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Happy Chinese New Year! I know I'm a couple days late, but they don't stop celebrations until the 15th when they have the dragon dance. I had to give a shout out because it's a big deal here being so close to China. The year of the Rat is upon us. I don't know exactly what that means, but I do know that my mom, my son and I all share the same Chinese animal. We're all monkeys! My daughter was very pleased to find that she was born in the year of the horse (horses are her favorite animal) and my hubby is a tiger. By the way mom, a pair of your socks that I'm knitting are from a pattern named Monkey. Fitting I thought. They're a pretty lace patterned sock that can be found by going to www.knitty.com and clicking on archives then on socks and then on Monkey. Now you can see what one pair will look like. I thought they were very pretty and I hope that you like them too.
We're all recovering from strep throat and are almost finished with our ten day regimines of antibiotics. I will be very glad when we are. I just found out that they opened a Mommy and me section to the gym last month which means that I can go there with my son and put him in a room to play while I work out. Before no one under the age of ten was allowed in the gym and they didn't offer any type of daycare so if you were a stay at home mom they wanted you to stay at home and work out too I guess. I'm going to start this week and go from there. My friend said that she would go with me, but even if she doesn't I'll be up there everyday ellipticalling my butt off (literally I hope). In my CT they found a calcification in my right kidney, but luckily it wasn't big enough to cause any problems. That has prompted me to drink 2-3 liters of water/liquid a day to keep from getting a kidney stone (I've had gall stones and I've heard they're similar on the pain scale and I'm not going there again!!!). So that will make me ready for all the sweating that I'm going to be doing. I'm hydrated and ready to go. I know from past experience that my diet will fall in line the more exercise that I do. Something about exercising makes me crave veggies and good for me foods and also makes me tend to eat less. It's a blessing that I'll take.
Valentine's came early for me. My hubby bought me a beautiful watch from the GFS downtown that was $80. I only put the price down because it's a big deal to me. I've never had an $80 watch before and it blows my mind and I'm so scared of scratching it. When I was a kid a watch was too expensive unless you got it out of a cereal box or with your meal in the drive thru. It was one of the cheapest watches there (I'm thrifty and it hurt me to watch him drop even that on a watch) as we were surrounded by Armani, Seiko, and Tag Haeur (?sp). There was a Tiffany's a few stores down as well as Chanel, Burberry, Ralph Lauren, and all the other big names that you would normally have to pass by a guard who has to swipe you credit card before you can even get into the place. The DFS is a big name mall with duty free shopping (DFS....... get it?) for all the Japanese tourists to spend their money. Down the street there is a row that I imagine Fifth Ave looks like and those are the actual stores where they do check your credit before they allow you to enter. Want a $10000 handbag from a big name designer? You can find it at the DFS. Want and Armani suit custom fitted, $50 chocolates, $1000 bottle of Henessey, and the most numbers that you've ever seen put on a price tag for a watch or charm for a charm bracelet? Then go to the DFS. You can find some deals and most things are in the under $100 range (but then again I'm smart enough not to walk into Tiffany's and the handbag shops so I stick to the cosmetic counters). My watch is a cheapo, by these standards so it makes me feel a little better and at the same time I feel very pampered and ritzy as I watch my new watch sparkle on my wrist. It's so purdy!!!!! (Picture will soon follow)