Half term holidays.

The kids have three days off from nursery/school so all normal routines are suspended. I quite like school holidays because you have whole days that you can go somewhere or do something nice, and go out as a family. Unfortunately Hubby is on a semester system so a lot of his holidays don`t match up with the school ones, but the kids and I have a couple of treats planned. Tomorrow we will either go to the zoo or to the cinema to see Chicken Little. I prefer the zoo myself because the kids get fresh air, exercise and tired at night, but we`ve got passes for both so I expect I can cope with Chicken Little if the weather is bad. No knitting though, as Mairi often ends up on my lap during the "scarey" bits. In Chicken Little?

On Wednesday we are taking Granny to Jimmy Chungs Chinese Banquet, a child friendly eat-all-you-want restaurant with a very fine buffet. This has totally taken over from MacDonalds as No1 family eaterie, at least for this family. Not only is the food of decent nutritional content, with lots of salads and non grease laden food, the kids also have to use knives and forks, sit on their bums and behave a bit. I much prefer this to the hysterical grease-laden atmosphere of MacDonalds, the kids love the Chinese food and they get a balloon so we go to J.Chungs. It`s big, bustling and popular with office workers, groups of giggling teenagers, families and even posh ladies in frocks, so the odd loud noise from a couple of kids squabbling over a chicken ball is totally undetectable. And as a real bonus it costs almost the same as going to MacDonalds, and I get coffee cake for dessert.

Maybe. The New Year diet started ...*ahem* ...Feburary. Two weeks down and eight pounds gone. I`m not telling you how much more there is to lose, but belive me, I may be talking about diets for quite a while! I lost 30lbs a couple of years ago on the Rosemary Conley low fat diet and exercise plan but put it all back on again and then some when SIL got ill and the depression I`d been holding at bay for a while finally got too much. The anti-depressant pills the doc gave me certainly helped me feel less depressed, but they also made me feel slow and sluggish and I was definately running at half-speed for quite a while. The weight just rolled back on. But I`ve been completely clear of the pills since last November and I`m definately feeling a lot better in body and mind, so now`s the time to take some positive action.

I read this very illuminating article in a magazine around New Year, where the punch line was "How many overweight old people do you see on the street?" By which they meant 70+ years old, not 60. And you know what? I see lots of skinny stringy old men and women out there, easily seventy or eighty and still very mobile. But fat ones? Nope. So presumably the fat ones are either dead or housebound with health problems. Made me think. I`ve got a four year old daughter and I`m 47, so.....I don`t like being this fat, I`m not getting any younger and I`d like to be still here and fit enough to see her grow up, so have to get rid of some weight now.