just how much I needed this trip to visit my best friends for 12 short hours. I needed to be tested with a flat tire in a place where I knew no one. And I needed just a few hours to drive and think. To put all my worries away and to not be able to do anything for a short while.

Life is a highway, my friends. Enjoy the ride!

PINK TAKES TECH

After weeks of voting and competition against other colleges last semester, Virginia Tech came out on top to win the Victoria Secret PINK Tailgate Party! The party was set up on the Drillfield and it was a HUGE production. There was an awesome stage for Chiddy Bang and Gym Class Heroes, two of PINK's models walking around the Drillfield, a bunch of pink tailgate games like cornhole and football toss, a photo booth, and even an outdoor VT PINK store.

The party started around 5:00pm and went until around 10:00. Luckily, my professor let us out of our 5:00 class early to head down to the Drillfield to check it out. I met up with Talene first! We explored the Drillfield, got some free swag, and took a few pictures. 

Then I met up with Alli, Alexandra, and KJ once they were out of class and done with dinner. We sat at the picnic benches, drew on the big pink TECH letters, and danced around to the DJ. 

I didn't end up staying for the Gym Class Heroes concert, but I could hear it all they way in Oak Lane all night. Thanks, Victoria Secret PINK for coming to Tech! We had a great time!! 

ALSO, VS PINK recently had a contest among the VT sororities to win free PINK t-shirts to wear at next weekend's home football game. And Alpha Phi won! I can't wait to get my free t-shirt. ALPHA PHI LOVES PINK!