Hi Readers!
I'm back after a 3-month hiatus. During that time, I was out and about living, traveling, sunning, having fun, and enjoying all that is my favorite time of year.
To pick up where I left off and to feed my need to keep things in chronological order because I'm weird that way...On Friday June 7th, we got the BLING.
On Friday June 7th employees and players were invited to an amazing party at 1 Winning Drive to have one last celebration and receive our forever memento...our reason for working here....the one thing that many of us have been waiting season after season for. The ring.
It was a raining day and in classic Ravens style, the team set up valet parking at the front door so that we didn't get wet walking to into the building. (#worldchampproblems) A group of us city peeps got together and went in on transportation. We had a shuttle from the city to our facility. The excitement on that shuttle could not be contained. We had a mix CD of music made by our fabulous broadcasting dudes to reflect the mood and tone of the evening, which was awesome, in case you had any doubt.
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| Group transportation to the par-tay |
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| Tried on some bling from the first win. It didn't suck. |
Upon arrival we were greeted by helpers with umbrellas to walk into our Field-house. The Field-house is a cool place because it houses our indoor practice field and it's a huge part of the training facility. However, typically, it's not what you would consider a party place. Enter, our super fantastic Special Event Manager, who can turn an ordinary athletic field room into a party palace that once inside, you had no idea you were in a Field-house. The glitz and glamour were breathtaking. The ambiance was upscale, classic with glimpses of purple, lots of bling mixed with total and complete class. Little did we know at the time, that the room was designed to resemble the ring, complete with a sparkly Birdie head rotating in the center bar. Simply put, it was gorgeous.
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| A Birdie-head with sparkles, could this be heaven? |
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| Little did we know.... |
When we entered the room, we were in aw of the beauty and elegance. On the floor was a huge replica of the Lombardi with the words Super Bowl XLVII Ring Ceremony 06.07.13. We were immediately greeted by a one of our photographers. He snapped pics of us entering with our plus ones. He captured our excitement for the night and later when we saw the pics, we got excited all over again.
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| We are the 3 best friends there ever was |
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| Coughlan, Edmond Coughlan...and some chicks. |
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| So you can invite us to a fancy party, you can dress us up, you can sass the place up a bit but you can't take the photo bombing antics out of us. |
The first part of the evening was a cocktail hour. We chatted and reminisced about the last 4 months. We got reacquainted with spouses, mothers, fathers and the groups we bonded with during our journey. After about an hour of cocktail chatter, we were asked to go to our assigned tables (Table 49 for us) and our assigned seats. The tables, like everything else, were beautifully dressed with enough sparkle to make even the most sparkle loving girl feel there were enough sparkles. A hard task, I might add.
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| A time to catch up with some all-time faves. |
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| Always fun when this girl is involved. |
When seated we watched a recap/highlight video of the season that elicited cheers, claps, gasps, sighs of relief, tears of joy, laughter and smiles on each person's face. After the video, Steve Bisciotti took the stage. He rarely addresses the entire organization as a whole but certainly, this was an occasion to address every champion in that room. He talked about how happy he was for each person. He thanked everyone for all of their efforts. He talked about how hard it was to come back and try again after that loss to NE the year before. He talked about coming back and rising up in the face of challenges. Set-backs happen. It's how you adjust to the set-backs and come back fighting that gets you where you are destined to be. He then said that everything we wanted was just within our arm's reach...literally. He instructed us to reach out and pick up the sparkled box that sat right in front of us...our rings were inside.
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How's that for a sparkle box with some major BLING inside?
On a another note, our 2 former 49er employees, sat at table 49 with me. How sweet it is! |
As each person opened their boxes, you could hear and feel the emotions. Pride, joy, love, friendship, winning. Some cried. Some laughed. Everyone smiled and the room erupted in what I can only describe as pure and simply happiness! It was a beautiful experience. We immediately put on the bling and began snapping pictures...as evidence, see below. You should be able to feel the joy coming through. Our expressions will tell you more than my words ever could.
No. Words. Necessary.
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| All-time bestie and my fantabulous plus one!! |
For the rest of the evening, we dined on amazing food, had unlimited open- bar cocktails, danced (and watched Jacoby dance), laughed, took pictures and soaked in every single minute of an experience each of us knows, we may never experience again. The goal remains the same, to win. But on that night, a group of people who will be forever linked as Super Bowl XLVII Champions, embraced that feeling of winning, cherished every second of joy that went faster than we all wanted it to go and bonded in a way that will never be recreated.
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| Yep...that happened. |
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| So did that... |
The ride was everything we thought it would be. And it was so much more. It is something I will always, always remember and I will forever be more grateful than I'll ever be able to explain, to have experienced. The bling is as fantastic as we thought and it will continue, for years to come, to bring joy to those of us who wear purple.
Thank you Steve. Thank you Ravens. Thank you friends!
XO~
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| Cheers! |
