Ms. PiggyBoo

Part 2 (finger & pedi-cure): July 10

Misaki and I went back to the nail salon, Theory, three weeks ago.  I chose a different design and color this time. I always wanted to do a french nail before, so here was a chance. I add a black lace (sticker) to each nail to the french nail. It was good on the picture I found on Yahoo, but when I looked at my nails, it was very questionable. My nails were too short to have a french nail with a black lace. Black lace does stand out. Well, this is still just a practice run. I also did a pedicure as well. Each big toe was supposed to have a marble design, but it unfortunately didn’t come up as I expected. Oh, well, no one is going to look at closely to my toe nails after all.

Part 1 (only finger): April

My friend and I went to the hair/nail salon, Theory, in Saratoga to do my first gel nail. I didn’t know how popular this gel nail in Japan is until my friend, Misaki, told me. I wanted to find out what this gel nail is about and if I can wear for my wedding in October. As per her recommendation, I searched many different colors and art designs of the nail from Yahoo Japan and printed some samples I like. I really liked how this art design and color looks on my fingers.

According to Misaki, it is supposed to be last up to one month! (Her case was two months.) I have to wait and see what happens to my nails after a couple of weeks. Well, this was my first and practice trial. If this will be last long as my friend says, I will definitely try a different color and art design for my next visit!

Mark and I went to J-town to play a purikura machine. We had a lot of fun to take a picture in the little booth and drew on our six different pictures with various signs, symbols, characters and colors. Here is what we ended up decorating pictures. My favorite is green & red beams come out our own eyes. We had a lot of fun

After a 20 month long journey, my braces were finally taken off on March 17. I am very glad that I made a decision to do this treatment.

You can see more details on my dairy-like journal in Journey to perfect smile page.

During our visit to London last month, I found my favorite snack from U.K. When I Google this product, it only sells in U.K.  Bummer!! It is essentially a smaller version of breakfast Pop-tart in US. When I ate this pack in the train back to London central from Dublin, my mouth was full of sweeten and chewy dry berry with crunchy and crispy cracker bite. It was delicious They have different flavors but I love this mixed berries. Yum yum. I wish I could bring back a whole package of these, but I couldn’t find it at the super market except for the kiosk at the train station. I will keep this last package until a month before the expiration date which is currently stated in June 5, 2010. It says a healthy snack because it is only 74 kcal per slice. Not bad for such a sweet afternoon snack.

We are going to leave for a week to London and Dublin tonight. When I think about why I chose these places in February, no idea! I wanted to have (and use) my vacation time at somewhere outside of CA. Going to the warmer place like Hawaii is a great destination but it is costly. It was over $1000 per person to fly out. On the other hand, flying to London, UK (i.e. cold and rain) was a half price and twice long distance. Well, my next trip will definitely be a warmer place for sure

I thought it was easy to make a yarn pompom when I found this web site the other day. In the reality, it is NOT . The instruction on the site was only four steps to make. I followed the exact steps, but at step 2 when I began to cut the yarn, the thing started falling apart.  I was basically cutting the yarn in half around the cardboard. That was my 1st attempt. At my2nd attempt, we put a single strand of yarn between the two pieces of cardboard at step 1 to hold the cut yarn. It was more successful than the 1st attempt, but when I tied the all yarn together, it was a very disheveled pompom. We had to trim it like haircut to do a final touch to make a perfectly rounded pompom.

Here is my yarn pompom. It doesn’t look bad after all, does it? But it was not easy. The yarn color I used was “mint chocolate” (mint green + dark brown).

This year is 2010 and year of tiger Yes, this year is my year (don’t guess my age yet). I hope a lot of good and interesting things happen to me this year (cross my finger). I try to balance out my time between work and life this year. Hey, I’ve already went to the gym THREE times this week. I didn’t go that many in September when I went last time. Well, being and staying healthy is a key to be happy. Release stress to sweat and workout. Well, I don’t do that much yet. Another year and another decade.

I’ve never liked the holidays in the states because holidays here are all about family. Since my family is oversea, I always felt lonely during this time of the year What made me through every holiday sprite without family present was (1) long break and (2) big sales at stores (more shopping and more spending)!! However, since I met Mark, I didn’t have to feel such loneliness during November/December anymore. It is more fun to shop for someone special and see his surprised and happy face when he opens the wrapped gifts. It is a joyful moment.

This year’s Thanksgiving was very traditional to me because we hosted the Thanksgiving dinner for good friends at our apartment. Yay!! Mark cooked a very juicy & delicious turkey and other turkey-related items and I cooked the rest of “must-have” dishes at the dinner table. The dinner turned out great and we had more fun games after the full-stomach dinner. It was very first time for me to see how the Thanksgiving turkey was cooked from the beginning. Brine the turkey with a big plastic bag overnight in our refrigerator. The turkey was supposed to take out from freezer at least 2 days in advance.

This year’s Thanksgiving was the best and most fun day for me. I am very thankful Mark is in my life and I can share such a happy moment with him.

XOXOXO

p.s. I cannot wait for Christmas in Texas.