Day 2: 7th Asean Inter-Club Age Group Swimming Championships

The girls were insistent that we NEEDED to be at the race site early so that we could get the team some seats. The poor team was like a group of squatters, sitting on the floor because there were no assigned seats! Grrr!

So as we speeded to the Woodlands at 640 am, I looked up at the sky and remarked to the girls: "Hey girls! The MOON is STILL out!" Bwahahahahaha! Hmp.

At least we DID get an awesome spot for them, right by the 10 meter-to-go mark. We had ample space to lay out their mats and then surrounded that space with the monoblock chairs. Basically blocking out anyone who wanted to squeeze into their space, hehehehehe. Yes, call us protective. Oh, and Coach Archie did have a bench-throne right in the middle of everything :)

Three events for Raegan today:

First up is the 200m freestyle. She was easily the first in her heat, by a big margin. This event gave Raegan her BEST showing so far, coming in 10th overall, out of 26! Hmmm.....a mid-distance swimmer maybe? Probably too early to tell, but at least she used this particular event to help calm her nerves a bit, for the 100m butterfly.


Second event was the 50m breaststroke. Ahhhh. Raegan came in 2nd here, behind her friend Kate (who's always neck and neck with Raegan in swim meets, hehehe).


Take a look at how CLOSE their times are! Lane 2 and Lane 8. That ONE second difference was the difference between 13th overall and 16th overall, out of a field of 33 breaststrokers in the age group.

Last event of the day was the 100m butterfly. THIS event Raegan was soooo nervous about. I asked her what the problem was last night and she answered that this was the FIRST time she was going to compete in this event. She was confident in her 50m fly, but she knew that the 100m fly would be a test.

And last night, she just could NOT keep still! I finally did some visualization with her, to calm her down. After that session, she opened her eyes and told me she was calmer. A little bit. In the middle of the night, I was wakened by Raegan FLAILING in bed. When I looked at her, she was doing the backstroke on the bed! While sleeping! Hahaahahaha! I guess she really was nervous!


She came in 4th in her heat, which was enough for a 12th place overall out of 20. Not bad, considering it was the first time she swam this event, but she did look pretty slow and her arms so heavy. When she went out of the pool, she looked pretty tired, but relieved that this was over. I told her that at least she now had a good gauge of her abilities for this particular event, and that she should try to compete in it again to see how she would do.

One of her main goals was to beat Franco in this event, which she did, by 0.38 seconds! Heheehhe. Healthy rivalry here, which is good! At least it will push all of them to swim better and swim faster.

Check out this series of pics of Reese:



Hehehe. She didn't want to eat the broccoli that came with their packed lunch. I told her I was going to SCRAP a page about her if only she ate a piece!

Happy 11th Birthday, Raegan!!!

Oh my goodness! My first baby is ELEVEN years old today!!!!! Officially (?) a tween....or has she been a tween for several years now and I was just clueless? Lol. Wouldn't put it past me! :)

A different birthday "celebration" of sorts.....Raegan and I are in Singapore and everyone else in Manila. Well, we did have a "pre-birthday" dinner of sorts before we left, when we ate at Sweet Inspirations, but I guess it's still always best to do something special on your birthday.

So.

We started the day getting up REALLY early. We did have a swim meet to go to, hehehe. Breakfast was a pathetic bowl of noodles. Yeah. The breakfast of champions right there, bwahahahaha! But the birthday girl was pretty content and looked happy with her noodly power breakfast:


Packing up the things she would need for the day, Raegan didn't forget her birthday gift, her new Guitar Hero for the Nintendo DS:


We actually got this yesterday, at a Toys R Us inside a mall on Orchard Road, but I told her she could only open it today, for her birthday. So she was excited to rip into the box and prepare everything for her (long) day today.

The birthday girl had a pretty good day, swim-wise. She improved on all her times, and came in first in 2 heats and 2nd in another. The Singaporeans were just incredibly fast! Raegan was 16th (out of 28th) overall, the top swimmer from the Philippines in the 10 and under category.


Her second event was 100m freestyle, one of her favorites (I think). She came in first in her heat, and placed 15th out of 33. Again, top swimmer from the Philippines in her age category, woot!


Last event for the day was what seems to be Raegan's specialty. At least, that's what it looks like to my untrained eye. The 200m individual medley. I like to think that Raegan's coaches took note of her potential in this event when she placed 4th last year at Mantas. Raegan came in 2nd in her heat (to some Singaporean) and was 14th overall, out of 24 swimmers. There was one other Filipina swimmer, and another from Brunei. The rest were Singaporeans.

Yes, the swim meet pretty much took the whole day, never mind the fact that we left right after Raegan's last event. After a couple of hours rest at the hotel, we were off to dinner. An early dinner, since we all had to be up with the moon, er, sun, tomorrow.

Raegan shopped for a few things, the FIRST time she willingly and enthusiastically shopped for clothes! Lai got her a pair of shorts and a shirt for her birthday, too, which added to Reagan's stash for the day, hehehe.

Here's my baby's "first official shopping spree":


And for dinner? Raegan treated us to an all-time favorite: KFC!!!


hahahahaha! I know, I know, what a place to celebrate! But trust me, we ALL wanted KFC! While I was buying our chicken, Lai went to the nearby Yoshinoya to buy R.I.C.E. Of COURSE we had to have rice with our chicken! Wouldn't be complete without it!

And yes, we were STUFFED by the end of the meal! Not to worry, the kids definitely need it for tomorrow's events. As for us moms, uhm..........it was a GREAT meal! Bwahahaahahha!

Stress in Singapore

What? Stress on only our second day in the city of the Merlion?!? Read on and you'll find out why.

{BUS TRIP}

We asked our lovely "smart" lady at the front desk (who shall be unnamed since I don't want to be the cause of her possibly losing her job) told us that there was only ONE bus that would take us to the Tampines Mall. Yes, we decided to be adventurous today and explore another mall; one with a Toys R Us since I wanted to get the boys their Star Wars Lego.

Anywhoo, this front desk lady explicitly told us to go to the bus stop on the LEFT side of the gate. Okay, check. We were there. We waited for about 15-20 minutes and the bus finally came. Check out Lai's pic above. It does say Tampines, yes? So we all excitedly dropped in our coins for the cheap fare (compared to taking a taxi!). When Lai, who was last in line, dropped her S$1 in the box, the stupid driver asked us where we were going. We told him we wanted to go to the Tampines Mall and he looked at us and said that we were on the wrong bus!

He could NOT have missed the fact that we were all tourists. Yes, we stupidly thought it was the correct bus since we were directed to it, but hey! It's my blog and it's my story! Hahahahaha! Anyway, to cut a long story short, we had to get off sans our fare since the stupid bus driver would not return the coins to us. Hmp! He probably pocketed the damn change!

So we crossed the street and waited for the CORRECT bus. And yes, we asked the driver BEFORE we even boarded and dropped in our precious coins! Finally! On the way to Tampines!
Forty minutes or so later, we were still on the darn bus, chugging through millions of bus stops through a residential area. Yes, the smart front desk lady assured us that it was only going to be ONE stop! Sheesh!

Of course I spent the time in the bus wisely, snapping pics with my handy dandy cellphone! Hehehehe. Much to the consternation of the kids. But they still smiled for the camera!

{TAMPINES MALL}

As it turned out, the mall was the LAST stop of the bus. Sigh! So we got off and followed the crowd. And they led us to the mall. We were all agog at the newness of the mall. Apparently, everything was new: the mall's opening day was TODAY!!! So much people, so many sales, so little time.

We agreed to meet after about an hour, and off we went our separate ways. Ten minutes later, I got a text message: Coach wanted us at the pool at 12 noon instead of 1:45 pm! What?!?!??? LOL. I looked at my watch and it was 11:15 am. Right. Hurriedly, I texted Lai and Matec about the news. And Raegan and I hurried through the mall in search of Toys R Us. Which was nowhere to be found! Ack!

We were in the WRONG mall! Toys R Us was located in the OLD Tampines Mall. We practically ran through the MTR station to get to the mall and buy the boys' Lego before we woud have to meet up with the others. We got to the meeting point a minute or so after everyone had. Is that stressful or what!

{DIVIDE & CONQUER}

This was the strategy that we swimming mommas came up with. It was the most logical. So:

I would take the 3 kids to the pool, passing by the hotel to get their stuff. Reese was the only one who was wearing her swimsuit.

Lai would buy Dic's basketball shoes first.

Matec would buy lunch for all of us, and we would just eat after the kids' practice.

Grabbing everyone's shopping bags, we rushed to the taxi stand and got into a taxi. Thankfully, there was no traffic. As we neared the hotel, I distributed the keys to the kids and told them to dump the shopping bags and grab their swimming stuff as fast as they could. I had barely chit-chatted with the taxi driver when the kids stormed out of the hotel doors with their bags in hand! I swear, it wasn't even a minute when they tumbled out of the cab!

{SINGAPORE SPORTS SCHOOL}

And so we arrived at the race venue. Whoa. It was a huuuge sports complex! I guess the kids here concentrated on their respective sports while studying. There were dorm rooms, gym, a built-in track along the inside of the building! No wasted space for sure!

The rest of the team had just gotten there, too. Barely. They had come from the airport and had only time to check in and leave their bags in the hotel rooms before having to board the bus that would take them to the sports complex. And we thought WE had it bad, hehehehe!

The kids were barely in the water when Lai and Matec arrived with food! Not that we ate when the kids were still swimming; we wouldn't hear the end of that, no sirree!

After close to an hour of swimming, the kids were done. A quick shower and we all trooped to the school cafeteria to see what was for (late) lunch and to eat our lunch. Matec and I ordered their lunch. It was a reasonable S$4 for a ton of food, plus juice and a dessert of orange slices. Good thing we did, too, since Raegan and Franco dug into their duck toppings AND then ours! Yikes! Hungry maybe? Heheheh.

Then it was back to the hotel to REST. Like we had a choice. We had to bring the kids to the south for their powwow with Coach Archie later in the evening.

{NEWTON CIRCUS}

Nope, not a circus with a big top and animals. It's a tourist-y place of food, food and more food. It was 7-ish and we were famished. Wrong thing to be when ordering food in a place like this, especially if you're Elizza!

Some pics of our ginormous meal:

This is Elizza, with mouth watering as she gazes into her black-pepppered crab's (dead) eyes:


This is the uber uber YUMMMMMY fried rice that we had. As in! When we ordered it, we put it down in front of Raegan and Reese as Lai and I searched for more food to order. We had barely ordered our other food and sat down to wait, when we saw that the girls had practically INHALED 3/4 of the fried rice!!! So Lai jumped up and got another big order; take note, this big-sized order was supposed to be good for 4-5 people!!!! Ack!!!


And yes, both of us adults almost finished that one extra order of rice!!!! It doesn't look all that great in the pic, but trust me. It was verrrrrry good! Probably with tons of MSG mixed in, hehehehe.

Here's my oyster omelet which I had to have, just like Lai had to have her crabs:


I know, gross looking, but totally yummy!

Last, but not the least, the carnage of our table after our meal:

Blech!

It was powwow time for the kids and the team while we swimming mommas waited in the lobby for them.

Home to the hotel, chatted with Japa and the other kiddos for a bit, before falling asleep.

Sooooo stressful, yes? :)

In Singapore

I am finally showered and all CLEAN after a pretty long day! Ahhhhhhh!

The day started at 445 am, when our alarm went off. A quick shower, a dash of ironing for the hair, a quick Mcdonald's breakfast courtesy of Elizza and Reese, and we were all off for Clark Air Base...in Pampanga....for our flight to Singapore.

What airline? Tiger Airways, a Singapore-based airline that offers el cheapo fairs! As in! The fare I paid for BOTH Raegan and myself were still less than what we would have paid for on Philippine Airlines for EACH of us! So now tell me WHY wouldn't we drive the hour and a half to the airport?!?! Hehehe. Soooooo worth it!

The catch for the cheap fares? No food on the plane. Not too bad actually, since we did eat before the flight. And since we were up early, Lai and I were fast asleep for a good part of the flight. Raegan and Reese were yacking up a storm, reading and playing their DS games the whooooole time!

Here are Raegan and Reese just before boarding the plane. Good thing I had my handy dandy cellphone camera on hand. And yes, I insisted they stop and smile, hahahahaha!


Here we are at the Singapore BUDGET terminal airport. Take a look on the lower left corner of the photo. It clearly shows the word BUDGET terminal, hehehehe. What, like this is a lower-class (well it actually is) level of terminal?!?! Gasp, gasp! Bwahahahaha! It's just so....so.....so un-sosy like you know? :)


{FUNNY HOTEL STORY}

From the airport, we hail a taxi. Our driver spends probably 5 whole minutes leafing through a book of maps. Then we speed off, and he starts punching in the address of our hotel in his GPS. While driving. He asks me to call the hotel, and I do, so he can ask for directions. He talks while driving. A manual car WITH a stick shift! He literally needed THREE hands!!! Sheesh!

Anyhoo, we get to a sort of residential area with big white structures. Apparently they were the British Army barracks way before. There are some buildings in one part of the camp that the Singaporean Army still use. Anyway, it was an okay-looking area, and we finally got to the hotel.

I swear, as we were driving up to the front of the hotel, I heard Reese say, "YIKES!" Bwahahahahhaa! I am laughing as I type this up! That remarked totally made me laugh and it was EXACTLY what we were thinking, only that she said it out loud!

It wasn't the greatest looking hotel, that's for sure. And we were MIGHTILY RELIEVED that we had the wrong hotel. Sort of. We were dropped off at the old wing; our rooms were in the new wing. The lobby was much much MUCH better, and the rooms were pretty decent.

I guess it's hard for US if OUR kids have been used to the standards of Mamalyn! Haaaaaaay! I swear, I'm going to hold true to my promise - er, threat! - of booking a really rinky dinky room for us to stay in during one of our trips! Hmp!

This next photo shows our FIRST meal in Singapore.


Man, were we sooo hungry! It was Yoshinoya for us, at Compass Point, some mall near the hotel.

Here's a fave pic:


Raegan totally enjoying her dinner of noodles with dumpling......at the food court on the highest level of Compass Point. That bowl right there was a mere S$4! What a meal, eh? Hehehehe.

Pre-Singapore Preparations

For dinner, we congregated at Sweet Inspirations for mongolian food. It was a pre-birthday celebration of sorts for Raegan, who won't be here for her 11th birthday to celebrate with Papa and her siblings.

After dinner, we stopped by La Vista to say hi and bye, and for a few wishes of "good luck"s to Raegan and Reese.

Then it was time to pack. Yes, it's last minute packing, as usual. Again. No matter how early I try to plan, I end up putting everything into the suitcase at the very last minute. Then staying up late for other last minute stuff. Not sure what, but it's always the case when I travel: staying up til the wee hours in the morning before we leave. Sigh! Our flight's not until 10 am, but we have to leave early because we're leaving from Clark, a good hour and a half away if we're lucky. Oh well. At least we can sleep on the way there.

Starting to Scrap My 365

With everything I got yesterday, I finally started to play with them! And boy, was I busy! But everything came together so fast, it was just exhilirating! For example, I finished monthly summaries just like that *snap*!




Pretty cool, huh? :)

I'm still deciding on whether to have my books printed monthly or quarterly. I guess we'll see how I do in the first few pages of scrapping the actual days. I guess the layouts came together so fast because I had my pictures at the ready, all labeled (uploaded to my Proj 365 Blog), and ready to be scrapped.

Thank goodness I had organized all those pics! :)

I actually made a mistake of flattening all my layers for the February Summary; I realized it only when I opened it to copy shadows and sizes. Ugh! So yes, I had to do that page all over AGAIN! But using templates and with my photos ready, it was a cinch!

Shopping for Scraps

There's a HUGE sale going on at Weeds and Wildflowers Designs today! A sale I've been waiting for so that I could pick up the Life 365 Collection....and then some. Yes!

Here's the wonderful stash I got. Stuff that I had saved for---which meant NOT buying anything in the scrapping world for several weeks. Seriously!




I spent most of the day downloading. With our wonky connection, it had to take the whole day! Grrr! Something going on there......hopefully it's because they're improving speed and all. Sigh!

I canNOT wait to scrap with these! Whoohooo!!! Sooooo worth scrimping for all these!

A Morning Walk and an Afternoon Assessment

The older kids were at swimming training, and Japa soon followed to bike around the village. After scrapping a bit and downloading, I decided to go power-walking in LaVi. Sort of. But when I had made the decision to get up, the rain poured. As in huge raindrops, and pouring in SHEETS! Whoa! It's the summertime, Mother Nature!!!

After an hour or so, the rain finally stopped. Ranger was in his couch potato position, looking like he was going to spend the entire DAY in bed just watching TV. I finally coaxed him to get up and get dressed, purportedly to visit Bric, hehehe.

So off we went to LaVi, and I was able to persuade Bang to come with Bric in tow.

The half hour of walking was pretty good, and I worked up a sweat in no time. I guess those Office Aerobics classes did some good, hehehe. I did miss them the last week when I was sick, that's for sure.

Bang and I kept up a pretty good pace, I thought, although my heart wasn't exacty pounding from the exertion. It was enough pushing the kids in their strollers, especially during the constant upward ramp in the route that Bang had us do. Whew!

And Bric sure entertained us the WHOLE TIME, talking non-stop round trip during the entire half hour. He had a continuous monologue going, lol!


Here's their photo when we got home. I fished out a couple of juice packs from my bag and gave it to them. I asked them if they were tired and they resoundingly said "YES"! Bang and I looked at each other and laughed, THEY were tired?!?! All they did was sit there in their strollers! LOL!

And thirsty---boy, did they chug that juice down like THEY had done all the walking!

In the afternoon, while Japa took the girls to the parlor to have a summer hair cut, I took the boys to have an assessment done for Filipino. Kind of like Kumon, in a way, I guess. Ranger apparently, wasn't all that ready to be enrolled in the program. He was still conversing in English during the entire assessment, hehehehe!

Rogan probably fits perfectly in their target market: older, can read, and refuses to understand Filipino. Truly his father's bane, hehehe. He knew a few basic words, but it was obvious that he needed a lot of work on developing his vocabulary. In Filipino.

I wish I had a ready photo of the girls with their new hairdos. They looked adorable with the shorter hair! Of course, it was all nice and fixed since they came from the parlor. Crossing my fingers that they'd be able to fix their hair like this everyday! Yeah right. Here's hoping that they'd at least ATTEMPT to fix their hair the way it should be fixed! :)

Homemade Tattoos

When the kids woke up this morning, it was to find some homemade tattoos, i.e, from Papa's markers, on various parts of their bodies. Rogan had a Philippine flag on his arm, Raegan a flower, colored in with red. But Raine's was the best one of all. Papa told her that he tried drawing on her arm or tummy, but because she was moving so much while she was asleep, he had to settle on making his mark here:

The red lips were drawn on Raine's back, the only place Papa could reach without ruining his drawing, hahahahahha!


Her homemade tattoo is on her lower back, just above her arse, bwahahahaha! She was spinning around trying to look for her tattoo; I had to take a photo of it just so she could see it!

After the day at the office, I *SO* needed to veg out.....by scrapping! And boy, a day off from scrapping sure can recharge the creative mojo!

EGG HUNTING

ON TIPPY TOES

THE WATER SPRINKLERS

DS BOYS

Yes! That's a bunch of pages done, whoohooo!

Game Night!

It was Game Night! We all gathered around the kids' round table: Raine, Raegan, Rogan, Papa and moi. Ranger was behind Papa, immersed in his DS games.

Raine - Mrs White
Raegan - Mr Green
Rogan - Col Mustard
Papa - Professor Plum
me - Ms Scarlet

I had forgotten how much FUN this game was! And, more importantly for me, it was a very good tool to hone the kids' logic building and problem solving skills! Shhhh, don't tell the kids that this is all educational, otherwise it would surely suck all the fun from the game, hehehehehe.

Papa came out the winner, guessing the correct suspect, weapon and room JUST before I did! Hmp!

Oh well. Maybe next time. This sure beats the ole' Marco-Polo game that the kids have been playing every night this week....with their father! LOL!

The Sickies Have Spread

Wouldn't you know it. The rounds of diarrhea had started with Raegan a few days ago. Then Raine followed a day after, with Rogan the next. Today, it was Ranger's turn. Although not watery, he had an "accident" while we were in the office for a First Wednesday Mass. He complained of a tummy ache, and slept through everything, including lunch.

He didn't have a fever in the morning, but it soon reared its ugly head a little bit after lunch. Thus precipitating yet another early exit from the office for me today. Sigh! At this rate, it's a wonder if I get anything done!

So we went home. The older kids went to training and I stayed home with my baby :) Fever of 101.8 degrees. After a double dose of Calpol 6 Plus, Ranger was fine and had no sign that he had had a high temperature. After about 5 hours, I gave him his regular dose.......and saw that it wasn't working! Grrrrr!!!! How frustrating is this??? I didn't want to overdose the child, so I was being careful, but his temperature was still 101.5. I guess it'll have to be a round-the-clock-every four-hours kind of night tonight. Just to get rid of the fever.

And the poor child wouldn't eat, he wanted me to be beside him all the time. Ahhhh......boys and their penchance for milking sympathies when they're sick! :) Say a little prayer for the little guy, that his fever breaks sometime during the night please! I hope and pray to God that this will be a one-night thing!

With Ranger's head or feet on my lap, I scrapped this: (do you THINK I could concentrate on work???? LOL!)

SPRING IN THE FLOWER FIELDS

Of, off to tend to my baby......and either scrap some more or update my Project 365 Blog! :)

Rounding Up March

Getting the questions to the Round Up from Katie the Scrapbook Lady:

Round Up: March

What books and/or magazines did I read this month?

Eeek! Another no-book-read month! How awful is that?! I wonder if my excuse of researching for GSS would be sufficient? I did get the kids started reading Grammarland, so that's a plus, right? We've done the introduction and Chapter 1. It'll have to do.

What movies and/or tv shows did I watch this month?

I thought we'd average a movie a month, but we did manage to squeeze in New In Town starring Renee Zellweger this afternoon. Japa was able to come home early (the kids needed the car and driver since I had used the other car to fix our tickets for Hong Kong!). So, 2 movies this month:

For TV, it was just CSI everything. Reruns.

What special days did I celebrate and how?

Swim Camp

Mom's Birthday

Year-End Program of the kids

Start of GSS

Swim Meet

Earth Day

What gifts did I give and/or receive?

A toothbrush sanitizer for Mom's bithday, which she said was something she had wanted for a long time! Yes! Score on that gift! :)

But I think the best gift that we gave Mom was going to mass with her on her day, and helped arrange Dad's gift of 63 roses and a mini-album that listed 63 reasons why he loves her :)

What illnesses or health concerns did I have?

Blech! Lousy head cold and sore throat. The pits to have BOTH of these at the same time!!!

Does discovery of an Age Spot count? LO!

What fun things did I do with my friends and/or family?

Office Aerobics was great because it gave me my 2 days of exercise in a week!

Earth Day was pretty memorable, with the country (and thousands of cities around the world) going dark for a full hour.

Oh, and finally convincing Mom to go to the nail salon to have our nails wrapped. I think she was pretty happy that her nails were a lot longer this month, and that they'd last a minimum of 3 more weeks with no breakage! Hehehehe.

What new foods, recipes or restaurants did I try this month?

Nothing new and adventurous this month. Shangri La (twice in a day!) and Silk in Serendra were the only 2 places we ate out this month. Oh, I guess we can count eating a Magoo's Pizza while watching a movie? LOL!

What special or unusual purchases did I make?

Nada this month. Although it sounds like such a boring month, it sure was busy as heck!

What were my scrapping accomplishments this month?

Only 22 pages scrapped this month, and probably another 3 more using quickpages. Eek! I guess I'm slowing down?

Anything else noteworthy to record?

I guess I should mention that I'm feeling proud of myself for surviving (albeit barely!) life without a yaya even when I'm sick! :)

Office aerobics have a special mention as well for giving me some much needed exercise.

An advanced Happy April Fools' Day tomorrow :)

I Feel Lousy

Ugh. I feel awful. Watery eyes, clogged nose, sore throat. Add to that almost no voice from all the cheering I did for the kids during the swim meet. Does not make for a pretty picture, that's for sure.

But valiantly, I got up, took a shower AND herded ALL four kids into the van to go to the office. I envisioned that I would give them GSS work which would keep them busy enough so that I could get a few hours of work in.

Umm....not that I said I had "envisioned" it to be that perfect. And of course, as we all know, NOTHING is perfect. Sigh.

First, Ranger wanted me to sit beside him when he did his painting. Ooookay. Not a very good start.

Then, when I had finally maneuvered myself out of the conference room (that's where I had their "classroom" set up, hehehe), and settled into my chair, the big kids started walking in one by one to ask me the SAME set of questions!!! Ack!!!

Finally, an hour or so after lunch, I called it quits. I couldn't concentrate with the kids going in and out of the office and making the entire place a playground (grrrr!) and I was coughing up a storm. We got home just in time for the kids to leave for training.

I settled in and drugged myself with Theraflu, which helped a lot. Ahhhhhh!

Feeling a bit better, I scrapped (since I had left my work stuff in my computer bag in my office, whoops!):

MEETING POOH

VERDUGO PARK

No Yaya :(

Yaya, nanny, babysitter. All mean the same word. And mine, along with our cook, went on vacation! Yesterday! Waaaaaaah!!!

I just KNOW this is NOT going to be an easy week....or half month. The kids' yaya will be back in mid-April and it sure seems sooooooo faaaaar away!!! Heheehe.

Sure, I exaggerate (a bit), but in all honesty, life is much much MUCH easier with a yaya for the kids. And you don't appreciate how much easier until you're left with no yaya for a period of time. Sigh!

Japa and I copped out a tad: we took the easy way out and brought the kids to see Monsters vs Aliens. Yes! A relatively PEACEFUL and fight-free couple of hours!

Movie summary:

When California girl Susan Murphy is unwittingly clobbered by a meteor full of outer space gunk on her wedding day, she mysteriously grows to 49-feet-11-inches tall. Alerted to the threat of this new monster, the military jumps into action and Susan is captured and secreted away to a covert government compound. There, she is renamed Ginormica and placed in confinement with a ragtag group of other monsters: the brilliant but insect-headed Dr. Cockroach, Ph.D.; the macho half-ape, half-fish The Missing Link; the gelatinous and indestructible B.O.B.; and the 350-foot grub called Insectosaurus. Their confinement is cut short, however, when a mysterious alien robot lands on Earth and begins storming the country. In a moment of desperation, The President is persuaded by General W.R. Monger to enlist the motley crew of Monsters to combat the Alien Robot and save the world from imminent destruction.

And the kids LOVED it! Ranger sat through it all, away from Japa or me, seated beside Rogan, at the END of our row of seats. He did NOT sleep through any part, but just sat contentedly, munching on his chips and popcorn. He was still and did NOT move until after the movie was over. Really over, AFTER the part after the credits *wink wink*

Yes, for those of you who have yet to see it, make sure you stay until the very very END. That means after all the credits have rolled up. Not the greatest post-movie scene ever, but hey, remember we were squeezing in the peaceful part sans yaya as much as we could. Hehehehe. That is precious time indeed!

Then after a short dinner at Ayala, we went home. I wasn't feeling very well at all. I think I must be coming down with something since my throat really REALLY hurts when I swallow! And clogged nose? Not fun at all. Grrrr! Time for some much needed meds!

Swimming and Earth Day

The kids competed today at the ULTRA. Warm up competition for Singapore most likely. It was a hot, hot HOOOOOOOOOT day! Incredibly hot, it was unbelievable!!! Sheesh! We were up early since Japa and I went with the kids because Romy was bringing Kocet and Sibred to the airport.

So at 720 am, we were settling ourselves on the concrete bleachers in front of the pool. Good thing there was SOME shade, so there was a little bit of respite despite the heat. And in true Filipino style, instead of the 830 am start time, it was at 9 or 930. Grrrr!

Here are the kids' events and their times:

Raegan
200m freestyle - 2:50 (2nd in her heat)
100m breaststroke - 1:39 (4th in her heat)
200m IM - 3:11 (1st in her heat) [splits: 0:43-0:50-0:55-0:43]
50m free - 0:35.18 (2nd in her heat)

Rogan
50m backstroke - 0:49.48
100m breaststroke - 1:55.81
200m IM - 3:46 (5th in his heat) [splits: 0:53-1:03-1:03-0:47]
50m free - 0:38.41

Raine
50m backstroke - 0:47
100m breaststroke - 1:55.40
200m IM - 3:56
50m free - 0:41 (4th in her heat)

Reese
200m freestyle - 2:59 (4th in her heat)
50m backstroke - 0:43.48
200m IM - 3:25 (1st in her heat)

Rielle
200m freestyle - 3:44
50m free - 5th in heat
100m breaststroke -

All of them were in the 12 and under category. Yes, you just KNOW my eyes are rolling, hehehehe. We didn't stay to even take pics of the final times and places, it was THAT hot! We just wanted out of there! Hopefully, the coaches will have everything!

{EARTH DAY}
We celebrated Earth Day with the rest of the world for the very first time. The original plan was a SIMPLE dinner in the middle of the garden, surrounded by candles. The meal was equally simple: fried chicken, hotdogs and burgers.

But our dear mother decided she was going to have a thanksgiving mass said for dad.......and lola invited the rest of the clan. So our simple dinner turned out into a party, pretty much, lol. With a buffet spread of so many foods, I don't know where to start the list!

Oh, and yes, the lights went off at exactly 830 pm. Mom had torches set up around the garden, so we had some light. We also had a couple of fans turned on; it was too hot without any air circulating at all. We tried in the beginning, but it was really stifling. The whole house was lightless, with the sole exception of Dad's room, for obvious reasons.

A few minutes after 930 pm, the lights went back on. Lola kept a very careful eye on her watch; she wanted the hour to be just an hour, hehehe. But it was a good feeling to have that we were one with hundreds of thousands in the world dedicated to take this little step in the fight against global warning. It was also heartwarming to have just family around, chit-chatting about our lives, about our families.

It would be interesting to know what the total wattage or whatever the Earth Hour people use to measure how successful this hour of no-light is, and what the effect is for the planet.

Here's to Mother Earth!

Squeezing in a Layout

I'm at work and have hit a mental block. Sooooo......I clicked on Photoshop and came out with this:

ENTERING TOMORROWLAND

AND, it wasn't too hard to boot! In fact, I only used ONE paper. Uh huh. Just ONE paper, from this new pack of Jacque Larsen:


It was easy peasy :) Of course, the hard part was trying to figure out what pictures I was going to use! Hehehehe.

Ok. That's it from the office. Finishing up some stuff (like health insurance!!!) before I head home. I am NOT feeling well at all. I think I'm coming down with something.

The darn kids must have been drinking from my water bottle from our ref in the room.....and left their germs to spread in the water! Ack!

Pee, Nails, Sleep

I know, weird title, hehehehe. Soon to be explained, below:

{PEE}

Ahh, the "dangers" of having a 4-year old sleep on your bed. Ranger was exhausted from all the swimming he did yesterday. Even when coach would be holding Riley and Ranger was supposed to be resting on the side, he would swim to the bottom and up, go to Bric and try to console him, and back. No wonder he was tired!

Anyway, apparently, he was scared to go to the bathroom by himself (he can't turn the door knob on that door) and he was scared to wake either Japa or myself to let us know he needed to go to the bathroom! Grrrrr! My memory foam!!! Waaaaaah!

Oh well. That was at 530 am. And if you know me, I was hard pressed to go back to sleep. Sigh!

{NAILS)....and WORK

I was finally able to convince Mom to go to Le Charment, the nail salon, and get her nails done so they'd last longer :) Yup, I took a photo of my hand with my wonderful-looking nails in their french-tip, wrapped glory.

By the by, those ARE my real nails, with some sort of powder wrap on them. I had them put on about 3 weeks ago (yup, they last that long, thank goodness!) so that one nail with a huge break in it wouldn't drop off on me. I loved the results, and have been extolling their services ever since, hehehe.

My nails have been sturdier and the best part? Becaue of the nail wrap, the nail polish doesn't chip as often! Seriously! The day after I had my nails done the first time, I was typing the WHOOOOLE weekend and then 2 more days or so and there was NO chip at all!

So of course I had them done again! They took out the wrap, nipping at it after soaking it in some solution. They were just going to add some fillers but I said no, I wanted the whole thing to come off so that they can put in brand new ones. I wasn't going to pay them a bundle for doing half a job, now would I?

Two hours later (hehehe, yes, it takes that long!), Mom and I were happy campers indeed with our nails! I should have taken a pic of mom lolling on the chair with 3 attendants: one for each hand and the other for a pedicure. But my nails were still wet, so there.

After the nail salon, I told Mom I had to go back to the office. A TON of work still left to do, but I have been so tired the whole day. Maybe it was because I was up at 530 this morning???

But anyhoo, off to work I went. Since I was sleepy, I sooo wish I had some voice recognition program to use to make work easier. Imagine, lying down and giving instructions, and having the computer get it right the first time around! Ahhh, that would be awesome, wouldn't it? They probably cost a bundle, but what if it would make someone more productive and efficient? Hmmm.....something to think about yes?

And with our trunk-hunting capability for the phone line in process, having a speech recognition software installed would have a ton of advantages! Like having the client talk into the phone and make an option, and the computer would be able to forward that call to the proper person! Cool, huh! Whipping out the wish list! Hehehehe. Just in case.

{SLEEP}

And no, I didn't do aerobics today, sad to say! :( I was just too tired and sleepy to be of any use; I don't think I'd be able to bounce around following the instructor!

So here I am at home, very tired. Uploading a couple of pages I had done late last night and early this morning (yes, because I couldn't sleep! hehehe) and I am calling it a day!

FLOWERBOX

A FUNDERFUL DAY

G'nite and TTFN!