I went to my family reunion this last weekend. It was held in the Black Hills of South Dakota, the most beautiful place I've ever seen. Honestly, I could see myself living there for the rest of my life! The mountains and rock formations were something I've never seen before and I'm extremely grateful that I did last weekend.

My family comes from the Dakota area, mostly North Dakota. Unfortunately, North Dakota is mostly flat land and there's nothing to do near my family's hometown, New Town, ND. My trip to the Black Hills was my best trip ever, especially since it was my first family reunion! My family usually tries to get together every 5 years, but that usually never happens because my family is a bunch of procrastinators (and unfortunately me too...) when it comes to saving money so we actually get together every 7-10 years. I've never been to a family reunion because I never have enough money, but this was honestly the best reunion I could've hoped for! I met tons of new family members and saw tons of great touristy things, such as The Heads, or otherwise known as Mt. Rushmore.

Mt. Rushmore was WAY more amazing than I thought it would be. It was positively gorgeous! Especially the walk up to the seating area where you can watch a presentation of The Heads and they show a video of how The Heads were made, you can even still see the rubble from the when the Heads were first being sculpted! Amazing...Unfortunately, we weren't able to see the fireworks that go on during the summer behind the Heads because it was so windy and SD was undergoing a burn ban, but it was still beautiful all the same.

One of my downfalls of this reunion was my inability to eat the right foods. I DEFINITELY fell into temptation when it came to eating at the cabin we were staying in. I ate out practically every meal during the trip and even though I had the choice to eat the right foods, I chose the crappy ones instead. I ate ice cream, fish and chips, regular lays chips, and had WAY too much soda. I actually haven't had soda for almost a year until I visited a friend in Kansas a couple of weeks ago. She offered me my ultimate weakness: Root beer. We went to A&W and I got a salad, and she bought me a root beer and I just could not resist. The same thing happened in South Dakota. On my list of soda temptations, Pepsi comes second, and that's just what I was offered and I, again, couldn't resist.

My reunion was a totally different story. We had planned dinners and picnics, and at all of those meals, my family had cooked the fattiest, fried foods ever. I come from a fat feeding family that just so happens to be skinny. They eat fat foods, but never gain a pound! I didn't get those kinds of genes and I hate that. I realize now that I can't eat the way my family does. If I want to lose weight, I have to work out twice as hard, especially since I have hypothyroidism, and I have to actually watch what I eat with a microscope.

Even though I definitely stepped out of my boundaries of what I can and can't eat during my trip, I'm determined to lose this weight and I don't plan on messing up that badly again. Despite my bad eating habits in the Black Hills, I did actually work out all day during my trip. I tossed a frisbee and played frisbee golf during the 3 day reunion, hiked, and went walking all around the tree infested resort. When I got back home from the trip, I got into this workout buzz, bought a new book of recipes and workouts for women 5'4 and under called The Petite Advantage Diet. So far, this is my favorite diet book I've bought. It's got a grocery list for a couple of weeks, day by day food plans, and tons of advice to get the most of your weight loss.

After I bought that book and read it cover to cover, I also got on Netflix and began watching The Biggest Loser from the very first season. I've bought the Biggest Loser workout dvd's and I LOVE them. I've never actually seen an episode of The Biggest Loser, but now that I've seen about a dozen of them, I got really inspired to workout. Yesterday I worked out inbetween episodes and even though I feel like crap today, I'm gonna keep on doing it. I actually created my own exercise plan for every day of the week.

A couple of months ago I bought the Brazil Butt Lift workout dvd's or whatever that thing is called. I saw it on a late night infomercial and I was just sold. I never watch infomercials but I watched that one and I was willing to try it. To my surprise, it actually works! I actually like the Brazil dvd's better than the Biggest Loser workouts! Plus, the guys accent is entertaining, too.

I know this is probably the longest blog entry ever, but this one has been a long time coming. I would actually be surprised if anyone read this the whole way through. Anyways, it's time for my workout. It may be raining, but I'm still gonna work for my Brazilian booty! :)