Pre-Meeting Uploads

Yup, I have a meeting with Bada-Bada today.....and I figure it's going to take forever, so I'm uploading all the LOs I've done so far for the guest books first thing this morning.

40th WEDDING ANNIVERSARY 6
40th WEDDING ANNIVERSARY 7
40th WEDDING ANNIVERSARY 8
40th WEDDING ANNIVERSARY 9
40th WEDDING ANNIVERSARY 10

And since I can only upload a maximum of 5 layouts per day to most galleries, I'm going to stop here. :)

Could We EAT Any More?!?!

Ahhh, Sundays.....a day of family, ergo, a day of EATING. The whole day. I guess we were lucky in a way that Japa had a dragon boat race early in the morning (which, for the life of me, I could NOT get up for!), otherwise we would most likely be eating breakfast at Sweet Inspirations. Buffet of course.

As it was, I was busy scrapping like heck to try and get more layouts done for the guest books of mom and dad for the anniversary AND downloading tons of stuff from Royanna at Divine Digital. Around 930 am, Mom calls me and says we're going to be having lunch at Freska. Buffet of course. Hehehe.

We go to Freska and the instant I saw the baked oysters, that was it. I piled at least a dozen on my plate, plus crab fried rice and I pretty much gorged on them. Sigh. Then there was mais con hielo (corn with ice and milk) which Boydee made for me.....and tasted like he dumped sugar in my bowl! But it was goooood! :)

After lunch, we vegged out at home, the kids doing Kumon and watching TV, Raine went with Japa to a friend's birthday lunch and a game of poker, and me doing the same things I did in the morning. Downloading like crazy....until the kids started complaining that our internet connection was incredibly slow, hehehehe! So I compromised and said I'd be downloading only TWO things at a time and no more. And yes, it took the entire afternoon!

For dinner, Lola was treating everyone to King One, a hot pot place in Macapagal Avenue (ugh--sooooo far!). And yes, you guessed it, of COURSE it was buffet style! Hahahahaha! I swear, this family LIVES TO EAT!

I normally detest hot pot kind of cooking---you know, where you have a huge bowl of soup in front of you and you dump all sorts of ingredients in to cook them, then eat everything from the bowl---but I sort of enjoyed this evening's food! I guess this is an indication that I must must MUST see my doctor!!! I need my meds to stop me from eating too much!!!

And with all the "activity" today ---more like, NON-activity!!!--- there was no more time to scrap. But we did have fun with the kids with a few games of Mario Kart! Hehehehe.

Did YOU eat today? :)

Welcome Home...

...to Dic and Lai! They arrived from the States early this morning. And the best thing? We didn't exactly allow them to sleep off their travel and ensuing jet lag, because we had dance practice in Apitong today! heheehehe. And boy, did they catch up on a LOT of dance steps and dance numbers! By the time we were midway through everything we had learned, Dic announced that he was dizzy with everything!

It was a productive day: we polished up the finale (of course), practiced Grease more, finished the Grease finale, practiced the Tango some more (this is NOT an easy dance!!!), and the angels started memorizing Dancing Queen more today. So yes, quite a practice! We were all so sweaty and gross afterwards, but satisfied that things were coming along so well. Despite the absence of some people (ahem--Zhar!!! hehehe)

Because Japa had a dragon boat race tomorrow, we rushed to attend the 6 pm mass at della Strada before heading over to La Vista for dinner.

While at Apitong, in between dances, I would stand by my laptop to scrap. Frantically trying to finish as much pages as I can so that we can have these printed out for the guest books of Mom and Dad. Thank goodness Apitong has good indoor lighting...despite the blinds being drawn (we didn't want the neighbors to wonder what in the heck we were all doing moving our bodies, hehehe) I had no problem scrapping AND even showing off to Mavie, RJ's wife, about the joys of scrapbooking :)

Wanna see what I've done so far? Of course you do! hahahaha

40th WEDDING ANNIVERSARY 1
40th WEDDING ANNIVERSARY 2
40th WEDDING ANNIVERSARY 3
40th WEDDING ANNIVERSARY 4
40th WEDDING ANNIVERSARY 5

And that's that! Yes, I used all CT kits, so two birds with one stone for sure! Quite a PRODUCTIVE day!!!

Chinese Date

Boydee and I *were* supposed to have a meeting regarding the website, but it was a good thing I mentioned it to Japa.....apparently, Marketing has been talking to a guy about advertising, branding and setting up a website. Grrrr! Talk about lack of coordination, man! Oh well. Anyway, the guy went to the office for a meeting with Mario, so I sat in a little bit.

Turns out he's an Iglesia ni Kristo, but is getting some flak from his parents for wearing a St Therese bracelet, the ones we give out I think. I'm not sure if it's just a ploy to cement our account, but it seems he has been questioning his sect for a few months (years?) now. He doesn't like the feeling of being brainwashed and being compelled to do this or that. He basically wants the freedom to think for himself. And he mentioned that whenever he has gone to the Shrine, a feeling of PEACE encompasses his whole being.

Which, I think, is one of the primary purposes of why we put up the Shrine the way it is. TO give people the peace that they are looking for in this uber-busy, frantically-paced world we live in. ANd if a person ups and tells us about this, we rejoice with him or her.

So, about my Chinese date. It was none other than Japa, hehehe. He was craving for dimsum, so off we went to Xintiandi at Crowne. Yum yum yum! It was a great lunch, and we had some pretty good conversation as well. We had a late lunch, which translated to being late for the meeting with the ad guy above, but hey, it was an actual date: just the two of us. If I really think about it, it's been a super duper long time since we've gone out like that sans kids. Sure, it was lunch time instead of dinner, but I'm not complaining. Besides, I'd rather be home in the evenings to catch up on the kids' homework. And play Mario Kart with them. Ahhhh.....parenthood. Hehehehe.

Because I didn't do website stuff anymore, and I didn't want to do salary stuff, I did anniversary stuff. I finally broke out the DVDs and CDs of scanned photos and categorized them. Not an easy job if we're talking about over 2,000 photos! But I am HAPPY to see that the SLIDES of mom and dad's ORIGINAL wedding, despite their very small size, came out with excellent quality when scanned!!! I am SOOO excited to be scrapping with those photos for sure! They were so clear and with practically NO noise at all! Beautiful! It was a good thing Stella found those when she was fixing mom's room in the States!

I scrapped today, trying to finish up some CT stuff:

LEGOLAND HELICOPTER
THE LOUVRE

TTFN!

Working and Scrapping

Nah, not together, though how I wish! It was work, work, work at work today, hehehehe. Since I sat down at my desk at a little bit past 10 am to a little bit before 7 pm. Sigh! I'm going to get old and gray fast, at this rate! Just trying to finish what Boydee wants tomorrow.

Admittedly, I have been able to squeeze in some anniv time, some scrapping (mostly downloading) time, and some ME time (facebook games, hehehe) in between all those hours of work. AND....I've been milking the time I have while inside the car...I've been starting layouts and so far it's been pretty productive for me. Sure, I'd get super duper dizzy, but during traffic times, this laptop is a godsend!

Here are my scraps today: (yes, as in plural, yeah!)

SPLASH
PROJECT BLUE WHALE

Off to try and scrap some more! I have to, you know...because I know it'll be all work again tomorrow! G'night!

Dance Fever

Another practice down, a few more to go! We started on time (sort of) and was able to make headway into the Grease number. The kids were so cute too! But I'm a bit leery of this part of the dance since I'm not too comfortable with the hip hop kind of steps. Well, I guess they're sort of retro, but still! I don't dance very well! Hehehehe.

We reviewed the tango and Japa and I were bumping into each other for some reason. And we forgot SOME steps, aaaargh! The best part though was when Margot and Noli did a round-robin type of exercise where they danced with every single one of us. The whole dance seems so easy when Noli was leading; he would make this little cue marks from his hand and I just knew what was going to happen next. When it was Japa and me, ummm.....well, he kept accusing me of leading, bwahahahahaha! At least he got some tips from Margot on how to hold his partner properly! I was right all along--the upper body MUST be stiff and his hand and arm had to hold my arm up. Hah!

The angels started their Dancing Queen routine and it was perfect for them: all prim and proper and nothing fast at all. We all wanted to do it, because the costumes were going to be amazingly funky, but I don't think we can because of the order of the dances. I still have to study it to see if we can put the kids in.....they really REALLY want in on this dance number!

Tita Paloming showed up and was totally gung ho about dancing! Too funny! She was trying to convince either Carlo or Tito Ricky to stand up and do the tango with her because she was dying to dance it! Hehehe. Maybe on Saturday they'll take pity on her.

The finale is coming along nicely. I think it's going to look FAB just because we've got lots of people dancing it! And we've memorized it so just a little bit of tweaking here and there and we should have it down pat.

That's it! Too tired to do anything else.....

How the Saying Came About

Just wanted to share. This was forwarded to my email and I love stuff like this, so I figured it was good to post it here and share, too; besides, I didn't want this to get lost in my inbox :

Most people got married in June because they took their yearly bath in May, and still smelled pretty good by June. However, they were starting to smell, so brides carried a bouquet of flowers to hide the body odor. Hence the custom today of carrying a bouquet when getting married.

Baths consisted of a big tub filled with hot water. The man of the house had the privilege of the nice clean water, then all the other sons and men, then the women and finally the children. Last of all the babies. By then the water was so dirty you could actually lose someone in it. Hence the saying, Don't throw the baby out with the Bath water.

Houses had thatched roofs-thick straw-piled high, with no wood underneath. It was the only place for animals to get warm, so all the cats and other small animals (mice, bugs) lived in the roof When it rained I T became slippery and sometimes the animals would slip and fall off the roof. Hence the saying It's raining cats and dogs.

There was nothing to stop things from falling into the house. This posed a real problem in the bedroom where bugs and other droppings could mess up your nice clean bed. Hence, a bed with big posts and a sheet hung over the top afforded some protection. That's how canopy beds came into existence.

The floor was dirt. Only the wealthy had something other than dirt. Hence the saying, Dirt poor. The wealthy had the slate floors that would get slippery in the winter when wet, so they spread thresh (straw) on floor to help keep their footing. As the winter wore on, they added more thresh until, when you opened the door, it would all start slipping outside. A piece of wood was placed in the entranceway. Hence the saying a thresh hold.

In those old days, they cooked in the kitchen with a big kettle that always hung over the fire. Every day they lit the fire and added things to the pot. They ate mostly vegetables and did not get much meat. They would eat the stew for dinner, leaving leftovers in the pot to get cold overnight and then start over the next day. Sometimes stew had the food in it that had been there for quite a while. Hence the rhyme, Peas porridge hot, peas porridge cold, peas porridge in the pot nine days old.

Sometimes they could obtain pork, which made them feel quite special. When visitors came over, they would hang up their bacon to show off. It was a sign of wealth that a man could bring home the bacon. They would cut off a little to share with guests and would all sit around and chew the fat.

Bread was divided according to status. Workers got the burnt bottom of the loaf, the family got the middle, and guests got the top, or the upper crust.
Lead cups were used to drink ale or whiskey. The combination would sometimes knock the imbibers out for a couple of days. Someone walking along the road would take them for dead and prepare them for burial. They were laid out on the kitchen table for a couple of days and the family would gather around and eat and drink and wait and see if they would wake up. Hence the custom of holding a wake.
England is old and small and the local folks started running out of places to bury people. So they would dig up coffins and would take the bones to a bone-house, and reuse the grave. When reopening these coffins, 1 out of 25 coffins were found to have scratch marks on the inside and they realized they had been burying people alive. So they would tie a string on the wrist of the corpse, lead it through the coffin and up through the ground and tie it to a bell. Someone would have to sit out in the graveyard all night (the graveyard shift) to listen for the bell; thus, someone could be, saved by the bell or was considered a dead ringer.

And that's the truth...Now, whoever said History was boring ! ! !

Thanks to Mario M for sending this! :)

We learn something new everyday, eh? ;)

Stroking Ruffled Feathers and Work

Remember my tirade yesterday? Well, Richelle Dee, our contact person and liaison for the corporate online banking, called me to apologize profusely about everything that happened. Rightly so, in my opinion. I mean, sure, I regret the harsh words and the almost-yelling-at-the-top-of-my-voice voice I used, but if I'm the client, by golly, I *expect* some decent customer service! I don't take crap at all, especially when used in a certain tone of voice! Grrr!

Anyhoo, my ruffled feathers have been successfully smoothed. You can breathe easily now, Bang, hehehehe. I have been appeased by Richelle....she knows what she's doing and BDO is lucky to have her. Imagine if all their clients were like me....they'd have NO clients at all! Hehehe. Or at least, everyone would be on the verge of pulling their accounts out, eh?

I've been stuck in the office the whole day yesterday. Desperately trying to make headway into stuff that Boydee is demanding I do. :) Love you, Boyds! Yeah, yeah, I'm pulling my weight--or at least, trying to! I don't think I've made much headway although I'm pretty much done with the organizational charts. Sort of. Just a little bit of polishing done. Tomorrow will be the daunting task of figuring out salaries and salary scales, position grades, and all that lovely stuff.

I think what I'm going to do is time myself. A few hours for MVC, a few hours for the columbarium, and a few hours for anniversary stuff. If there's time left over, maybe squeeze in a few MINUTES for ME! Hehehehe. Sigh. Really, all I can do now is laugh...because if I don't, I'd probably end up in tears....not because I feel sorry for myself but tears of rage because I have GOT to finish this on time! Yup, self-imposed deadlines set which I stupidly blurted out to Boydee. Oh well. I work best with a deadline of some sort anyway :)

I went home in time to check the homework of the kids, play some Mario Kart with them (won one team game, lost one), print out photos that Ranger needed for school, and scrap a page. I started this in the car earlier today on the way to work. Obviously, I didn't get to work on it at the office, so I just uploaded this tonight:

THROUGH OUR EYES

I love how this turned out, don't you? Pretty cool! I love Nina Scrap's templates and how you can make them simple as is, or totally embellish them, the way I did (sort of). Find more of Nina's awesome designs here.

TTFN!

My Refrigerator Tells Me.....

this:

What Your Fridge Says About You

You like to be surrounded by things you love. You aren't exactly greedy, but you can be materialistic at times. You tend to be a fairly thrifty person. You splurge occasionally, but you're mostly a saver. You are a very adventurous person. You love to try new things, and you get bored very easily. You are responsible, together, and mature. You act like an adult, even when you don't feel like it. You are likely single - and a workaholic.

What Do the Contents of Your Refrigerator Say About You?

Second to the last line: so true :)

Last line: SO NOT!!! Hhehhee. What are these quizzes telling me?!?!? Fun eh?

Raining and Draining

Because of the ferocious storm that ripped through the city the whole day yesterday, the Department of Education declared that there were no classes for all levels today. Dapat lang, no! A lot of streets were flooded, people had died, and there were a lot of people who were rendered homeless because their shanties had been blown away by the winds. All in all, not a pretty situation. Sigh! I think most people in the city were surprised by the storm because it had suddenly veered inward, into the middle of the country, instead of touching just the northern tip and exiting into the seas.

Despite the fact that I was soooo inclined to stay home with the kids who would be playing Mario Kart the whole day (hehehehe), work beckoned. Turns out I had TONS to do, after a marathon 3.5 one-on-one meeting with el presidente! Sheesh! I was smart though, I had Bechay order McDonald's to tide us over during the meeting. And was I right!!! Sigh! My head hurts trying to think of everything I have YET to do!!!

Time to pull my weight...and my keep, hehehehe. Seriously, I do need to buckle down and start finishing up tons of stuff just so I can say I've had a hand in this and that! But oh my gulay! I'm drowning in lists and I have yet to start! Heheheeehe. Tomorrow is a new day! Starting tomorrow!

And the draining part of this whole day? Damn BDO---that's BANCO DE ORO, in case someone wants to read on about the god-awful service they give their corporate online banking clients!!! First off, I was already P.O.d that I had yet been locked out of our account. Me, an authorizer!!!! How and why? Because the server was soooo slow, it probably wasn't recognizing any passwords that were being typed in! I had to keep calling every single time I had to use their stupid system just so someone could reset the number of times I was trying to log on! How inane can they get?!?!?

Another thing, the inept A$$ that answered me on the phone could not understand why I was so upset. And if you're upset, you tend to yell. A bit. And the a$$ (Rex Alcantara) had the gall and temerity to tell me that if I didn't stop shouting he would be forced to put the phone down!!! How $HITTY is that?!?!? But of course that riled me even further!!! I yelled at him that I refused to talk to him and DEMANDED a supervisor. I didn't care if he told me that he was empowered to make decisions, he was still an assistant (said with sarcasm dripping from my entire mouth!!!).

While I was being put on hold for yet another agonizing period of 20 minutes or so (there is NO exaggeration here!), mr a$$ alcantara most likely overheard me saying to a secretary who had happened in on the phone call that I wanted her to look for the contact person and phone number of the person Bang had called to set up this imbecilic and archaic online banking system because I was THIS close to pulling our entire account from freakin' BDO!!!

Apparently, he heard me because suddenly he was all nice and sugary sweet. Yeah right. Whatever, dude! I am NOT a dingbat like you! He asked for my number and told me that he would have a supervisor call me. And me, wanting to make it harder for hum (HMP!) demanded how long it would be. He said 15 minutes. And I put the phone down. No, I didn't exactly slam the phone down, but I so wanted to.

Exactly 15 minutes later, the supervisor, Marie I think it was, called me. She was all apologies and calming down ruffled feathers. Yeah, well, it takes a lot more than talk to calm me down. I want excellent service and by God, I was going to get it!!!

Anyhoo, this Marie consented to email me a reset password (because their archaic system wanted me to WRITE to them.....not an email, not a fax, but an actual kill-the-tree kind of letter on PAPER!!!). Which was all and good, but then this chick didn't know when to stop. She kept repeating that this was the first and last time they were going to do this for me because their (old system) policy was for a letter to be sent to them. Fine. The first time she said it. But did she have to keep repeating her damn spiel for 5 million times?!!? I swear, every other sentence she said was this particular spiel!!!

Which obviously, got my goat yet again and sent me on another tirade. Again. I cut her off and told her in this REALLY bitchy voice (my brothers know this voice) "stop repeating what you're saying. I am not deaf, I heard you the first time around and I do not need to hear it another 5 million times!!!" or something to that effect.

Ugh, I swear! If it weren't for the EXCEPTIONAL service (so far) I get from being a platinum credit card holder of theirs, I would be so OUT of BDO right now!

So there!

And how was YOUR day? Hehehehe.

Storm, Floods, Brownouts

We woke up around 345 am to the sound of winds howling. Strongly. Apparently, Frank the storm had veered off its original course and had, instead, gone through Metro Manila. Our auto air conditioning had shut off, and it was slowly starting to get warmer, despite the storm raging outside. Japa and I simply acknowledged to each other that the power had gone out and we promptly fell asleep again.

We finally got up to questions like, "Mom, is it brownout?", "Mom, do we have electricity yet?" , and my personal favorite, "Mom, if it's brownout does that mean we can't use the computers?" Grrrr..but I must admit they were a little bit funny, especially since we figured the kids were bored out of their minds because they couldn't watch tv. And this was before 8 am!!!

We went to mass at 930...slightly late as we braved the pouring rain. Even the church had no power, so the priest was saying mass at a makeshift, much smaller alter and we were straining our ears to hear both the priest and the lector and readers. The priest said that we were all such an inspiration to him as we hadn't minded the storm..just so we could attend mass. He mentioned that the 2 earlier masses also had lots of people in attendance despite the storm.

Listening to the news, floods are everywhere as a result of the storm. A ship carrying 700 passengers had also capsized, with 12 deaths reported so far. Not an auspicious start to the week at all. Even our offices had been flooded although they were in the other wing, thank goodness!

We stayed in La Vista the whole day since they had a generator. The power did come back on a little bit before 2 pm.

We say What Happens in Vegas and it was pretty funny. It was a much-needed lighter fare than any of the movies currently showing which, based on previous posts, we had pretty much watched a majority of.

Two people discover they've gotten married following a night of debauchery in Vegas, with one of them winning a jackpot after playing the other's quarter. The pair trys to undermine each other and get their hands on the money... falling in love along the way.

An almost improbable film, but highly entertaining nevertheless. It did occupy me somewhat, as I actually let go of my laptop just so I could pay attention to the conversations going on in the movie. :)

I did some major scrapping today, though, which was good!

MACAROONS
NEVERS
ST BERNADETTE

And now I'm pooped! The 3 bigger kids are staying the night in La Vista, so we have some MAJOR peace and quiet at home right now...which I can't enjoy that much since I am tired and very sleepy! :) Oh well! Maybe next time, hehehehe.

TTFN!

Fitting #1

Lola, Zhar and I went to Tatang's to try on the beginnings of our gown for the Ruby Anniversary. Lola's was pretty, in a chartreuse, i.e., lime, color which totally took years off her age. When my gown was brought in, I started squealing with glee, and clapping my hands, hehehehe. It was a wonderfully vibrant RED color---just what I wanted!!!

Aureo Alonzo has been making Lola's gowns ever since....decades ago. With the exception of Mom's wedding dress, he has made Mom's gowns for special occasions, including her silver wedding anniversary gown. Tatang was also the one who did my 2 debut gowns and my own wedding gown. I remember telling Japa that we can cut corners on anything in our wedding EXCEPT my gown. Ever since I could understand wedding gowns and couturiers, I had always dreamed about having the famous Aureo Alonzo make my gown :)

Anyway, as was Tatang's style, I had expected to be stepping into a white, cotton sheath that would serve as the basis of my gown for the anniversary. To my surprise and delight, the pin-woman (you know, the one who had all the pins in a pincushion in her hands and would adjust my gown and pin everything in place) brought in actual, *colored* gowns for us to try on! Hehehe. And no, there was absolutely NO design showing what our gowns would look like, as is Aureo's style. Oh well. We just trust him to come up with fahbulous creations for us! :)

We spent the rest of the day in La Vista. I stayed in Boydee's room, occasionally stealing glances at the tv playing 3 different kinds of movies, while scrapping. It was a slow day, scrapping wise, but I did finish this:

PEAS IN A POD

TTFN!

An Intervew and (another) Movie

I went to meet Ditas of Baby Mag for an interview. A good friend and former teammate from Dragon Boat oh-so-many years ago, Anna Marco, had told Ditas about me when Ditas approached her in search of an athletic mom. Umm......yup. Athletic mom. I did tell Ditas via text that I was NOT an athletic mom, although I *was was was* athletic in the olden days! Heheheehe.

Well, I guess Ditas was looking for an athlete (former or still an athlete---whew!) who had kids. And apparently, Christine Jacobs and all the other famous mom/athletes were too used and written about, so there I was, at 2 pm, sipping a Mocha frap in a Starbucks booth, talking a mile a minute to Ditas.

And holy moly, I talked her ear off for 2 hours straight!!! Yikes! Hahahahahaa! I didn't know I had sooo much to say! :) And of course we had a discussion on raising kids, influences in parenting, and parenting styles. Stay tuned for the August edition, hehehe.

We met the kids at Eastwood to watch yet another movie. This is what, the 4th movie in the past week or so? Hehehe.

Maxwell Smart is on a mission to thwart the latest plot for world domination by the evil crime syndicate known as KAOS. When the headquarters of U.S. spy agency Control is attacked and the identities of its agents compromised, the Chief has no choice but to promote his ever-eager analyst Maxwell Smart, who has always dreamt of working in the field alongside stalwart superstar Agent 23. Smart is partnered instead with the only other agent whose identity has not been compromised: the lovely-but-lethal veteran Agent 99. As Smart and 99 get closer to unraveling KAOS' master plan--and each other--they discover that key KAOS operative Siegfried and his sidekick Shtarker are scheming to cash in with their network of terror. Given little field experience and even less time, Smart--armed with nothing but a few spy-tech gadgets and his unbridled enthusiasm--must defeat KAOS if he is to save the day.

Steve Carell was sooo hilarious! The whole movie was just so funny! It was great to see a revival of Get Smart; the tv show was one of my favorites evah! hehehe. The kids couldn't believe that it was a tv show from waaaaay before.....and that I knew it and watched it!

After the movie, the kids were hungry, so we went to Sweet Inspirations (again, hehehe) for a late dinner. Lai, Reese is beginning to love eating there, hehehe, and enjoys it a lot! So hey, a new fave restaurant which isn't expensive! Yeah!!! :)

I finished this page today:

ON EAGLE'S WINGS

TTFN!

Productive Day!!!

I went to Makati Shangri La to make a down payment for the anniversary celebration next month. Apparently, it's the second down payment of P100,000, the first done by Rondic sometime last month. So no need to panic, brothers and sisters, it really was scheduled! Mom of course, panicked, calling me later in the afternoon when she found out I had made a down payment....she said that Rondic had already made a down payment and was wondering why I was making another one. Anyhoo, I ruffled her feathers and told her there was a schedule of payments to be done before the big day :)

On the way back, instead of going to the office, I decided spur-of-the-moment like, to do wedding stuff. So I went straight to Blue Ridge to make a last-ditch effort to find Mom's original wedding dress. Sadly, it was nowhere to be found......although I did find some vintage dresses that the girls may use (if it fit!) for Zhar's soltera in August. So I snagged a yellow short dress to take home and see who will fit in it.

The find for the day, however, was Mom and Dad's *original* wedding album!!! It was bunched in with the wedding albums of all of Lolo and Lola's children. I was almost dancing for joy---and Mayang, Tito Rey's maid, was just looking at me like I was crazy, hehehehe.

So from Blue Ridge, on the way home, I stopped at Kodak to see if they had the equipment to scan these small slides that Mom unearthed at Polaris. These slides were of their wedding, almost 40 years ago. The problem with them was that the slides were all cut up into these tiny, less-than-an-inch size, so none of the commercial photo labs would take them to scan them in. I did try to do it myself on a scanner, but it would take too long. So I stopped at the Kodak lab, just in case.

And lo and behold, they said they could do it!!! At 3 times the price. Grrrr. But hey, at least they did everything in a day, and I asked the driver to pick up the slides and the CD containing the scans a few hours later!

So whoohoohooo!!!! A productive day, indeed! I think I've got most everything I'll be needing to make an album or 2 or 3 for the anniversary......just the scans of the original album left!!!

McDreamy

Ahhhh yes, Patrick McDempsey truly is McDreamy. Sure, I'd rather have Dr McSteamy from Grey's Anatomy, but hey, in Made of Honor, McDreamy really was dreamy! :) He was cute, charming, playboy, yes, but cute, charming....oh did I say that yet? Hehehehe.

Japa and I squeezed in Made of Honor during lunch and it was a treat to watch. Japa said it reminded him too much of My Best Friend's Wedding, but I just LOVED it! It was darling, cute, charming.....here we go again, hehehehe.

But honestly! It was a very lighthearted romantic comedy, and that was just right for lunchtime fare! I was laughing throughout the movie; but I couldn't even begin to tell you what my all-time fave part was though. It was an overall pretty good movie, sure, predictable at times, but so what! It was very entertaining and I love love LOVE everything about it!

And yes, I love movies about marrying your best friend because in all honestly, why wouldn't you marry someone who was a friend first? You get to know that person, all the ups, the downs, the glamorous part, and the part where you both are wet and bedraggled. Your friend has seen you sexy, and has seen you fat.....yes, someone send me a bottle of lipovox now, please!!! Sound familiar? Sure---I had that with Japa :) especially the wet and bedraggled part, hehehehe. So yes, marrying a friend isn't un-romantic...at the very least, the both of you KNOW the other person inside and out and there are no secrets (ok fine, BARELY any secrets) since you've pretty much told this friend everything about your life. In actuality, I think it's even simpler to marry a friend, more than marrying someone who has swept you off your feet.

Yeah, it's nice and romantic to have someone do that...but to spend the rest of your life with someone you barely just met? And I'd rather spend my married life DOING stuff with my spouse than "getting to know my spouse better". Doesn't that make more sense?

Anyhoo, movie summary coming up:

Tom Bailey is in love with his best friend Claire. But Tom has a fear of commitment and refuses to admit the obvious--he should propose to Claire before she finds a less procrastinating suitor. When Colin, a rich Scotsman sweeps Claire off her feet and asks for her handin marriage, Tom must witness her unquestioned happiness up close and personal--because she's chosen him to be her Maid Of Honor.

Can I just say that this movie is cute and charming one more time? Hehehehe. Yes, this movie IS cute and charming and I would watch it all over again! :) Chick flick? Of course! Would I drag Japa to see it again? Heck yeah! (if he'll let me, hehehehehe).

The Green Monster

Nope, not jealousy, hehehe :) I'm talking about the Incredible Hulk, which the kids, Japa and I saw last night. The kids didn't have swimming, and we figured it was a good time as any to watch. We decided against bringing Ranger because 1-we knew he wasn't going to stay still for an un-animated movie and 2-I figured it was going to be too violent for him.

And it was. Pretty violent, I mean. Especially that last part where Hulk was fighting that monstrosity that was a soldier. Ugh. And of course, that was Rogan's favorite part. *roll eyes* Go figure. I thought Liv Tyler was exceptionally pretty in the movie, and I never knew Edward Norton had a pretty sexy side! Hehehehe. In my mind, Edward Norton was always this highly intelligent, clean, decent character; I never thought how boyish he could look and how.....vulnerable I guess is the word I'm looking for.

I thought the movie was cute, too, with references to Stan Lee, the creator of the Hulk: look for the Stanley Pizza Shop, hehehe. Japa caught that one. And my fave were the cameo parts of Bill Bixby (well sort of), the original Bruce Banner, and Lou Ferrigno, the original Incredible Hulk. Japa and I got a kick out of pointing them out to the kids who were surprised that there *was* a TV show of the Hulk waaaaay before, hehehehe. What, didn't they think WE had tv in our childhood?!?!? Hmp! Kids!

Oh, and if you haven't seen the movie yet, make sure you stay AFTER the credits!!! There's a cute and cool reference to what could be an awesome movie to come!!!

Movie Gist:

Scientist Bruce Banner desperately hunts for a cure to the gamma radiation that poisoned his cells and unleashes the unbridled force of rage within him: The Hulk. Living in the shadows--cut off from a life he knew and the woman he loves, Betty Ross--Banner struggles to avoid the obsessive pursuit of his nemesis, General Thunderbolt Ross, and the military machinery that seeks to capture him and brutally exploit his power. As all three grapple with the secrets that led to The Hulk's creation, they are confronted with a monstrous new adversary known as The Abomination, whose destructive strength exceeds even The Hulk's own. To stop it, one scientist must make an agonizing final choice: accept a peaceful life as Bruce Banner or find heroism in the creature he holds inside--The Incredible Hulk.

TTFN!

First Day of School & LOTD

Well! This was less than exciting! Hehehehe. Maybe because Raegan, Rogan and Raine are a lot older now, or again, it's probably MY age, but there wasn't too much of a hullabaloo for the first day of school.

Things *have* been pretty busy, especially this weekend (for the kids at least), so maybe there wasn't that much excitement to go back to school. There was a token "I wish it was still summer" and "I don't want to go to school yet!", but I think it was just because of something to say to try and get a response from me :) I didn't give them the satisfaction of that though; I was half-asleep when they left. I did tell Ruby to take some photos of the kids at school, but I haven't downloaded them yet, much less taken a look at the pics!

I guess I'll just update this post with a pic or 2 of them off to school...just because.

I felt a bit frazzled trying to get their school stuff in order though..there was a last minute trip to the bookstore to get some much needed things last Friday. And I thought I was done. Um, not. The kids came home today with more lists of *other* stuff to buy!!! Grrrrr! And what pisses me off in a MAJOR way is that Raegan's teacher told her she NEEDED to buy the school's dang homework notebook! But from experience, it was a LOUSY notebook to begin with, with the leaves coming off after a few weeks, AND it was grossly more expensive than a notebook I could buy at the bookstore! It made me soooo mad! *breathing deeply here and trying to count to 10*

Anyway, I figure the teacher was new and didn't know any better (and I was right, dang it!) I guess she was trying to impress Teacher Joy. Grrrrrr! Good thing the teachers of Rogan and Raine were a lot more reasonable, since they knew that the school's notebooks were overpriced and not that great. So anyway, I just made peace by buying Raegan the stupid notebook just so I would hear the end of it from her. Ugh. I soooo hate the few days before school starts, honestly! And each year, I vow to myself that I'd be better the next year by getting everything together waaaay early. Yeah, right! Hehehehe. Oh well.

A bright spot today, though, was when I opened my email first thing in the morning. Rina Kroes, one of my fave designers that I CT for, mentioned that I was Layout of the Day over at 3Scrapateers! WHoohooohooo!!! I got it with the page I uploaded yesterday, the Treehouse Boys one. And because it got LOTD, I figure it earned itself another spot here on my ole' blog:


Click on the image to go the 3S thread that says it got LOTD for June 15. I'm not making this up! Hehehehehe!

TTFN!

Yesterday, Extended

Love my title? That's what happened today....whatever our schedule was yesterday, was pretty much a repeat for today. Good thing we were able to go to mass at Celebrity at 6 pm.....as in RIGHT after the kids had showered and dressed. The function room was packed, but thank goodness we were able to sit down!

So today started bright and early.....Reese had to be at the pool at 630 am. Yes, in the MORNING on a SUNDAY. On Father's Day at that! Japa and I were smarter......Raegan went with Reese so at least she was with someone other than her yaya. We told Raegan to text us when the races would start, since I estimated that Reese's race would start close to an hour after the first race.

But if you know my dear time-conscious daughter, she of course texted several time to let me know that it was nearing Ate Reese's race and for us to hurry. Her last text said that it was already event 83, and that Reese was going to race in event 88. I knew though that there were SEVERAL heats in the races in between! Sigh! Oh well. At least Raegan is very prompt in everything :)

So we get there and witnessed Reese's event:

100m Free
Reese - 1:27.64 (1:42.00), 4th fastest heat in division B

After that, we told her we'd ALL go home since the next events for them wouldn't be until after lunch. So off we went and had yummy kielbasa, cheese sausages and rice for lunch. Hehehehe. We cautioned the kids against eating too much since they still had races to swim.

Anyhoo, race times are as follows:

200m Individual Medley
Rogan - 3:52.00 (4:26.60) in the fastest heat of division B
Raegan - 3:38.90 (4:01.00), division A

50m Fly
Reese - 0:44.77 (0:52.10), fourth fastest heat of division B
Rogan - 0:52.81 (0:56.20), fastest heat of division B
Raegan - 0:44.91 (0:49.00), fastest heat of division A
Raine - 0:51.41 (0:58.00), first in second fastest heat of division A

50m Free
Reese - 0:37.67 (0:41.80), first in the second fastest heat of division B
Rogan - 0:39.34 (0:39.80) in the second fastest heat of division A
Raegan - 0:38.92 (0:41.80) in the fastest heat of division A
Raine - 0:45.54 (0:45.80) in the fastest heat of division A

200m Medley Relay
Back - Reese
Breast - Raegan
Fly - Raine
Free - Danelle

Final standings for today's races:

200m IM
Rogan - 7th place out of 13, division B
Raegan - 5th place out of 8, division A

50m Fly
Reese - 10th place out of 42, division B
Rogan - 4th place out of 10, division B
Raegan - 6th place out of 10, division A
Raine - 6th place out of 10, division A

50m Free
Reese - 6th place out of 34, division B
Rogan - 9th out of 21, division A
Raegan - 7th out of 12, division A
Raine - 9th out of 10, division A

Medley Relay - 4th out of 5th. The girls were only 2 seconds away from 3rd!!! And they were majorly PISSED at their coach....because they said he didn't listen to their pleas when they told him what stroke they each wanted to do. Each girl knew her specialty, and they totally expected Coach Archie to put Danelle at backstroke and Reese at freestyle. Raegan and Raine could easily do the breast and butterfly part. The girls were so funny; they would frown at their coach and not make eye contact...but if looks could kill, the poor man would have drowned in his own pool! Hahahahahaha! According to their coach, he had fixed their positions a month before, a month before---when Reese was slightly faster in backstroke than Danelle, I guess.

But the sad part was, if Reese had done the freestyle, there was an EXCELLENT chance of their getting a medal since she would have really gone after the anchor of the 3rd place team! Danelle did a decent job, she made up soooo many meters in that last lap. But I'm still guessing that she doesn't have the killer instinct that Reese has, hehehehe. To be fair, Reese did stick to the pack at backstroke, which gave Raegan enough to make up a few meters for breaststroke, which gave Raine a bit of a headstart at fly (although the poor thing was tired from her last race!).

And yes, while at the races, I did start and finish some layouts:

FEARLESS

TREEHOUSE BOYS

And to Japa, Dad, Doods, Boydee, Rondic and Randy, a VERY HAPPY FATHER'S DAY to all of you!!!

Happy 89th Birthday, Lola Nene!!!

Lola Nene is a young 89 today! And looking at this picture from earlier in the year, she still looks glamorous as ever! Can you tell I'm so lazy to even edit and crop pics for my post? Hehehe. But you get the picture :)

Anyway, we're not celebrating with Lola today because she is in China with Mom, Dad, Rod and Zhar. It was always her wish to go to China and she didn't want the trip moved at all, despite the fact that Mom said it was going to be sweltering hot!

I *was* going to go, but it was a good thing I decided against it ---because I didn't want to miss the kids' competition and their first day of school--- because my back has been hurting recently. I don't think I'd be able to last all the touring they have scheduled for the entire trip. Not on this back right now!

The kids had their first day of the 1st Chairman's Long Course Swimming Competition today at Celebrity. Egad! What a day! What a loooooong day! Hehehehe. It was filled with action, though, and the kids did well in general.

Let's see if I can go through their times. I have them written down in the souvenir programme....

100m Free
Rogan - 1:28.84, chopping off a full 10 seconds off his time! 3rd in his heat, fastest heat of B division
Raegan - 1:31.34, faster from her seed time of 1:38, 4th in her heat, fastest heat of B division
Raine - 1:46.37, slower than her seed time of 1:39, 5th in her heat. She did beat the other 7 year old in the same heat but was still slower than 3 other 8 year olds. A division

50m Back
Reese - 0:49.8 (0:46.90), 8th in her heat, the fastest heat in the B division
Rogan - 1:12.88 (0:56.70), 4th in his heat, fastest heat in the B division
Raegan - 0:47.09 (0:49.00), 5th in her heat, fastest heat in the A division
Raine - 1:09.34 (0:52.00), last in her heat (I think), A division

50m Breast
Reese - 0:56.17 (0:55.30), 3rd fastest heat in the B division
Rogan - 0:53.61 (0:56.80), 2nd fastest heat in the A division
Raegan - 0:51.40 (0:55.30), fastest heat in the A division
Raine - 0:57.32 (0:59.00), fastest heat in the A division

4x50m Relay (Free)

The girls - Reese, Raegan, Raine and Danelle - came in 4th (last), only 3 second away from third place. They did well, considering that Raine had just finished her 50m breast race not a half hour earlier! They were 8 seconds away from first placer (and rival) Quezon City Sports Club, who they almost always meet in their sort of regular tri-meets.

Final standings for today's races:

100m Free
Rogan - 3rd place out of 20, division B
Raegan - 4th place out of 15, division B
Raine - 5th place out of 5, division A

50m Back
Reese - 21st out of 32, division B
R0gan - 14th out of 16, division B
Raegan - 5th out of 10, division A
Raine - 10th out of 17, division A

50m Breast
Reese - 27th out of 32, division B
R0gan - 16th out of 22, division A
Raegan - 4th out of 10, division A
Raine - 2nd out of 10, division A

Whew! What a looooong and hooooooot day!!! And with soooo much waiting time in between events! Ugh! Tomorrow, methinks I will bring my laptop so I can scrap in between races! I did spot some sockets so I'm sure I can plug in my Mac somewhere sometime tomorrow, hehehehe.

Yup, this is a PERFECT cap to this long, HOT summer---a swim meet! I think without fail, for the past couple of years we haven't gone abroad for vacation, we've always spent in and by the pool...the kids training, and once or twice per summer, we have swim meets! Sure, we go swimming too, but that's nothing compared to what the kids do all summer long: swim, swim, swim! No amusement parks, some video games over at Time Zone, but more often than not it's swim, swim, swim! Hehehehe. Swimming time overtakes watching movies, playing the DS, the Rock Band and Mario Kart any time, any day! :)

Am exhausted....and I didn't even race! My back is killing me, and I just about felt my entire torso collapse when I took out my girdle which, apparently, was pretty much the only thing that was holding my lower back together! Time for some Tylenol!

But first, I scrapped one page today :)

ON THE STREETS OF PARISTTFN!

Waaaaaaaaah!!!!!

The Lakers lost!!!! I canNOT believe they blew a 19-point lead and totally lost it in the 4th quarter!!!!! Aaaaaaaarrrggggghhhhhh!!!!! This game was *SO* not worth staying late at home for!!! Grrrr!

Oh well. It'll be a tough next few games, with the Lakers down 3-1, but we can still hope, right? Sigh!

I went to work.....and proceeded to do anniversary stuff. There was some teeny weeny bit of MVC stuff, but mainly anniversary stuff takes front court for now. Gotta catch up on my list of to-dos!

My frustration over the Lakers' loss I poured onto my scrapping pages. As a result, I churned out not 1, or 2 or 3....but FOUR layouts!!! Whoa!!! Hehehe. It was made easy by templates of course, and the fact that my CT stuff was piling too fast for me to cope with.

BLECH
MY MAMA PURSE
ST THERESE'S THINGS
BEHIND THE BASILIQUE

Very productive, eh? Now, gotta get the kids to sleep early because they have a major swim meet this weekend!

TTFN!

Philippine Independence Day

Today should have been the REAL holiday. See a couple of posts down why it isn't. Still gets me every time!

Anyway, it was Ranger's FIRST day of school today! He starts in the Junior level and he was pretty excited to go! He had a new bag, and a new container for his rice and baon for recess. He was up bright and early and was talking a mile a minute when he entered the room to greet us good morning.

I sent the camera with Kocet to take pics of him. Call it age, I don't know---maybe my bad back? But I was in no mood to get up so early just to take photos of him at school. :) Hmmmm....laziness? Hehehehe. I figured the yaya can take pics because she knows how to operate the camera anyhow. Both the non-SLR AND the SLR. So major whew (!) moment because there's at least someone else who can take photos of the kids! Sure, they won't always be perfect photos, but hey, that's what Photoshop is there for, right? Hehehe.

Absolutely no time to scrap today, but we did have our very first practice for the Ruby Anniversary celebration! We had a couple of choreographers come to the house...in La Vista. Mom and Dad took Lola to China for her birthday (along with Rod and Zhar), so we had the house all to ourselves!

There was a lot of us, and the BEST part was that we actually FINISHED and nearly perfected (nearly!!!) the Finale for the entire program! Can anyone say "fast learners"???? Not a small feat, considering we had the kids, some office angels and a mix-and-match bunch of other relatives! Hehehehe. But it was fun, and boy, did we work up a sweat as we literally danced the night away....well, all 3 hours of practice time, anyway!

Thank goodness I had a girdle on. Yes, I was plastered with sweat, but it was the ONLY thing that was holding my lower back together all throughout the entire practice!!! When I took it off at home to take a shower, I almost crumpled from the sheer pain of it Ugh!

Anyway, before signing off, I just want to announce to the entire world how much of a NERD I am: (all for a Sweet Rewards Point over at SSD)




TTFN!

Happy 9th Birthday, Rogan!!!

Happy Birthday, Rogan!!! My baby boy is 9 years old today! How time flies! He was this not-so-little baby (my biggest!) at slightly under 8 pounds. Today, he is this larger than life character who would rather spend all day playing video games or whatever games he has on the computer rather than conversing with other people! Hehehehe. He does do his swimming, which is good, since it is his only form of exercise right now. He loves playing the guitar and absolutely gets a kick from being in the Kids' Band at school.

So today, the both of us get up REALLY early to attend the 6 am mass. I told him it was important for him to go, that it was his one unique chance to thank God for the gift of life; and what better day than for you to do this but your birthday itself? So he was a good boy and didn't complain about having to get up so early in the morning.

Right after mass, and after I had taken pics of him with the parish priest giving him his birthday blessing, Rogan said he was hungry. I expected that, hehehehe. So off we went to Pancake House to start off his birthday celebration. We called Raine who instantly said she wanted to go. Raegan begged off, probably wanting to start losing weight before school, hehehehe.

After a huge breakfast of pancakes, waffles and pan chicken, we went home. And the kids started playing Wii and Rock Band. For his birthday, Rogan asked if he could have Nathan and Kiel over for the whole day. I told him he could, but only until 330 pm as they had training at 4. The boys had a blast the whole time. I told the girls to leave them alone, to avoid any fighting going on.

For some inane reason, just when all the boys are concentrating on a certain toy, that's when the girls will decide that that's what they want to play with, too! And vice versa!!! Sheesh! Gives me a headache all the time.

Lunch was a simple call to Pizza Hut, hehehehe. I just LOVE not spending so much money on celebrations!

As it turned out, it rained super duper hard, and the kids didn't have training at all! Oh well. We congregated next at Sweet Inspiration for some Mongolian buffet, yay!!! La Vista and Ayala families were there, and we embarrassed Rogan when we sang a really loud birthday song for him, hehehe. Not that he cared one way or the other. All he wanted was that chocolate cake!

And to top off the perfect day for him, he opened his gifts and gave out a long yell when he started opening the gifts of Dic and Lai: it was a total of 96 mini Pokemon figures! His night---his WHOLE day---was perfect, indeed! :)

While the boys were busying themselves with video games, I scrapped:

FLOWERS OF MY SOUL

THE GAVINO BUNCH

Blah Day

Nothing exciting happening today. Just went to work and stayed at my desk for the whole day. Which is a major reason why I think my back has been acting up recently. No, not just some lower back pain...I'm talking about a pinched-nerve kind of pain, even a slipped-disc kind of pain! In other words, not so good news for my back. Grrr!

And I've been doing so well on the Wii Fit Board, too! Hehehehe. However, I think I'm not doing any of the push ups just yet....I tried it and I think it hurt my back even more...Ugh. But the YOGA did wonders for the pain though. Stretching really does help those back muscles, and I think I'm going to keep doing it. I don't have time to go and get some physical therapy so I think this is the next best thing.

I'm still a-scrapping, just in case there won't be so much time to do anything tomorrow for my big boy's birthday! :)

And just a short mention of my dream vacation (for that Sweet Rewards Points that I oh-so-need to get before the month ends):

I want to take the entire family on a Disney cruise! :) Not on a measly 3 or 4 night cruise either! A whole week surrounded by Disney anything sounds like so much fun, and I'm sure the kids would have a blast! Ok fine, *I* would definitely have a blast, hehehehe.

Going on a Disney cruise would match living in Orlando, Florida and getting lifetime passes (ok, annual passes, hehehe) to ALL the Disney theme parks!

Soon, soon. Good thing Disney cruises now leave from California...making it more affordable than having to fly all the way to Orlando just to get on a cruise ship! Hehehehe. Yes, ports of call would be in Mexico rather than the Caribbean, but that's ok. With Disney on board, I don't think I'd be leaving the ship! :)

School and a Holiday

Reese and Rielle were supposed to start school today. Riley won't be going until the 17th, and my kids won't be going until the 16th. "Supposed" to go to school...yup. Gloria Arroyo did her infamous holiday-economics or whatever the heck you call it. She's actually moved the celebration of Philippine Independence Day from the 12th to today. And Filipinos wonder where the heck our sense of patriotism has gone?!?!?! Grrr!

Anyway, we did make use of the holiday...

First off, I watched the Lakers-Celtics game live. And the Lakers won, whoohoohooo!!! The kids were bugging me to change the channel, but I told them it was MY room and I wanted to watch MY game. So there. In the afternoon, we trooped to Metro East to watch Prince Caspian; the kids hadn't seen this and they decided to wait for me to come home from the States before watching it.

Summary of this movie with the oh-so-handsome prince:

One year later, the Kings and Queens of Narnia find themselves back in that faraway wondrous realm, only to discover that more than 1,300 years have passed in Narnian time. During their absence, the Golden Age of Narnia has become extinct and Narnia has been conquered by the Telmarines and is now under the control of the evil King Miraz, who rules the land without mercy. The four children will soon meet a curious new character: Narnia's rightful heir to the throne, the young Prince Caspian, who has been forced into hiding, as his uncle Miraz plots to kill him in order to place his own newborn son on the throne. With the help of the kindly dwarf, a courageous talking mouse named Reepicheep, a badger named Trufflehunter and a Black Dwarf, Nikabrik, the Narnians--led by the mighty knights Peter and Caspian--embark on a remarkable journey to find Aslan, rescue Narnia from Miraz's tyrannical hold, and restore magic and glory to the land.

And the movie did keep us on the edges of our seats! When I looked over, Raegan had both hands in front of her face and Rogan's head was in his shirt! hehehehe. Raine had grabbed my hand and I told her to close her eyes if that would help. It was too funny!

After the movie, as the kids were at swimming, I was finally able to sit at my laptop and scrap scrap scrap the day away!

TAHO

LES BUISSONNETS

Oh it felt soooo good to start scrapping again! I think I've gotten my mojo back----keeping my fingers crossed! :)

Early Breakfast and Then Some

Again. It's been a loooong while since we've had breakfast early in the morning! We went to mass at 8 am at Pentecost, then decided to go to Sweet Inspirations. Raegan had slept over at La Vista, so we had her woken up to ask if she wanted to meet us for breakfast. Of course she did! Hehehe.

Ahhh....garlic fried rice, scrambled eggs, tapa, beefsteak, adobo, arroz caldo, puto bungbung and bibingka. Yummmm! I've noticed that my appetite isn't as big as it used to be (thank goodness!) and I didn't actually gorge myself on the yumminess spread out on the buffet table, but it sure felt good to eat! :)

Probably it's because I hadn't had my appetite suppressant medicine at the time, hehehe. The stuff works, and I take it twice a day. If I wanted to, I guess I could NOT eat if I followed my stomach. Of course, it would be easier (albeit, a lot more dangerous in general) if we could get Phentermine no prescription, yes? I mean, for my meds, I couldn't just buy it over the counter; Mercury Drug surprisingly required me to have a prescription from my doctor! Oh well. It *is* good in a way, that they require this, just so people don't abuse medicines in general.

After breakfast, we had a few hours to hang out before Bang was calling us for our weekly family lunch, hehehehe. This week we went to Cafe Bola in Greenbelt 3. It wasn't a big restaurant, and our entire family probably took up a third of the space. Cafe Bola was kind of like a sosy World Topps place; toppings and rice. Boydee must have ordered something like FOUR different plates/bowls....for him, although he said it was for "sharing". hehehehe. It was surprisingly not that expensive, considering it was in the Makati area.

So, stuffed yet again, we rolled on out of the restaurant and window shopped a little bit at the Mac Studio in the mall. Mom got a hard plastic casing for her Mac Air and was happy that she found protective covering for her itsy bitsy laptop! :)

We *were* going to take the kids out to see Prince Caspian, but we were all feeling so drowsy after two huge meals, so we just hung out at home until we fel l asleep, hehehe.

The Panda and the Eagle

The PANDA

Kung Fu Panda overview:

Enthusiastic, big and a little clumsy, Po is the biggest fan of Kung Fu around...which doesn't exactly come in handy while working every day in his family's noodle shop. Unexpectedly chosen to fulfill an ancient prophecy, Po's dreams become reality when he joins the world of Kung Fu and studies alongside his idols, the legendary Furious Five -- Tigress, Crane, Mantis, Viper and Monkey -- under the leadership of their guru, Master Shifu. But before they know it, the vengeful and treacherous snow leopard Tai Lung is headed their way, and it's up to Po to defend everyone from the oncoming threat. Can he turn his dreams of becoming a Kung Fu master into reality? Po puts his heart - and his girth - into the task, and the unlikely hero ultimately finds that his greatest weaknesses turn out to be his greatest strengths.

As I promised Lai, we took ALL the kids to see Kung Fu Panda. Of course, we watched the very FIRST showing of the day! Lesser people that way. Only thing was, we were in a RUSH to get to Galleria! Yes, the first show was at 11 am, but for one reason or the other, we ended up leaving the house at 1030. We used the red van (hehehe) so that we could all fit.

So anyway, when we got to Galleria, the driver dropped us off at the entrance and we all jumped out. I remember distinctly thinking that any passerby looking at us would wonder what in the HECK we were thinking having 7 kids, and all looking like they were born one right after the other! Hahahahaha!

Right before the escalators, Japa took some kids to get some shakes somewhere downstairs. The rest I took upstairs to get tickets and some popcorn, juice, soda and hotdogs. Yes, you can shake your head at this part. Imagine me with all sorts of bags hanging from my arms and hands carrying everything until we met up with Japa. He wasn't better off either, with the amount of plastic cups he was trying to hang on to!

And we settled down to watch. It was Rogan, Riley, Japa, Ranger and Kocet. In front of us, a little bit to the side, were the girls: Reese, Raegan, Rielle and Raine. The movie was great over-all, not withstanding the fact that there was so much kung fu, I was thinking that the kids ---at least the boys--- would go into karate chops as soon as we got out of the theater! Not to worry though, as all of them were well-behaved. Ranger I didn't have to worry, as he was fast asleep after a third of the movie was done. Oh well.

The rest of the kids though were rocking with laughter, especially towards the end of the movie. Lai, Riley was shaking with laughter and he thoroughly enjoyed himself! No yaya at that! :) I swear, these movie tickets were the best buy ever!

On the way home, we even had various discussions on what happened during the movie!

The EAGLE

As part of the big to-do in July, we are going to have the kids sing the responsorial psalm during the mass. Originally, we planned to have Rielle sing the solo part (the verses) while the rest of the kids sang the refrain. When I distributed the lyrics to all the kids, and as they were waiting for me to get ready for the movie, I played the song and listened as they tried it out. I told them their parts and I waited.

From the very start, the refrain kids complained: the refrain was just too high! All of them were having a difficult time hitting the high notes, including Reese (which surprised me since I thought she had a relatively high voice)! I started giggling and told them to keep trying. And the poor dears did, they really did.

We continued the singing in the car and I decided to try and switch it. With a sigh of relief all around, the refrain kids belted out the verses in varying pitches, hehehe. I quickly put a stop to that one! After a few minutes, they got it together and sang as one. Sort of. Will definitely need some practice.

For Rielle, ahhh...here's the Eagle part: she sang the refrain perfectly! With feeling, with the purest voice. It made my hair stand on end. And moved me to tears, which I quickly squelched, just in case any of the kids were looking at me :) There was one time, while she was singing her solo, that she felt really consious....and she smiled....and I heard a difference in her voice. I turned around and asked her if she smiled or made some facial expression. She looked surprised and asked me how I knew. I told her there was a difference in the way she sang that particular part. Ever since that comment, she sang the whole verse seriously, with much feeling.

So much so, that when we arrived at La Vista for lunch, I called Bang aside to listen to Rielle. And as expected, she started tearing up. Rielle's lilting, pure voice was enough to do that, I tell you!

So Lai, make sure you listen to your dear daughter when you arrive. Oh, and have some tissue ready when you do, hehehe!

Wedding Talk

Just in case my dear mother reads my blogs (on super duper rare occasions), best to say that we had a looooong meeting today. Bang is one thorough lady, that I must say! Hehehe. Whew! We covered everything I think, and looks like we've covered a lot of ground! A few more little details here and there, and of course the major detail *wink! wink!* hehehe.

Suffice it to say that everything for the big day has been laid out, and we just need to do a lot of follow up to ensure that all the things that need to get done WILL get done.

I finished a layout that's been sitting on my laptop for the past couple of days at least, despite the lateness of the hour:

TAHO

TTFN!

Flower Fotos

No, I won't bore anyone silly by filling a blog post with photos of just flowers, hehehe. But I did take a TON of pics while at the Shrine....with sweat pouring literally from me! Ugh! This I do a day after I arrive from the States. From a nice, balmy, cool temperature to freakishly, heckishly HOT numbers!!! Ugh ugh and UUUUGGGGHHHH!!!

Bang and I got to the Shrine a little bit past 10. With Japa's SLR in hand (of course!), we met with Sonya, our florist, who was going to set up all sorts of arrangements for the columbarium and Shrine areas. After a few minutes, we got ready to start taking photos.

I must say, Sonya's people were right on with their floral arrangements! They had all sorts of different bouquets and whatnots all ready to be arranged wherever we wanted them to be! After a couple of hours shooting, I was drenched in sweat. Disgusting. The huge fans didn't do any good at all. We didn't want to turn on the AC since we were trying to conserve electricity, but I sure wish we had turned on at least ONE! Hehehehehe.

Anyway, we finished up sweaty but happy with the way everything turned out. I haven't downloaded my pics yet, but I leave you with this lovely pic:


Have a florally good day! Hehehe.