FINALLY!

Wow, do I have lots to catch you up on!  I have no less than 50 posts stored up in my brain.  Good thing it's so empty, or I wouldn't have enough room for all of them. =)

Let me start by going back a couple weeks.  I did something BIG!  Are you ready?

Here are some not-so-recent, random "before" pictures.  I picked this one cuz I think I was really having a good hair day here.  This is actually from about 2am, after a full night of dancing with Stud at the Mother/Son Dance.

This one is from this past Christmas, with my beautiful niece.  You can't really see my hair, but she's so darn cute, I wanted to post it anyway.

Well....a couple of weeks ago, I did this....

My sister and niece took those at the salon, after my girlfriend finished.  Then, I took a couple more at home, just for fun.  Every single person who looked at these said it looks NOTHING like me.

 I had to see how the new 'do was going to look when I wore my glasses...

I kept this new look for a few days, but then I finally had to see what it looked like curly, instead of straightened.  Keep in mind that this picture was taken on a morning when I had only had 3 hours sleep the night before, so be gentle.

Last Saturday, my cousin and his boyfriend had a big party, and I took this picture with my beautiful niece.  (My other niece took the picture, and she seems to always take pictures at a weird angle.  My legs look like they're 3 inches long.  In real life, they're at least 5 inches long!)

Ok, so that was the first thing I wanted to share with you.  I realize some of you (men!) might be thinking, "Who the heck cares?!  It's hair!"  But, my girlfriends understand.  It's hair!!!  I've had some moments of regret in the past few weeks, especially since my hair was to about my mid-back before I cut it, but for the most part, I'm digging my sassy new look.  My biggest issue is that I can't just pull it back and put it up to get it off my face and neck, but I'm learning to deal with it.

Now, moving on.  You may remember me teasing you the other day with this.

Well, my SIL and I ran The Biggest Loser Run last Sunday!  It was a blast!  If you aren't a fan of the show, you may want to just skip the rest of this post, as I'm sure it will bore you to tears.  If you're a fan though, keep going, so you can be super jelly.

Here we are at the starting line.  How cute are we?!

Even though I have many pictures from that day, naturally I'm only going to share the ones that are the least hideous.

There were professional photographers posted along the entire route taking pictures.  We were then able to go and download all the pictures that were taken of us throughout the race.  Here are a couple of us.

 You have to look closely at these.  It's us approaching, and then crossing, the finish line.

 We did it!!

Now, let me tell ya the REAL reason I did this run.  I just had to go see my "boyfriend!"

OMG, I LOVE DOLVETT!!!

Turns out that one of my SIL's best friends went to college with him, and is one of HIS best friends.  Apparently, she put a call in to her friend, who then spoke to Dolvett.  I was told, on the way down to pick up our packets, "Umm...ok...don't be mad.  Dolvett knows your name, and your story, and he's going to be looking for us tomorrow."  What da WHAT!?!?!?!

He is just as sweet and wonderful in real life as he appears on the show.  He hung out at the finish line, cheering people on, and even crossed the finish line with some. 

When we got to the finish line, my SIL told him who we were, as he was high-fiving us, and he went to talk to us, but I actually said to him, "Um, can I go cross the finish line first, and then come back to you?"  Yes, I really did.  But, I wanted to get in a good finish time!  He just laughed and said yes.

I tried to get some pictures of him from the sidelines, where we stood for a while and cheered on the other runners.

 Yeah....that would be his backside...so what?!

We were able to meet all of the Biggest Loser celebs who participated in this event.  And, God bless my sweet SIL.  She took a ton of pictures of me, and never got into any herself!!

Me and Danni, Season 14 Winner!

Me and Francelina.

Me and Pam.

Good Lord, Pam is a freakin' RIOT!!!!  Every time we met someone, my SIL would immediately tell them, "She lost 75 pounds!"  When she said that to Pam, Pam punching me in the arm, and said, "You fuckin' bitch, that's more than ME, and I was on the damn show!"  I thought I was going to wet my pants from laughing so hard.  She hung out with us for quite a while, and was just hilarious the whole time.

Me and Jackson

He's another sweetie pie.  And, yes, they both have beers in their hands.  Every runner could get a free beer after the run.  Apparently, it's a great way to replace some of the carbs burned while running.  Too bad it was only about 9am when we finished!

Pam, me, Jeff and Francie

When we were looking at these pictures after we got home, it was brought to my attention that I'm in this picture with 3 former contestants, and I appear to be the smallest one in the group. I'm certain that has more to do with the camera angle or something, but it made me laugh.

And, yes, Jeff and Francie are still a couple.  They are adorable together.  Francie wouldn't let Jeff have his beer because she put him on a No Carb diet.  tee hee hee...  (He got one anyway....)

The Whole Gang

Ok, here comes the part where you're gonna be REALLLLL jealous....

SQUEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!

They almost immediately posted the results after the race.  Now, for our first 5k, I actually tried to train somewhat, and went running, etc.  I am embarrassed to say that the last 5K was the last time I ran outside until this run.  I ran on the treadmill at the gym twice, and that was in the week immediately after the last race.  I didn't even go to the gym for the three weeks leading up to THIS run.  ~~hangs head in humiliation~~

All that being said, we actually beat our last time!!  Not by a ton (about 2 minutes) but still!  AND, the first run was very straightforward, up and down the streets of the town I grew up in, so it was all flat and easy.  The Biggest Loser run was routed through some really pretty areas on the lakefront, and there was a lot of up and down on that path!  It certainly seemed harder, and we seemed to do a lot more walking than the first race.  But, according to the microchips in our bibs, we shaved about 2 minutes off our last run time.  Hell, I'll take it!!

Here are the results for my age group (AKA-old!):

I came in 48th in my age group, and 695th overall.  There were about 1,000 runners, so as far as I'm concerned, that's not too shabby.  Hey, I wasn't last!!

We had such a blast at this run.  Oo, and SIL and I played a game, and both won exercise bands.  Sweet!  I can't wait to use them, and tone up my Bingo Wings! 

Sheesh!!  Maybe if I posted more than once every couple of months, I wouldn't be so long-winded, huh?  Well, hopefully I'll be back before September.  Enjoy the weekend!