ETA / ETD

Manila Manila
I keep coming back to Manila....

Home-bound in 4 months time!

Estimated Time of Arrival
21:45 Sunday, 8 January 2006

Estimated Time of Departure
15:50 Friday, 28 January 2006

Two weddings and a big catch up with all!

Make new friends and keep the old... one is silver and the other gold

Cerise is in her "senior" year at kindergarten. Over the course of nearly two years, she's made numerous friends and bonded well with all the teachers. Teachers say they'll miss her terribly when she leaves kindy. Glad to know she's made a good impression.

Because her birthday falls late in the year, Cerise has been left behind by many of her chums who already turned 5 and moved on to "conquer the world". Luckily, she's quite good at dealing with goodbyes from friends, anxiously waiting for her turn to bid farewell and explore the big wide world of Primary . Now she's left with less close friends and more new kids to make friends with.

This photo shows her with her 3 dearest girlfriends.
Her popularity at kindy has never been more apparent to me than in the last year. She'd been invited to so many birthday parties I'm running out of gift ideas! Though I'm pleased the last party is the biggest success yet...when the birthday girl had only half opened Cerise's gift to her, Alyssa gasped "It's just what I wanted for my birthday! I have a Sky Dancer (a ballerina doll that dances in the air)". She then ran around showing it off to everyone. I tell you, it can be tricky giving gifts to 4 and 5 year olds coz they can be brutally honest about what they think of it. So in this case, high 5 to Cerise and I for making the perfect choice.

Seen here dressed up as an elephant, Cerise begged me to let her wear her Snow White dress but being a practical mum that I am, I insisted that she wore her elephant suit because it's the only dress-up costume she has which she can wear during winter (too hot for summer which is just around the corner).
Of course, when we first got to the party it all made sense to me why she was insisting on her Snow White dress. All the girls were wearing princess and fairy dresses! They must have talked about it, and perhaps agreed on it, at kindy! I felt really bad that Cerise was going to feel out of place. So I told her she didn't have to wear her costume. But she later on asked me to put it on her. And boy did she turn out to be the life of the party! All the kids thought she had the coolest costume, so soft, fluffy and cuddly.

Gabby couldn't stop fussing over her!

Some of the kids were just a little too excited I worried they were gonna tickle the elephant to near hyperventilation!

Often I run into parents of Cerise's classmates at the mall and they would tell me how their children always talk about Cerise. I'd like to think Cerise is in the good part of the story when they ask their children how their day went at kindy. I should know... parents know by heart the names of their children's classmates under two categories only - the "nice ones" and the "naughty ones"! Well, at least I do!

Our recent photo and story in an Auckland wide community paper must have fuelled Cerise's popularity. I remember dropping by their class one afternoon and the kids instantly recognized me, despite me not being seen there often. After some whispers and giggles, her classmates blabbered on and on about how they saw our photo in the paper. And then one said, "Cerise, your mum is cool!". To which my little angel replied, "Yeah, she dressed herself up and put make up!". That was the cue for me to go and leave them in peace.

Just as I was about to leave, I witnessed an even funnier conversation...

CERISE: Do you wanna come to my house?!

ALYSSA: Yes! (short pause) Do you have a job?

CERISE: (with a puzzled look) No! (translation: what the...?) (shook her head and walked away)

Who's counting?

Atop this page is a countdown to my birthday and that of Cerise. I didn't put this in place to remind anybody about it. If anyone needs to be reminded, that would be me, the party planner. This count down add-on is simply one of my recent discoveries in the world of blogging and since 5th and 30th birthdays are both milestones in anyone's life, I thought that was a good enough excuse to utilize the add-on. Besides, it comes in handy if I want to stick to my timetable.

In the last three weeks, I have started making arrangements for our millenium baby's 5th birthday. It didn't take long for me to realise this is no ordinary birthday that a know-what's-best-so-leave-it-with-me stage mother can conveniently and effortlessly organise. Don't get me wrong. It's a huge task putting something like this together. It requires system, creativity, attention to detail, resourcefulness, multi-tasking, and forward thinking, not to mention money. But it's "convenient" simply because a stage mother of a toddler like me gets to do all the thinking and make ALL the decisions. Sweet! So that makes it effortless.

But for the first time in my birthday party management career of 5 years, I found I no longer call the shots around here. Reality check. I am no longer a mother of a toddler. Cerise is turning 5, marking the end of her infanthood and the beginning of her childhood, that period in her life when she certainly knows what she wants and gets it. Needless to say, my new job title is "consultant to the decision-maker". Cerise has her say on every detail from the venue, the theme, the dress, the guests, right down to her present --- can be very distracting. We brainstorm and debate until we polish the big plan --- tough! whew! quite a challenge! Cerise makes the executive decision, Daddy signs the cheque and Mummy directs the floor on the big day, of which I will blog about in due time.

As for my 30th, I am sooooo looking forward to it, make no mistake about it. But I have no idea how I'm going to celebrate. Wish my family and dearest friends were here though.

Papa

14th of August.....

Papa flew back home to Manila after 9 months of staying in New Zealand. That's 3 seasons excluding spring; several sightseeing trips in, around and outside of Auckland; a once in every 12 years experience of witnessing The All Blacks beat the Lions (he's acquired taste for rugby... as you do here); a handful of good live theatre; innumerable crossword puzzles; nearly 300 days and nights of catching up with me and bonding with Edwin and Cerise; more than a dozen pieces of wooden furniture created from scratch by his own hands including shoe cabinets, DVD/CD cabinet, side table, laundry bin, remote control holder, condiments holder, jewellery box, etc... all built for the purpose of diminishing our everyday clutter.

The scene at the airport wasn't as emotional as it was when I sent my mother back home in 2003. I guess it's because I spent my growing years waving goodbye to my father, a retired seaman, too many times that it's almost like my mind and heart have been conditioned to be okay with that, or at least to keep it together. If there was one who was emotional, it was little Cerise. So heartbreaking to watch her sob quietly for half an hour and then hysterically for the next half an hour. She pulled herself together only after being told she would see Papa in January and in the meantime, he would make her a playground in Manila complete with a tree house and a swing. I should probably tell her now not to hold her breath for that but I'll deal with the consequences of my exaggeration later. She misses Papa terribly. In fact tonight, at dinner, she pretended that Papa was around and said "Papa, time to eat!"

The first two days since Papa left were the most difficult because I was feeling the pangs of emptiness and just the absence of someone you've gotten used to having around. I don't remember spending this much time with him before! After work last Monday, I picked up the paper on my way out of the building, stopped and realised I no longer had to bring home the newspaper for Papa! I put the newspaper down, saddened. I was also reminded of how I felt days after my mother flew out of NZ and weeks after I came back from visiting my sister in Chicago last year.

Here is a photo I took of Papa (in black and brown clothing and wearing a cap) on his way to his gate. The next down shows Cerise posing with gusto. We would have watched his plane take off but his flight was delayed for another hour and we were just not up to waiting.

my favourite people

Good friend, Laura (third from left), celebrated her 25th birthday at Rakino's. Another great excuse for a reunion with my favourite people - Natalie, Laura, Catharine and Roi! See more photos in my new flickr badge on the left hand side of the page, scroll down. Of course, ever present are our partners. Though a teetotaler, Edwin enjoys gatherings with these guys :-) The entire crowd for the party was overall, great. I was telling Laura how nice it was to move around and have small talks with any guest and still have a good time. By 10pm, Edwin and I had to bail out and have dinner at Mission Bay. While we intended to go to our favourite japanese place (it was closed), we ended up at Portofino and shared a yummy pizza. Awesome night indeed!

pre-schoolers don't doodle like adults do

Today, Cerise wrote this.

You'd think it's just another scribble by a bored pre-schooler on a late afternoon.

But think again.

Because when asked what precisely she was attempting to say here, Cerise (who turns five in October) replied, "Cerise ALMOST 5! (duh?!)".

But of course! How could we not have read between the letters??? Hello! It's not rocket science. It's just phonetics.

Clearly, she has put a lot of thought into this (therefore, much is expected of you who reads it), as she does when she speaks, builds, draws and paints anything.

Brilliant.