Ree Drummond's Stunning Transformation Into The Pioneer Woman

The world may know Ree Drummond as the Pioneer Woman today, but she first found fame in the early 2000s when she decided to write a blog. Not yet known by her nickname, she used her blog to write about both her life living on a farm and her fabulous cooking.

Reading it, one would think Drummond has always been a country girl; it's a natural fit for the redhead. But in reality, Drummond is not originally from rural living. In fact, she lived in both the suburbs and the city before meeting someone in her mid-20s who changed her life. She then found herself in the place she was meant to be, starting her very well-known country lifestyle.

Fans can find Drummond on television, read her best-selling books, and still check out that blog she has kept from the very beginning. She has had quite the life story so far, finding her way to the place she now calls home. So let's take a closer look at Ree Drummond's life and the stunning transformation she has experienced throughout the years.

The desire to be a part of the entertainment industry eventually led Ree Drummond to Los Angeles for college. As The New Yorker reported, the future star attended the University of Southern California, initially studying broadcast journalism. "I wanted to be Jane Pauley," she shared.

After switching her major to the "completely random" gerontology, Drummond spent a lot of time enjoying her early 20s in the city and she felt she fit in well and could picture a certain kind of future on the West Coast. "I'm pretty sure I could've ended up on Real Housewives of Orange County," she shared with People. "They need a fair-skinned redhead." 

But Bravo success wasn't in Drummond's future. She continued to work in Los Angeles for a couple of years. She then eventually headed back home in order to study for the LSAT and prep for her next life adventure. It was meant to be a pitstop before returning back to big city living.

When Ree Drummond found herself back home after school, it was meant to be temporary. But the unexpected happened when 20-something Drummond went out to the bar with friends. As she described in her book The Pioneer Woman: Black Heels to Tractor Wheels (via Today), "That's when I saw him — the cowboy — across the room."

She convinced herself that meeting this man didn't change the facts. She said, "I was headed to Chicago. To a new city. To a new life. I had zero business getting attached to anyone around there, let alone some Wrangler–wearing cowboy with salt-and-pepper hair."

And yet, get attached is just what she did. She ended up staying in Oklahoma, and, at 27 years old, she married that cowboy in 1996. As she shared in an interview with People, "I didn't even know any cowboys growing up. When my friends heard that I was marrying a cattle rancher and moving to the country, they literally could not believe it." It was the beginning of something big. According to Drummond, "They started calling me the Pioneer Woman as a joke."

Throughout the next ten years of Ree Drummond's life, she gave birth to four children — two girls and two boys. And not only was she raising her children, but she was homeschooling them as well. So when her husband told her that he was taking all of the kids with him to work one day in May 2006, Drummond didn't know what to do with herself. It was the 37-year-old's first time alone for hours in years.

According to The New Yorker, she was going to spend that precious time planning for homeschooling, but she instead decided "to start one of those blog things." When she started, the blog was more for fun than anything else.

During an interview with Design and Living magazine, she said, "I just started with a personal blog, free software online and no plan at all except that I would post photos and my mom would read it. It enabled me to express a creative side that I didn't know I had. I lived in the country for 10 years at that point, so maybe it stored up and needed to come out somehow."

Ree Drummond's story of living in the big city and eventually experiencing love at first sight with a cowboy at a bar sounds like the perfect plot line for a movie, and others have had this exact same thought.

In 2011, The New Yorker interviewed 42-year-old Drummond about her success in life. It wasn't long before the talk of a possible movie, based on her book Black Heels to Tractor Wheels, came up. Movie producer Laura Ziskin, who optioned the book at the time, shared during an interview with The New Yorker, "When you look at the book, or you look at the cookbook, you think, I'd like to do that. I don't care if there's cow dung on the porch, it looks pretty good to me."

As the article reported, Reese Witherspoon was in talks to star in the film at one point. Since then, there hasn't been much word on the movie, but fans of Drummond have more of the star's blog posts and cookbooks to keep them occupied in the meantime.

The refreshing thing about Ree Drummond is the fact that she is very honest when it comes to her blog and social media. One topic that she has brought up includes yoga and being healthy. 

She shared her and her husband's fitness goals in a yoga-inspired Instagram Story in December of 2017. She just told it as it was, writing of her husband, "He's a cattle ranching athlete stud-muffin, but he can't touch his toes and he wants more flexibility." Drummond, on the other hand, has no issue with touching her toes. Instead, she shared, "I can put my ankles behind my head and need no help with flexibility, but my jeans are tight and I want a small bottom and a six-pack."

Drummond is honest about her goals, and she's honest about the results too. So how did yoga go? "The funny part is that I got so winded carrying the yoga mats back to the hotel that I had to stop and rest," she continued. "The only thing that gave me the strength to continue on my own was fear of ridicule."

She's a mother, author, wife, cook, and plenty more, but Ree Drummond isn't content simply being a multi-hyphenate businesswoman. She wants to be a multi-multi-hyphenate, which is why the reality star decided to go into fashion, too. A post on her official site revealed her line — which is inspired by her own casual, comfy dress sense — is due out by the end of 2020. "I'm working on a clothing line right now," she told The Pioneer Woman Magazine, as noted on her website. "The idea has been in my head for many years, but ... the reality of it has started to fall into place and I'm so excited!"

Drummond first worked out what kind of shape and fit she wanted for the pieces before moving on to colors and patterns, noting, "It's very important to me that the clothing be gorgeous and great quality but affordable." The Food Network star hoped to launch in stores and online before the year was out. 

Fans are constantly asking Drummond where she buys her signature flowy blouses whenever she posts an outfit selfie, so her line will likely fly off the shelves as soon as it drops.

Motherhood has certainly changed Ree Drummond for the better, as detailed in her bestselling book The New Frontier. However, it's also brought unexpected difficulties, as she discussed in a wide-ranging interview with Cowboys & Indians. The book documented how the family home went in a new direction as each child left for college. Drummond recalled, "When Alex, my oldest, left for college in 2015, it was sad and difficult as is always the case when the first kid goes to college." She add, "But I still had my second daughter, Paige, at home, so while we experienced a void where Alex had been, the vibe in our household was still the same."

Then, when Paige left in 2018, everything changed. Suddenly, their home became a "man cave," where sports ruled and Drummond had to work extra hard to maintain some semblance of female energy. However, the newfound sense of calm and quiet has also given the cookbook author space to focus on different projects and experiment creatively in her own way.