We are family

I love my extended family. My cousins and their spouses and kids, my aunts and uncles, my grandparents.

LOVE them.

It was a great deal of fun to spend so much time with them this weekend.

Most of them are from Saskatchewan, so I don't see them much. But I love my quirky family and every time I see them I resolve to make more of an effort to see them more.

And I have not one picture of any of them to share with you right now from this weekend.

Some of them didn't recognize me at first glance. It was kinda weird to be driving up and see two of my cousins who I spent summer upon summer with growing up look at me as I was waving frantically in the passenger seat and then look away like there was some crazy lady waving at them.

Even my grandparents didn't recognize me at first as I was crossing the road in front of them.

That was fun.

But ya know, I come from big stock. We are not small people. We are tall and we are solid. Every last one of us. I mean, I wear a size 10 ring (even since I've lost the weight). Do you know how hard it is to get a size 10 woman's ring that doesn't have to be sized or doesn't look completely ridiculous because it's so darn dainty? And that's just my ring finger. Forget about my middle finger. I don't wear a lot of rings, not because I don't want to, but because it's near impossible to find them. I wear a size 10 shoe too and while I love shoes, I hate shopping for them. That doesn't seem so bad to me though because my mom wears size 12. Yup, we're not small people. And I am big boned. I don't particularly think that's an excuse to be overweight (though I used to), but I am.

And most of us struggle with our weight. Or should I say most of us are overweight because I don't know that everyone is unhappy with where they're at. Part of it is obviously genetic. Part of it is lifestyle. Part of it is likely our collective love of food. I have some pretty amazing cookie recipes that come from my grandma. And a good, fresh roast with all the garden vegetables and gravy to go with it...all from the farm is one of my most favoritist memories growing up. In fact, I'm not sure that there are many memories I have with my family that do not involve food. We love our food and my grandma and my aunts and mom are all great cooks. And being that my grandparents were farmers...food was important to have a lot of because farmers work hard. Most of us aren't farmers now, but the tradition lives on.

And being around all that; the people that love me regardless of my size and joke around and laugh with me and remember all the stupid things I did as a kid...made me want to eat. And believe me, I did. I ate and I ate and I ate. I made better choices than I've been known to in the past. I didn't eat until I felt so sick that I was gonna pass out. But I ate a heckuva lot more than I should have. And I suppose since I only see them less than once a year, that's not the end of the world. I only gained 2.2 lbs and that's even after eating too much sodium filled McDonald's food at 9 pm the night before I weighed.

I did feel a bit left out though when a few of the girls headed over to the plus ladies' store to go shopping and there was no reason for me to go since I couldn't wear the clothes anyways.

I made the mistake of telling my grandma that I still wanted to lose 10 pounds. She had just finished telling me that she'd just lost 22 lbs and still had another 10 that she wanted to drop and I told her that I'd still like to lose about that too. My grandma gave me a very stern glare and told me I was perfect just the way I was. (And if it wasn't for my inner thighs, I might just agree).

The thing is...we love each other for who we are and don't care about how much each other weighs. We're just glad to see each other. And while I continued to be told how good I looked, I was quick to remember that I'm not done...it's keeping it off that'll be the hard part.