The Year of the Dragon

We use to have a New York City "bucket list" on our wall.  It was all those things that we wanted to do while living here.  That list is long gone (in one of our many moves, I'm sure), but I seem to still have a mental list going.  (And since NYC always has new fun stuff to do, my list is never ending.  I'm coming to terms with the fact that I will never be able to do everything in this amazing city and must accept that 95% is enough.)

Going to the Chinese New Year parade was on that mental list.  This year--our 7th winter in the city--I was going to go!  I marked it on my calendar a month ahead of time even (very rare for me).  The morning of the parade Brian felt sick (he finally caught what the kids had), the kids were bouncing off the walls, and I was thinking it wasn't going to happen.  But, somehow, when I really want something to happen, it does.  Everything came together.  Brian started feeling better, Oliver feel asleep in the ergo on the way there, and Isabella always thrives on being outside--so she was a trooper.

Since Chinatown was going to be beyond crowded we left the stroller at home; Brian had Oliver in the ergo and I had Simon in the sling.  It worked so well.  We got there a bit late, but found a decent spot and watched the parade for about a half hour.  Then we headed to Joe's Shanghai for yummy soup dumplings (my fave!).  After that, and the best part of the day, was when we wandered the streets full of confetti, shot off some confetti canons ourselves and just enjoyed the day.