Almost everybody knows that my dad is into barbershop business and there are days that the income is really great especially this December where there were so many customers who want pampering. But there are days that the income is really low to the point that my dad wants to give up. He sometimes feel that setting up the business is a bad move and that he even pays more of all the rent and expenses that earning from the shop but now that he has a regular job in a semi private company, he decided to keep the shop and give it another chance, since there are condominiums being built around the commercial center where his business is located so it means more customers in the future but there are friends he knows that really loaned money just to pay and maintain their business so he is still lucky. Some even complained to him that banks really taking advantage to business people in need. If only they new about onlinecheck.com, where there is fast transactions, fast approval with no extra cost and accept credit cards. I’m happy that I knew this, at least when my dad needs it, I will have a company to recommend.

Starting today I will be on my diet once again. I did this diet for the first time before my best friend’s wedding and I did this for 14 days, my bad and because of that I got really sick with high fever, naapektuhan ang resistensiya ko and I blamed it on being too diet conscious. Anyway, the diet is No Carbo-No Sweets Diet for just 10 days only. After that you go back to your normal diet of eating rice and maybe a little sugar. But of course, kailangan you watch what you eat na wag naman sumobra ulit ang pagkain di ba? No rice, no bread, no potato and anything that turns into carbohydrates plus no soda, no Starbucks and no fruits. My diet? Just veggies, fish, lean pork, chicken and a little beef once in awhile. When I get hungry, I will eat a can of tuna and drink water in between meals. I will have to weigh myself tomorrow morning and be back to this post to update. Just to keep track of my improvements.

Also the holiday ends today for me and my family. We had a day of extra holiday yesterday and I even got another gift from the husband, a Havaianas. I will be blogging about so many things and right now I’m still overwhelmed. Frankly, I really don’t want to get up and go to work this morning because my son is coughing so hard at 5 am and I wanted to just take care of him and maybe sleep more, lahat kami kulang pa kasi sa tulog. Anyway… be back later for more updates.

Let me borrow Aggie’s title for a minute because in my family, the holidays are indeed not yet over. Just today, we had my Dad’s family and my Mom’s family come over for lunch. I (including the husband and the son) stayed in our room almost all day since the son is resting from his fever last night. His pedia thinks it’s over fatigue, well he is coughing once in awhile and vomited once but I only heard him cough twice while he was sleeping last night and he coughed four or five times the whole day today so I guess nothing major about that. Dustin’s been going out of the house often, he even played around High Street for half a day when the termite exterminators had to do their job before New Year’s Eve. He usually takes a total of 4 hours of nap during the day, 2 in the morning and 2 in the afternoon but with the Holiday rush, mahaba na ang 2 hours for him. Then puyat pa lagi, he’s used to sleeping around 8 pm or 9 pm pero since everybody is busy, usually 10 pm na siya natutulog and wakes up at quarter to 7.

Anyway, we still have an activity tomorrow, he’s a little feverish pa, usually his temperature is 36.6 pero since this afternoon, it’s 37.3 or 37.5, I find it hot already but his Pedia said it’s still normal. We’ve decided to push through with our Bellevue trip, since naka-leave na kami ni Dee for Monday, sayang naman. The doctor told me that Dustin should drink lots of fluids, take paracetamol every 4 hours - round the clock and REST! So, he will do a lot of resting in Bellevue for the next 2 days. NO MORE Enchanted Kingdom for us, the husband still wants to go but I said no. We will be spending most of the time in our hotel room whether the husband likes it or not. Dustin will be very tired if we go to EK on Sunday, I told Dee that we’ll see if we can visit Fun Ranch by Sunday, so we have to settle at ATC lang. We’ll just bring gadgets to pass time and maybe keep Dee company when he takes a deep in the hotel’s pool, bumawi na lang siya sa breakfast buffet. LOL.

I hope Dustin feels better and gets better by tomorrow morning. Ayaw ko rin naman kami maghotel nang masama ang pakiramdam ng bata. Di rin kami mag-eenjoy kahit nasa hotel kami. I, myself is feeling a bit fussy kasi my throat hurts tapos parang I have clogged nose. The husband on the other hand is feeling much better with his colds, kasi he’s taking meds already. I just hope things gets better before we check in at 3pm tomorrow.

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Rule: Leave a comment on this post once you finished answering the tag and I will add your BLOG on the master list.

TEN THINGS ABOUT ME
1. Are you single? Happily taken.
2. Are you happy about that? Read the answer above.
3. Are you bored? Nope. Sleepy? Yes!
4. Are you sad? No.
5. Are you Italian? No.
6. Are you plastic? No.
8. Are you cool? I don’t think so.
9. Are you Chinese? Nope.
10. What are you? A girl.

TEN FACTS
1. Initials ? LMBA
2. Nicknames ? Charie, Sharie, Litz, Litzie
3. Birth place ? Manila
4. Hair color ? (real hair color) Medium Brown
5. Age ? 31
6. Eye color ? Dark Brown
7. Birthday ? March 20
8. Mood ? Ready to hit the sack
9. Favorite color? ? Brown and Pink
10. Left or right handed? ? Righty

TEN THIS OR THAT
1. Love or money? Can I have both? LOL.
2. Hard liquor or beer? I don’t drink anymore.
3. Cats or dogs? None.
4. A few best friends or many regular friends? Few best friends.
5. Television or Internet? Both. But now that we don’t have television or even tv lifts in our bedroom, I will say internet.
6. Pepsi or coke? Coke.
7. Wild night out or romantic night? I’m a hopeless romantic.
8. Money or Happiness? Definitely Happiness.
9. Night or day? Day.
10. IM or phone? Phone.

TEN PREFERENCES IN A RELATIONSHIP
1. Smile or eyes? Smile.
2. Light or dark hair? Dark hair.
3. Hugs or kisses? Kiss sabay hug!
4. Intelligence or attraction? Both.
5. Hook-up or relationship? Relationship.
6. Trust or love? Love. It all comes down to love. I believe that.
7. Long distance or close? Close.
8. Call or text? I’m a text maniac.
9. Older or younger? Younger. LOL. My husband is a year younger than I am.
10. Looks or Personality? Personality.

TEN LAST
1. Last phone call you made? Hubby.
2. Last phone call you received? My Dad.
3. Last person/people you hung out with? My boys and my bro’s family.
4. Last person to text you? My BF, I think.
5. Last person you tickled? My son.
6. Last person you IM? My sister who is in Canada.
7. Last person you hugged? My son.
8. Last person you slept with? My boys.
9. Last person you laughed with? My boys.
10. Last dream you can remember? Too embarrassed to say this.

PLAYERS: Chikai | Gengen | Yen | Joan | Kathycot | Anne | Litzie | YOU

Still a bit in a Holiday mode, just finishing important tasks online and is already excited of our Bellevue getaway after the New Year celebration. Before going back to work mode on January 6, my family (the husband, me and our son) will be going to our 2 days and 2 nights stay in The Bellevue. I still need to list down our itinerary. Only a few days left and we will be saying goodbye to 2008 and will be saying hello to 2009. So how was your Christmas celebration? I will blog about it next year right now let me show you a sneak peek…

I bet my online friends will have tons of stories too, I’m excited to hear their stories as well. I will be blog hopping a lot after New Year’s Celebration, I bet!

It’s my first time to attend an event with this kind of party favor for the guests, so to some this may be really old but for me I found it so unique and new, well aside from the custom rubber stamps I saw once. During my best friend’s wedding they thought of putting a photo booth with unlimited photo access for all the guests all through out the party. The line was really long and they thought of closing it while the program at the reception was on going or else nobody might be inside to watch the program. Anyway, before my Christmas post let me share with you some photos from the booth… Feeling artista talaga kami…

Di naman kami medyo camera shy nuh?

All guests came home with these…

And you can even grab the individual photos in their site gallery. As for the couple, they get clear copies of all the photos taken during their wedding compiled in a CD. Ang gandang souvenir talaga, parang ang sarap ulit magpakasal. LOL.

The wedding prep started when I left my boys at around 9.30 am and went straight to David’s Salon near our place to have my hair ironed for the event, I had it colored the night before. Anyway, after an hour of ironing, I went straight to The Pen to have my make up with my then wedding make up artist, Jasmine Mendiola. She said, it’s like de javu and as usual, she made me look better, no traces of my freckles or dark spots, the acne scars are still visible but she’s no magician, you know! Anyway, it was fun hanging out with my best friend’s family, I had fun talking to them and seeing my best friend prepare for the event. She looked so nervous, I just knew this because she laughed all the time, a sign that she was indeed conscious that she is the center of attention but after a few minutes, she warmed up and her photos were gorgeous, I’m not saying this because she’s my best friend but when Imagine Nation showed their AVP, there were really no bad shot of her, all pictures showed how pretty she is. Of course, I took some shots of her at the hotel…

Very Gorgeous Profile

Sobrang shy kaya dinadaan nya sa tawa. Read More…

I’ve always wanted a home with a nice view. A really nice porch with a really big garden so that my son can play and will be great in holding parties. I want a shabby chic style and with class, not too big since my husband and I don’t want a very big family, just enough space for the family and will be nice to entertain family or friends for a night or a week to stay in. Of course, quality and pricing are important as well. We don’t want a house that would only last a few years, it’s an investment and it should be worth our savings. Money is hard to earn these days and we should be sure where we put our savings. I’ve heard of custom houses all across states like Arkansas, Indiana, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Texas, and West Virginia and schumacher homes are very popular. I’ve read reviews of families that are so happy with their homes from the phases of blueprinting, pricing, planning and even the actual construction, something that my husband and I are looking for. Choosing a home and planning every step is very stressful as much as moving in the new home and with the help of the very reliable and credible staff of the company, the process will be less stressful and the anticipation of moving in will be much worth it. I hope we can find a very nice custom built home in the future, just like the families that are raving about schumacher homes, I hope we will be raving the same about our home, our dream home.

I did mention that I’m organizing and decorating our small bedroom. My son is growing up and it’s easier to clean our room without worrying that it will be VERY messy the next minute. Since our room is just small, when my son makes a mess, it only takes me a few minutes to clean it up.

I’ve posted photos of our organized room and since I’m done cleaning and organizing now I’m into decorating our room. We don’t have much cabinets or tables and where can I put our displays? The only things that we have in our room are our shelves and the walls to put what I’m planning to display. Since I love photography, I’m planning to display nice black and white photos in white lining and plain black frames in a part of our room with this one…

But this is a bit pricey so I’m saving for these tiles, maybe by May or June I can purchase them after I look into really cheap mantle at SM Home.

And then I plan on ordering this too, for a small spot in our workstation wall…

But I will have a quote about Creativity.

Then I got these 8″ letters, A for Anchinges, that will be painted all white and D for Denon that will be painted in dark moss green.

Then I ordered a customized 7″ letter L with this font in deep red with vintage feel…

Then I ordered these letterpress for Dustin’s name, but some letters are still out of stock and I convo the seller if he can possibly find it for me since he already found me the “&” character I want…

So here is the letterpress “&” which was used from the 1910’s or something a really vintage piece in only $6. Slavko will be sending the letters to me tomorrow and I will probably receive them by next year already.

I found the nicest sellers from this group, ever ready to answer all my questions. Slavko even went out and look for the “&” for me since I only like it small and he doesn’t have any stock of this character. He got so many choices for me and I chose the one in the circle. The seller of my initial L, Darline (The Back Porch Shoppe) was so nice to me, telling me that she will make my order right away as soon as she finishes all the orders for Christmas, and she even told me how busy it is for her and that the snow and the mist these days affect her productivity, slowing down the drying of the paint and all, she even apologized for that. Really really nice people. Oh and Darline even make way to look for cheaper shipping for me.

This is my project for next year. I hope I can finish everything including finding a  nice white mantle and frame the black and white photos by the first months of 2009.

Last Tuesday, my mom was talking about a very persuasive telemarketer who called her on the phone. She wanted to put it down, the telemarketer kept on talking and talking even if she already heard my mom tell her that she’s not interested. If she only recognized the number, if she only knew that numbers like that are from people who just don’t understand the word “No” she could just have ignored it and just didn’t answer the phone. If she only knew www.reportphonenumbers.com, where she can read telephone numbers and the comments where people can tell something about the number. Could be a prank caller or a very irritating telemarketer or just a simple wrong number then it would have been a different story but of course she had to listen and really be nice to the telemarketer. I told her next time, just don’t anwer number that is not registered in her phonebook unless they call her landline phone, then that would be a problem.

I want to do this entry maybe weekly. This weekend, I’ve been very diligent in taking pictures. There’s one thing I’m sure of, Nikkie needs servicing badly. Every shot is noisy already even with enough sunlight and the photo is already in raw, still blurry. I miss my old photos when Nikkie was still fine. Sigh. Anyway, I will have 2 parts of this post. Christmas is just around the corner and I’m really getting busy every minute. Everybody is getting busy, I guess. I just love the Holidays.

Saturday.

The whole day was spent at home. Dee helped me take care of our son. We spent the day walking around the house, watching Finding Nemo for the nth time and playing. It was a nice day spent at home. We woke up late, late meaning 7:30 am. Yeah that’s late already, then we went down to eat breakfast and took tons of pictures:

From top L -bottom R: I didn’t put any gift tag for Denon’s gift but he convinced me to tell him where the gift was and he never stopped shaking it and asking me what’s inside, parang bata nuh; Dustin taking off the balls and playing with them, we were telling him to put it back and sumusunod naman, yun lang, he will get another ball and play with it, tapos sasabihin na naman namin, put it back; driving my brother and my nephew to pick up my mom’s CRV in Honda The Fort, while waiting for them ayan kuha muna ako ng shots; Denon inside the van while we’re parked outside Honda; Baby Jesus, one of my faves and Dustin playing inside the van.

Then Dustin and I took a very long nap in the afternoon while Denon went out to bike with my brother then he had to take care of Dustin because I will prepare for my best friend’s bridal shower. I left home at 6pm and dropped by Boni High to buy her a little something-something. My Bf texted me while I’m on my way to the hotel, it was funny, she had no idea we’re having a party. The party started late since the fiance had to do something to pass time and when we told him that they can come over already, they were caught in traffic then the car overheated.

Opening her gifts…

The party was a blast. The games were fun, I won the first Bridal Bingo and I got a Starbucks GC, then I won again this time with my groupmates and everybody was teasing me, na luto kasi best friend daw ako, I won another game with my group again in a Pictionary game this time. I won 3 games and everybody wanted me in their groups already. Funny! I left the party at 11pm and I went to a home with a sleeping son and a smiling husband who was in front of the laptop asking me if I enjoyed the party… Sweet!

Part 2 here.

Disappointed that I still don’t have the hardbound. The more I want to read the book soon, the longer is the wait. I hate it. Some friends are done reading the series. Sigh. When I go to the malls, I never miss a trip in the bookstores just to ask the stocks and they said the delivery of the books are still indefinite. Darn!

Anyway, I’m not so much interested with the cast, right now I just want the book, period. But this didn’t stop me from googling about them and saw really cool photos.

Read More…

I left my boys for at least 5 hours and I went home to a husband who is all smiles while in front of our laptop. Am I lucky or am I lucky? Hehehe. He willingly took care of our boy while I attended my best friend’s bridal shower at The Legend Villas Hotel in Pioneer and boy, I had so much fun. There were only 10 girls who attended the party but most of them were so wacky and funny, it felt like there were 20 people there. Pictures to follow. I didn’t bring my still busted DSLR and since my best friend has her own Nikon DSLR, I just told her to send me pictures. Anyway, there were games and the food? Oh the food! Delish! The pork barbecue was my favorite though, so delicious, I had to stop myself from eating too much fat. I ate a lot and the wedding is in 7 days. I’m gaining so much weight from all these parties and I will still be attending another party tomorrow night, this time it’s my dad’s PMA Class Christmas Party so all of us will be there. I’m sure there will be so much food again. I need to fit in my gown next week, I need the best diet pill! Well, I might do the non carbo diet thing my best friend’s fiance taught me starting Monday. Yes, Monday because I still have another big party to attend to tomorrow!

I was like, did I do Yen’s QOTW this week? So I went to her site and read the questions, the answer is no. So I’m doing it today even if it’s already a Friday. She has a little contest going on too so if you want to try your luck, come join us here.

1. Do you like to read a book that is in movie format before you view the movie, or afterwards? It depends, but I opted to watch the Twilight movie first before I buy the book, and besides everything is out of stock in bookstores and I just can’t wait to watch the film. I read the Nights in Rodanthe first and I was a bit disappointed with the movie.

2. Have you ever had a dream about being a place you’ve never been, and days or years later, you end up there? I couldn’t remember. Maybe?

3. How do you dream… in black-and-white or color? Oh colored.

4. How many personal ‘fantasy worlds’ exist in your head? As for now? 1, the one where GY exists! HAHAHA… But we can never tell, I need to read Twilight first then maybe, Edward will be in my another fantasy world!

5. What would you like to learn more about? I want to learn more about Photography. I just love the hobby so much. I also want to learn more about myself, improve myself and learn to love myself more.

6. What was the last family event you attended? Well, we had a party here at home for my Lolo’s despedida (mother isde) and my Tita’s despedida (father side).

7. Have you told your Mom and Dad, lately, how much you love and appreciate them? Yes. Not directly but through text maybe.

8. Too much to do, what do you do? I do mostly a lot of online stuff. I’m also busy as a wife and a mom. Today, the Holidays keep me busy by going here and there, shopping everywhere plus my best friend’s wedding is coming up!

9. Do you like to save ‘the best for last’? Always especially when it comes to food! hahaha…

10. Pick an online friend. Only ONE. Tell me something about her. A link to her blog/site so we can take a peek!

I have so many online friends that I would love to talk about but I will talk about Aggie, because she deserves a special mention here, I came across here blog a million years ago, I became a lurker then she inspired me to write more not only online but through scrapping. I started scrapping because of her after that I started leaving comments even if she doesn’t know me, I’m a really shy person you know. Then I also discovered paid blogging through her. I see her as a dedicated wife and mother, she doesn’t hesitate to admit some flaws in her which made her more real to me, even if I haven’t met her at that time. She speaks her mind and when I met her I found her really nice. She laughs a lot and really laughs to her heart’s content. She talks a lot too and I find it really amazing since I’m really not that kind of person.

I had fun Yen. Thanks!

3rd year of wedded bliss. Denon spent more than half of the day with my dad and my brother watching Pacquiao beat the hell out of Dela Hoya. He arrived with them almost at 2pm already, ate late lunch and watched over our son while I prep up for the 3pm mass. We attended a healing mass, offered our thanksgiving and headed back at home to play with our son for an hour before we leave. Our plan, watch a movie then eat dinner before we go home. I was itching to see what’s all the fuss about Twilight, great thing my husband loves movies and he is open to watching just about anything, from chick flicks to action movies or horror movies to Filipino film, damn good man, he can keep up with my “kacheapan” sometimes of watching old Juday movies. HAHAHA. Anyway, on our way to Greenbelt, I was already telling him that he’ll take pictures of me with the Twilight standee but it was gone when we got there. Too bad. So off we watched the 6:10 pm movie. He even loved it. Sweet. Bitin ang movie if you ask me though the movie lasted for almost 2 hours already. Then off we go to find for a restaurant to eat our dinner. He didn’t have any preferred cuisine that night and I was craving for Indian food for ages now so we went to Hossein.

Our Dinner

Lamb Massala - my all time favorite, Vegetable Curry and our favorite drink, Mango Lassi.

Hubby wanted to eat without rice so we got Nan bread.

Hubby took pictures of me:

We were stuffed. Thanks hone! So did he gave me anything? Well, he gave me what I wanted, a new wallet. He bought me a Guess wallet. We both shopped for it, I first wanted a Charles and Keith wallet but after a visit to two shops and found nothing, I’ve decided to find any brand that suits me. What I gave him? I was first looking into Ferrari parts but heck we don’t have a Ferrari and so I just gave him lots of lovin’ and huggin’. LOL.

This is way over late but better late than never, so cliche but true. Anyway, I never went to work the whole week last week because of the accident, I had to take enough rest from muscle trauma, the doctor advised. By Thursday, the pain was almost gone, I only felt it when I carry my 14 lbs. son, great thing because Friday was our Twitter Meet Up and the husband will not allow me if he sees me still limping. Thank God by Friday I was okay, still can’t carry my son but aside from that, everything was back on track and I wasn’t even scared of driving even after the accident, the husband confronted me though, he said that maybe I can take the wheel while we don’t have our own car yet (we are borrowing from my parents when we need to go out). Anyway, Friday… I had a BLAST. It’s a given already, we’ve been raving about it for almost a week already. Read More…

I promised my high school best friend that I will be making layouts for her wedding guest sheets, months came and still no pre-nup photos from her, the reason? Her work sent her to the states to work there for 3 months, if it wasn’t for the wedding, she will still be there working until next year. So the preparations were almost done alone by her fiance. And now that she got back, everything was in a rush. They had their pre-nup last weekend and had tons of photos, beautiful photos that was taken in the beautiful backdrop of Tagaytay Highlands sayang I was invited to come kaso Saturday yun and Sunday naman when we had our family trip there. I would love to share the layouts with you but I have a confession to make, since I need 6 pages to have it printed (I’ve decided that I will pay for the printing, our gift to the couple, I need to rush it since printing takes 7 days, her wedding will be on the 20th already) SO I sort of lifted (my meaning is copied some beautiful pages of some of my fave scrappers and in respect to their creations, I will not post the lifted layouts here but let me give you a peek of a page I made…

She wants the guest sheets simple, no “leave a message” text and no details of the wedding, just their pictures and my art. Plus lots of snowflakes, she loves snowflakes kasi.

Here are some of the great photos taken by their photography hobbyist friend, Rodel.

She is never the girly type, so opposite of me, as I drool and gets all mushy over my wedding, she is the complete opposite, so laid back, so relax and just lets her fiance decide over things. Para bang she just wants this wedding to be done and over with. But when I met her last Monday night and saw how blooming she is, I don’t believe her. And when I received the pictures yesterday, I just knew, she is way over excited and all mushy inside just like any bride to be, even if she doesn’t say it. They look so in love di ba?

Very happy couple, I can’t wait to see my best friend walk down the aisle. I always talk about being married and being a mom to her and somehow I can feel, she can’t relate, now we will have more things to be in common. I love this girl to bits and I always pray for her to be really happy, I know Mon will make her happy. They are just perfect for each other. Ok! Enough of the mushiness, this wedding reminds me to start my diet again, I need to fit in my bridesmaid gown real fast and it’s less than two weeks before the wedding, I need Lipovox for help!

… in our house finally. Well, what I meant was, finally Christmas decorations can now be seen at home. We or should I say the people at home (Mom and our helpers) started decorating just recently. And the house is now very Christmassy. The kids love the lights on our stairs and on the tree. Let me give you a peek…

L-R: Our tree, view from top of the stairs; The socks of the tots (singit si Dustin who loves to sit sa stairs while watching the lights on our tree, we usually make the lights blink pag-andun ang mga bata); my boys (shempre); faith angel (we have several angels like this hanging, may happiness, love, etc. I think my Tita from Illinois gave them to my mom); view of the living room from second floor (ang likot ni Dustin, kakalakad, fave place nya yan sa baba); Me - I wanted the indian sit shot of Alpha pero ang hirap gawin with the stairs, di umubra kaya ayan na lang. Too noisy, tapos naglink pa ako ng shot ni Alpha na pagkalinaw linaw. HAHAHA)

Since it’s Tuesday and I want to keep up, I will be doing number 1 as well.

Christmas Preparation
1. How soon do you start shopping? ~ As early as October?

2. Who do you shop for? ~ I usually make a list, it’s not too long actually, I only have my boys, our immediate families and some close friends.

3. Do you still believe in Santa? ~ Oh yes, I do.

4. Do you decorate your house? ~ I usually do, but now that I have a son and I’m gaining weight, I was a bit lazy to do it, I really need those Hydroxycut fat burners so that I can get back to shape.

5. Do you make gingerbread houses? ~ I don’t. I’d love to learn though. I should taste one too.

Grabbed and join us here.