Baby Shower for Little Lilly

Last Friday, a good girlfriend of mine celebrated her birthday. I asked her beforehand if she would be our little girl's godmother and she eagerly replied with a "Yes!". And so it happened that she also threw a baby shower for our coming child on the occassion of her birthday. We just felt so happy and loved for it was a very intimate gathering of good friends, celebrating my friend's birthday and celebrating the life of a soon to be member of our community. It felt like heaven was also celebrating with us, because we had a mild weather, it rained in the morning and so the afternoon air was cool and pleasant.

Here are some snippets of the baby shower and the birthday celebration. It was a first for me although this is my second pregnancy because baby showers were not yet a trend some 12 years ago.   

The nicely decorated cake table with some diaper cakes.
Baby socks and baby bodys hanged on the line make for perfect "baderitas"!

The birthday / baby shower cake. It was delicious!
Forgot to ask what it was made of though because of too much excitement.

The diaper cakes lovingly hand crafted by my friends.

Cake pops? No! These are oreo cookies coated in milk and white chocolate and
garnished with sugar sprinkles. Lovingly prepared by my friend's daughter.

My daughter and my friend's son, trying out the oreo pops!

Of course, our sumptuous feast composed of grilled meat,
the ever present pancit, and some fresh salads to balance it out!

My heart is overflowing with gratitude for all the love, well wishes for a safe delivery and healthy baby, and gifts for our little girl. We received not one, not two, but three diaper cakes among other gifts... This is very useful because the little one will surely be using them, until such time that she is potty trained.

Our little angel is expected to come out into this world in September. It is not easy to be pregnant with the pandemic still going on, but observing proper hygiene protocols, keeping distance at gatherings, and wearing masks when in enclosed public places, one can still enjoy the little things life has to offer. I pray always for a healthy baby. 

And I also pray that things will turn out for the better in the coming days... 

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Gifts for People Who Say They Want Nothing

It is always frustrating to ask someone what they want for a specific holiday, and they answer the dreaded "nothing." Although a few might genuinely want nothing, most do want a gift. They either don't know what they want or can't think of a gift that they need. Instead of making the mistake of not giving anything, try one of these simple gifts.
 

BouquetsWhen in doubt, many gift-givers stick with their go-to option and order bouquets online Boston MA. Bouquets are one of the more perfect gifts; there is a wide variety of different types, sizes, colors and styles of flowers grown in hothouses year-round. You don't have to know the person's favorite to pick one.

Flowers can represent friendship, love or just a thank you. Some bouquets can last for weeks if they are cut with proper care. Many florists will be happy to help you pick the right flowers for the right occasion.
 

PlantsFor those who don't like flowers that don't last, you can always send a plant or foliage collection that does not require a lot of care. Plants are symbols of friendship and life. Even if the person you are giving to doesn't have a green thumb, there are beautiful plants that come with care guides and don't require much attention.

You can find a plant for their office, home or patio. There are plants for every occasion and type of person. With a little research, you can find a plant that suits any personality. One of the best parts about giving plants is that some of them last for years, offering your friend or relative a reminder that you care.
 

Edible BouquetsEdible bouquets are an excellent gift for those who can't have traditional live plants because of pets or allergies. These are usually filled with a variety of sweet treats and fruits. A florist or specialist individually crafts each one to suit the person receiving the gift.

They often have something for every season, holiday and taste. You can order a pumpkin spice basket or a spring fruit Easter arraignment. You could also choose a balloon-filled candy basket for a birthday, or a healthy fruit and nut combination as a get well thought.

You can individually tailor these plants or bouquets for the person you have in mind. Even without knowing a lot about the person, you can pick the perfect gift for the person that says that they want nothing.

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Tips for Throwing a Large Party

Whether you’re hosting a party with an extensive guest list for a friend or family member’s birthday, anniversary or graduation, for example, ensure the event goes smoothly by thoroughly planning for the event. Preparation is key to arranging a gathering that you will enjoy just as much as the invitees and the guest of honor.

Set a Budget

Determine the essential elements of the event – such as the venue rental, invitations, food and beverages, decorations, seating, utensils and entertainment – and create a budget. If the necessities still leave you with money left over, add such items as party favors, a photographer or additional activities. Because you’re planning for a special occasion, it’s easy to go overboard. Stick to the plan without adding extras that will leave you with bills that you’ll have to contend with months after the soiree.

Rent What You Can

Despite the fact that you may be trying to cut costs, consider renting some of the important elements that may be stressful to gather yourself. Opt for a chair rental Hawaii or a service that provides seating, tables and linens rather than pulling together items from friends and family that may be mismatched, uncomfortable and inconvenient. Professionals may also save you time since they’ll set up and clean up after the event.

Prepare as Much as Possible in Advance

If you’re handling aspects of the party such as the food and beverage preparation yourself, reduce stress by delegating wherever possible. Find recipes that you can prepare in advance and heat and serve the day of the event. Choose simple drinks that you can pre-mix or allow guests to create themselves. Taking care of the details ahead of time will allow you to greet and mingle with your guests rather than being stuck in the kitchen.

Head off potential problems with organization that accounts for every element of the big bash. By planning meticulously, delegating and sticking to the assigned budget, you won’t have to worry about snags during the event or have any regrets when it’s over.

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Thank You For Being Born

I owe what I am today partly because of my parents. They have in their own ways raised me to become the person that I am today. The lessons and wisdom they have taught us, especially my Mom will always be in my heart and mind. My mother is not a perfect person. She also has her flaws but I will always be thankful and grateful to her for being a great mother to me and my three siblings. I never realized before how much sacrifice she has done for us but NOW I know -  now that I too have my own family and a child (and hopefully this will turn into "children" in the near future) of my own.

My Mama with her granddaughters A, S and N. 

So as you celebrate your birthday on the 4th of September, I thank you for being born. Thank you for loving, caring and nurturing our different interests. For always making sure our meals are warm and ready to fill our tummies when we get home from school and from work or from just a day out with friends. I may miss another of your birthdays by your side but my thoughts are with you on this day. May our good Lord continue to bless you with good health and the time and resources to enjoy your senior years with Papa, your children and your grandchildren.

I love you Ma. Have a wonderful and blessed birthday.

Thank you for being born. 

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Happy Mother's Day!

To all my Mommy friends out there, here's wishing you all a Happy Mother's Day! Always remember that motherhood is a blessing and always be thankful for the gift of being called a Mommy, Mama, Mutter, Nanay, Inay...

My Mama with her granddaughters.

This equally goes to my mother for unconditionally loving me and my siblings all these years. Thank you for your guidance, for the lessons in life, for sacrificing for us and always finding ways to somehow make ends meet. We may not get or have everything while we were growing up but you taught us how to be diligent and resourceful and to strive for the things that we want in life so that we may one day be able to live the life that you have dreamed for us. Thank you for instilling us the value of having our own faith in our God. Before I did not understand how and why you did what you needed to do but now I guess I am beginning to understand. I know I still have a long way to go in this journey called motherhood but I count myself very lucky to have a mother like you who is with me and my siblings every step of the way. Thank you for being a good mother to me. The example you showed us will be my guide as I raise my own children.  

My only prayer is that you realize that you have done a great job as a mother. I wish only that you may live a longer and healthy life so that you grandchildren too may be able to enjoy you.

I love you Ma... and I miss you. Happy Mother's Day! 

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My Little Girl's Frozen-Themed Birthday Party Part 2

A birthday party will not be complete without the games. Kids and kids at heart always look forward to an activity-filled party so it is important that you prepared some activities that the kids will enjoy. At the end of the day, our objective will be to let the kids go home happy and say that there never was a dull moment. 

We just had some typical birthday party activities and modified some of them to fit the theme.

"It's Snowing Candies" Pinyata:

This is just hand-crafted since there are no Frozen-themed pinyatas available at the local suppliers. What my sister did was paste together cardboard paper to form the body of Olaf and then she covered it with white cartolina. They then cut out Olaf's hands, hair, buttons, carrot nose, mouth, eyes and eyebrows using the rest of the rubber sheets and colored cartolinas. At the bottom, she made a flap and tied white plastic ribbons that the kids can pull. We filled it with sweets and other goodies for everyone to enjoy!

Pin the Carrot on Olaf:

For this game, I just had Olaf printed on a tarpaulin, minus the nose of course, and mounted it on a flat surface. Then I cut out carrot figures proportional to the size of Olaf on the tarpaulin and pasted double-sided tape on each carrot. We then asked the kids to line up and had each take their turns "pinning" the carrot on Olaf blindfolded. It was really a fun game that the kids enjoyed they wanted to "pin" again. So just make sure you have enough carrot noses at hand.

The Frozen Dance:

This is just your traditional stop dance game where each kid should "freeze" when the music stops. We modified it a bit when the number of kids went down to 3 so we can determine the best "frozen" dancer. Instead of freezing when the music stops, they should dance instead and freeze when the music plays again. Who do you think won this game?  

You can add more games if you still have more time... and prizes too. :D

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Samantha's Big Birthday Adventure

It has been almost 3 weeks since my little girl's 5th birthday celebration. I know it is a bit too late for a birthday post but I am writing this post anyway. I guess the lack of things to do has made me too lazy to blog lately... And I was complaining a few weeks ago that I had so many things to do! Perhaps it is because that they got completed at the same time and now I am left a bit restless it's making me confused and well, lazy. Oh darn! 

But anyway, my little girl had a Dora-themed birthday party. I was expecting that my little girl would want a princess-themed party but because she chose a dora-themed cake, we had to plan around this theme. I searched through the net for some Dora-inspired invites and chose a design I found on tinyprints, edited it on Photoshop and voila! A nice birthday invite for the little girl.

The birthday invite and the birthday tarp...

I decided to hold the party at my sister's place and my brother's friend transformed the terrace into a wonderful party area. We rented some tables and chairs and decided to have the food catered so we would not to labor over the cooking . I added some DIY projects to add a little personality to the setup, with some ideas I got on the Internet like the banner at the cake table and the flowers in a bowl. I also had two tarpaulins printed, one a Dora-themed tarp and the other of my daughter's most recent photos. We also hired a party host for the games and balloon twisting for a more enjoyable evening for the kids. My hubby's cousin also volunteered to do face-painting for the children but not everyone got their face painted because they got so engrossed in the games.

Some birthday preparations...

The birthday girl with her cake... all ready for her party!

(R) Getting her face painted with a butterfly design. (L) Enjoying the food with her cousins.

It was overall a simple but fun party and my little girl enjoyed it a lot, celebrating her fifth birthday with her cousins and relatives from both sides of the family. The one person we missed on her big day was her daddy, who had to go back to Germany for work. But they talked on Skype and wished his little a very happy and enjoyable birthday.

Three generations... Mama, Nichole, Samantha, Me

We love you Samantha! May you have always be blessed with good health and surrounded with love and laughter. Mommy and Daddy are always here for you. We love you so much!

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Of Family Gatherings: Because Life is All About Celebrations

Celebrations have always been a part of life. Whether birthdays, baptisms, anniversaries, thanksgiving or congratulatory parties, we always gather around to celebrate with family and friends the milestones that we go through in life. To make the celebration more memorable and remarkable, we even put up a printed tarp, with a specially designed graphic or layout customized for the person or the celebrant.

My cousin's layout for my little girl's first birthday. The theme was Winnie Pooh and friends.

The layout I made for my daughter's tarp on the occasion of her Christening and first birthday.

I remember my cousin making a very beautiful layout for my little girl's christening and first birthday celebration. She had it printed on white poly tarp and it was quite big, it covered half of the of the wall of the party venue. I also made a design for my daughter that my cousin kindly printed as well.

When there are family gatherings, it is of course important to prepare a place where everyone can move around and socialize. Outdoor gatherings are one of my favorites because they offer a sense of openness and freedom. But in my country where the weather can be unredictable, it is important to prepare for those weather changes so that the celebration can go on, rain or shine. So what we do is put up garden tents with canvas tarps - they help keep the heat and the water away. 

Of course, there's always music and food. For what is a family gathering or any gathering without these? Of course, to keep the little ones busy, we make it a point that there are games for the little children. And prizes, giveaway items, and loot bags too! Yes, that's how we celebrate. More or less.  

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I ♥ Berlin: Craving for Dunkin Donuts

Dunkin' Donuts is one of the things that I miss about the Philippines. There's a lot of franchise stores there and it was one of my favorite hangout areas way back in high school. There's just something refreshing about the sugar-coated toppings, and the lightly-salted ham and egg and cheese sandwich. 

Sadly, there's no Dunkin' Donuts here in Stuttgart but I was happy to learn that in Berlin, there is! Some 23 stores if I am not mistaken. So during our trip to Berlin last end of April on the occasion of my birthday, we went to a Dunkin' Donuts store located at the Sony Center along Potsdamer Strasse for refreshments before continuing on our sightseeing tour.

The taste hasn't changed... But there are some assortments missing that I think is only available in the Philippines. It was a delight though to select my favorite flavors like Boston Creme, Bavarian Creme, Chocolate Coconut, and Double Chocolate. There are other variants too that my little girl chose and enjoyed eating. It was a wish come true... a Happy Birthday indeed!

When we left Berlin, we also bought a box of donuts as pasalubong for our friends in Stuttgart. I guess no matter where you are in the world, Dunkin' Donuts will always be "pasalubong ng bayan!"

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Thank You!

My daughter had her 4th Birthday celebration here at home last Saturday, the 3rd of March. Our friends gathered at our house for a simple celebration and to pray the rosary since it was also the first Saturday of the month. My daughter was so excited, because she knows that she will be receiving lots of gifts on that day. She got more than what she expected.

Time to blow the candles on the cake! Thanks to Rizi for this delicious cake..
Samantha finished everything!

Aside from the material and monetary gifts, she received friendship and lots of love. Not just from us, her parents, bur from our friends as well. Her girlfriends came to play and celebrate with her. Her ates and kuyas, and "aunts" and "uncles" and "auntie-lolas" and "uncle-lolos" also came too. Even those who couldn't make it called to wish her good health and greet her a happy birthday.

There was joyous spirit on that day. And I know that although for now, she might only understand that birtdhays mean gifts and cakes and merrymaking, in her heart, she knows that she is LOVED.

We love you Samantha. We hope that you will grow to be a good child. May you always be surrounded with good friends.

The happy little princess, surrounded with her gifts. THANK YOU all!

To all those who came and who are with us in spirit, THANK YOU VERY MUCH... for your friendship, your generosity, and love.

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Almost Four!

In three days, my little girl will officially turn four! I can't believe she will be four in a few days! Time indeed flies so fast... I can still remember when we arrived here in Germany. She was just a year old then and she still cannot walk. I have witnessed her first tiny, wobbly steps and how proud I was to see her walk, I almost cried. It was really a joy being able to see her grow, to witness the small transformations. These, I will always treasure in my heart.

So what are our plans? She will have a birthday celebration at the Kindergarten, with her friends at the Kindergarten of course. I think I will just linger for a bit to take some photos of the big day. Since the next day will be my final exam (which is really very BAD timing!!!), we will just celebrate as a family. Perhaps we will just eat out. We'll see. Then come Saturday, 3rd of March, we will have a small gathering here at home to celebrate her birthday with our Filipino friends. My little girl is already very excited for her birthday to arrive. I can tell why... She is anticipating the gifts and the cake and how she would be the center of attention on that day. Maybe I will get her bouquets of decorative cookies instead of baking a cake for a change. That is if I don't have time anymore to bake a cake.

My mind is actually in a tangle, with lots of "things to do" all clamoring for my attention! And I just wish that I will have enough time to make my little girl's 4th birthday a memorable and happy one. My constant prayer: that God will bless her with good health and that she will grow knowing that she is loved.

"Soon, it will be your HAPPY BIRTHDAY my little one. We hope you will enjoy it. We love you!"

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Gone Formal

It is nice to dress up for formal occasions once in a while. When an invitation to go to a Gala Dinner arrived, I was having second thoughts at first but then again, such events only happen once in a while, so why not? It is a Filipino event anyway so we wouldn't be bored, knowing that we have friends whom we can sit with at the table. The Gala Dinner, which was held last night at the Maritim Hotel in Stuttgart, was in honor of the Filipino Nurses who came here in Germany some forty years ago.

Since it was a formal occasion, we had to dress up for the event. I am not fond of wearing dresses and wearing make-up, and my husband is not a fan of suits and ties and leather shoes. I always feel awkward when I am wearing dresses but I guess once you are there, you realize that you need not be so self-conscious since everyone is wearing formal wear too.

Thankfully, a friend Aunt's daughter also came to the event and she helped me with my hair and make-up. I do not wear any make-up at all, nor do I have my own set of cosmetics so I was really null when it comes to putting on make-up. She applied gold eyeshadow on the corner of my eyes and also some mascara on my eyelashes. While she was putting on my make-up, I suddenly thought of women having very long eyelashes. I wonder if they are natural or they used products to grow them. My eyelashes are okay but should I want to have longer ones, I'd better read about eyelash growth products reviews. She also did my hair and braided both sides and tied it on the back of my head, Tibetan style. The make-up I can say was just light and good enough for the evening. I don't know what I would have done without her help. The make-up suddenly gave me a boost of self-confidence. Hehe!

It was a nice evening, with good music and Filipino folk dances. Dinner was also nice and delectable. The highlight of the event: the recognition of the Filipino nurses who have been serving the sick and the elderly for forty years now.

The night ended suddenly for us when our little Princess got exhausted and wanted to go home so she can sleep in our own bed. We went home exhausted but feeling nice about everything. It is not so bad to go formal once in a while after all. :)

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Easter Memories...

Easter is a much celebrated event here in my part of the planet. Not just in churches... I even got into the Easter spirit and decorated the house with spring and Easter decoration this year and I haven't found the time to put them away yet...

The Easter season is one of the most poopular events among children here, along with St. Martin's Day, Fasching or Carnival, and Christmas. I remeber my girl telling me excitedly what she did at the Kindergarten for their Easter celebration. That they went egg hunting and each child was allowed to choose among the many kids Easter baskets and fill it with the easter eggs that they find. That after collecting and finding all the eggs, they ate the eggs and that she ate all of her share. And she giggled. A few days after that, she wouldn't stop asking me to boil eggs so she could shell them herself.

Easter for me is like starting anew, starting fresh and I guess my little girl will come to understand it and appreciate it more as she grows bigger. Beyond the decorations that beautify are the symbols of new life and new beginning, which is what Easter really represents. And isn't it very good timing that Easter morning comes in Spring time,  when everything comes back to life again? An amazing fact....

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