brooch bouquet: summer!

This one is flying to Cebu!!! I love the mix of colors and materials of this bouquet.  Not yet done as I have yet to assemble the handle and the "foliage" or fabric base to cover up all the wires but I am loving it already! 

My vignette below accompanies the Summer bouquet really well!

Lamp and  clear glass jar from Metro Market Market, clock and stripped black and white hand towel turned table cloth from Robinson's Department Store,  green tall jar, beige and pink ceramic flowers from Uniwide, elaphants with intertwined trunks from Mandaue Foam, "You make me happy" by Swerling and Lazar from Booksale and "Happy Chic Colors" by Jonathan Adler from National Bookstore.  All atop the Ikea White Lack table from True Value. :) 

So, I Never Got to Show You the Tree

A week after I took the tree down, I finally got time to post pictures! Hehehe

As I told you before, I was hell bent on getting a while tree...

Tada!  We went aqua and red so that it will go with the rest of the living room.

I had to scour Divi for the most affordable white tree that had leaves that did not look like bottle brushes.  I found one along Soler St. behind the new 168 Soler - Recto wing.  7 ft tall tree set me back for Php 4200

We put in two strings of white LED Christmas lights.  This I bought at SM, I'm a bit wary of buying electrical items at rock bottom divilandia prices as this could be a source fire should there be any faulty wires. :/

We put in the red ornaments first, some of these were from Divi along Tabora and Soler and some from Uniwide.  The balls were all candy apple red but had different finishes.  I also scored a couple of clear balls with gold and silver glitter designs.  

 

Then we started to put in the aqua details, the ones here on the tree came from Uniwide and the aqua gifts and candy ornaments came from 168.  The additional aqua and disco mirror balls that you will see are from my Mom since they went back to green and bronze for their tree.  And I'm pretty much the only one there who wanted that much sparkle in the tree! Hahaha

Last we put in the red ball garland and the wire glitter star topper both of which also came from Divi.  Under the tree I put in a red and white snowflake felt tree skirt, a major score at Php150.00 from Uniwide!!!! :D 

Right before a house party, I put in a DIY sign made from white board, red construction paper, aqua glitter and lace paper liners that can be used on cake plates! :D

Ooohhh honorable mention!  Our mini tree from Gourdo's! :D  Assembled by the boys next door, Miggy, Gabby and Rafa! :)

So in the end we still got a little pop of green. :)  I looooove the white as it makes the ornaments pop like a magic dragon.  But I realized it's still going to take a whole lot of ornaments to cover more of that white and give depth to our tree.  Since the tree is white and it is seriously one solid color.   Unlike the green ones where there happens to be different shades of green in each tree and since green is darker, the mere presence of fairy lights gives it additional dimension.  Oh well there's always next Christmas! :D

Love is the answer

It's been a while since I posted about weddings and went on a Same Day Edit (SDE) marathon.  God knows (and my then fiance knows!) I lost a good amount of sleep watching wedding videos.  And warning, this video made me cry.

I love a good love story but this one told a great love story.  For me this video and this marriage is amazing not because they are different - physically different from other couples, from each other, or that they have problems that are different from other couples.  Their vows unknowingly posed a question from a man and also garnered an answer from a woman.  

Love is a dynamic entity that can serve many different purposes for different people.  This story is amazing because it told a side of what love could be - an answer, a woman who is the answer to a man's life long question to God and a solution that can solve the problems that they encounter every day.

"Why?"
"I believe I am the helpmate God designed especially for you..."

The story of Mara and Elo as told by Jason Magbanua.  Special thanks to weddings @ work, if it wasn't for the 12 top weddings of 2012, I wouldn't have the chance to know about this beautiful story of love and answers.



Love is the answer.



Mara and Elo: Same Day Edit from Jason Magbanua on Vimeo.

New Year New Life

OK I promise this will be the last title with repeating words. (for now hahaha)

feel free to download this calendar via hello, cuteness!

After one year and five months of wedded bliss.  I know you're probably thinking that I felt my world drastically change last year.  However, since we spent most of these times living at my room at my mom's house and at my in law's place, we felt that we did not have to adjust that much.  There is something about lived in homes.  There is a system to each family, schedules and routines that vary from household to household.  Where you put things, where you get things.  We just had to abide by these systems.  Now that we are together in our own home, it's taking some time for us to adjust and to develop our own system for our home.

That's why I love this list from apartment therapy!  It gives me a sense of control over what to do everyday.  Unlike other people, I actually plan to start January 7, 2013.  Why wait for one more week?  Officially that's when I return to work. And also because my crazy friends are coming on January 5 for our Christmas/New Year party so after all that mayhem that at least I have a clean slate to work with. :)  So here's a 20 minute clean up schedule for 30 days.  They actually recommended that you have a cleaning sound track (this really helps!) and also use a timer so that you can actually see how much time you have left to do a particular task. 

1. Surface clean living room and kitchen (pick up stray items, dust, sweep, vacuum)

2. Clean bathrooms (toilets, showers, floors, walls, mirrors)

3. Surface clean bedrooms (put away toys, clothes, dust)

4. Surface clean "extra" rooms (basement, office, play room)

5. Surface clean living room and kitchen

6. Clean bathrooms

7. Clean all interior windows (white vinegar and newspaper works great and is cheap!)

8. Sweep and vacuum all floors in the house (don't forget stairs)

9. Surface clean bedrooms

10. Deep clean living room (mirrors, baseboards, dust artwork)

11. Clean bathrooms

12. Clean out closets (hang up clothes, mittens, jackets, hats)

13. Surface clean "extra" rooms

14. Deep clean bedrooms (organize drawers, check under bed, tidy closet, dust artwork, fans, lights, mop)

15. Surface clean living room and kitchen

16. Deep clean bathrooms (clean inside drawers, inside of trash cans, tops of mirrors, tile, mop)

17. Clean all door knobs, phones, entertainment equipment (remote controls), switch plates, banisters and other things that are repeatedly touched.

18. Clean out the refrigerator, take stock of food, organize pantry

19. Clean entryway, sweep porch (if you have one), clean out car (because they're often our home away from home)

20. Surface clean living room and kitchen

21. Surface clean bathrooms

22. Surface clean bedrooms

23. Sweep and vacuum all floors in the house

24. Clean linen closet, straighten towels, sheets or regular closet if not applicable

25. Surface clean living room and kitchen

26. Deep clean kitchen (scrub appliances, wash trash cans, base boards, wipe down and straighten cabinets)

27. Surface clean bathrooms

28. Surfaces clean bedrooms

29. Clean one item you've been meaning to get to and haven't (deep clean your stove, wipe down all light fixtures, tackle a particularly unruly area)

30. Sweep and vacuum all floors in the house

In our case, we also have to add a couple of other tasks that we have to do daily.  Laundry was suggested to be done daily but I don't think that's feasible, too much water and energy consumption me thinks.  There are two more chores that we have to do daily which is watering the plants and releasing the Cracken este walking the dog pala.  Will introduce the giant teddy bear to you in a few days.  :)  If you want to see the whole article on cleaning schedules, you can check it here.

Christmas Lights Traffic Lights

Every time December hits Manila, every conversation would most probably include a bit about the horrible traffic that every one encounters (or a bit about their surprise that traffic wasn't that bad getting to that area haha).  We all know Christmas = traffic.  Times like these google maps is my best friend and I have been known to explore all possible side streets just to avoid traffic.
The tried and true tested path always leads to gridlocks for me so I need to get creative just to get to where I am going.  Green line is for normal route and red line is for my route. Hahaha

Example:

From Manila (via SLEX) to Fort Mckinley Hill just so I can avoid 40 minutes of Nichols Traffic 

From Macapagal Avenue to Roxas Blvd so I can avoid the crawl along Star City and CCP

Traffic aside, you have to admit, having festive lights twinkling around you eases the pain of being stuck on the road during rush hour.  Here are just a few of my favorites.

I love looking at the tree in front of Aloha Hotel along Roxas Blvd. cor. Quirino Avenue in Manila.  There's no escaping traffic here but I don't mind being there for 20 minutes as long as there is  shimmery eye candy.  Personally I love that they followed each groove of the branches and lined them up with Christmas lights.  Nothing also beats the old school bulbs that they use to light up the upper part of the tree!

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My love for Manila continues with the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas and Department of Finance Christmas Lights!  I love how these two buildings always set up gigantic images using colorful lights.  And this year, they went all Pinoy! :D

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Just across at the the next corner is the Cultural Center of the Philippines and their parols from Pampanga.  I love love love this showcase of Filipino craftmanship, much better than just outlining the building with Christmas lights which they used to do before.  What's amazing about these lanterns is that they are the same kind of parols, but the intervals of the blinking lights are different from each other so you start to think that they have different designs.   

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Who can miss the lights of Ayala Avenue and the Ayala Triangle Enchanting Light Show? The bright LED lights makes you feel like you are having a white Christmas in the middle of a tropical country.  The moving lights and music of the show entertains the crowds night after night.  I also love the decor of the old Prudential Bank building along Ayala Ave. with the angels and the giant Christmas balls.

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Will post pictures of shiny bright lights in and near our home soon! :)  What are your favorite buildings or structures this Christmas?

Dreaming of a White Christmas

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Ever since I was a young girl and saw the immaculate white Christmas tree of my Lola Vey at their house, I knew I would get a different colored tree when I grew up.  I love the idea of bringing in other colors into a festive event.  I still love the red and green and all the glitter and shimmer that comes from gold and silver. (wow, it rhymes! haha)  I kind of remembered telling my Mom to get a white tree when we had to replace our old one but she told me if dust or dirt settled on the tree it would be so obvious. So no white tree for us.

But now... I get to buy my own big tree! And I can pick a different colored one! :D  I contemplated getting a silver one made of tinsel but I had a hard time thinking about how we would actually clean it after.  So I decided to stick to white, blank canvass for any type of holiday color scheme that I want! haha

Sooooo on to decor ideas!

How about a rainbow tree?

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White on White Tree

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Go crazy with color

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home sweet home

And the best part of having a white tree lets your ornaments take the center stage!!!

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Going to the urban jungle known as Divisoria in a few days, so I will just keep you updated about what will be the final turn out of our first tree!!! :)

Thanksgiving! Cheers to moving in!!!

Hi Everyone!

I know I haven't posted anything since October but I do have a couple of good reasons for my negligence. :)  I think Thanksgiving is a great way to get back into the blogging bit since I have a lot of things to be thankful for. :)

First I took advantage of the looooong Nov 1 weekend and we moved in to our house:

Things have improved a lot since then I assure you. :)

Then we moved in and had the blessing of Achievers!

Some shameless plugging first.  If you live within Gen. Trias, Tanza, Naic, Maragondon, Ternate, Trece Martires and Rosario and you are in need of QUALITY occupational therapy and speech pathology services from licensed and certified therapists call ACHIEVERS at 09151864746.   We're along A. Soriano Hiway Tanza, Cavite! Add us up on facebook by clicking here! 

Will be posting more updates soon! Such as how to turn IKEA furniture assembly into a contest, our quest in finding the perfect faucet (took us a couple of hours I tell you!) and never ending pamahiins (lipat bahay edition).

I know God is a great and giving and there were a lot of trying times these couple of months but in the end were so many blessings to be thankful for! Such as sleeping in our own bed and house, finally having access to running water, setting up a clinic in under one month and having cable service installed to the TV! Oh I am also thankful for family, friends, colleagues, clients and an awesome husband who makes the best efforts to clean the house.  What are you thankful for?