Well – the May issue of Shape magazine came out and I am on page 122!

It is so weird to see me in print!  I talked about this in February when we did the photo shoot.

One thing that I love, love, love is that the cover model of this issue is Ellen DeGeneres!

I am so glad (and my Mom mentioned this as well) that it wasn’t some fitness model, but a real down-to-earth person.  Maybe Ellen will read my blurb and have me on her show (I’ll bring you, MizFit!)

I am so thrilled to be in this magazine, and when they contacted me about possibly doing a story, I was about busting at the seams.  And this was back in October of 2009!  I gave them all the info they asked for and didn’t hear back, so I assumed they didn’t think it was worth following up on, but then I got another email and a phone call right after the cruise in Feb to firm it up.

Since this is all about me, here are some more gratuitous behind the scenes shots of that day that I have been waiting to show you.  Diane can vouch for the dozens of photos they take to choose just one for the magazine.

My sister shot all the photos and video of this, so thank you Colleen!

Getting prepped with makeup by Allie.

(Love that posture 🙄  )

Thanks to Allie and Sara for making me look so good!

This was the shot I was hoping a little that would get used with me actually curling the bigger dumbbell, but I like the one that was chosen.

We did a variety of moves.

Lots of thinking about what different positions to try.  I keep eyeing Sara’s camera 😀

This is Mike (?), the lighting guru.

I was getting a little tired at the end of smiling so much, so I got a little silly. Note how little weight is on this!

The story actually came out pretty accurate, although there are a few things that aren’t quite right, but close enough (I have never worked out in a basement and I cook a lot of chicken in advance, not brown rice!).   One thing that did bother me was the the cover of the magazine has a blurb that says ” weight loss made easy” and my header under it.  My story is anything but easy!   I was a little surprised that there was almost no talk about lifting, because we talked about that at length (you all know how excited I get about it) and no talk of the triathlon, which we also talked about at length.

One reason why I am glad to be included in this is to show a real un-retouched photo of a woman who lost weight and works out, and yet is not stick thin.  You don’t have to look like supermodel to be fit and healthy, and you don’t have to be at a certain weight goal to celebrate your achievements thus far!

2010 has certainly had a lot of things going on for me!