Birthday Vacation (a 3-part series)

I had the best birthday so far! It was not only for 1 day but 5 days of relaxation and having fun!

Day 1 – July 1, 2010 (Canada day!)
Early morning flight to Vancouver at exactly 9:22am. We left the house 2 hours before our flight. As we can’t bring the car, we decided to call a cab to bring us all to the airport. After all the airport procedures, we were by the pre-departure area exactly 15 minutes before our boarding. Didn’t wait that long which is good. We arrived at Vancouver 15 minutes earlier than our scheduled arrival time. It was Canada day so Vancouver airport is packed with tourists. We waited for our friend for few minutes and he gave us a ride to our hotel – Hyatt Regency. It was a modern hotel. I liked it! Reminds me of Shangrila Hotel Makati. Anyway, we went for lunch as everyone is starving and headed to go to Canada Place (Downtown Vancouver) and took some pictures. There was a big event going on as they celebrate the Canada day. Almost everyone had their face painted with maple leaf or Canadian flag. I love the spirit! Reminds me of Independence day back home.
Ella and I had our face painted with maple leaf (they used stick ons for Ella as they’re afraid she might get some allergies). So we took some picture, stayed for a bit to watch the show/concert. Couldn’t really watch it as there’s a lot of people. Just too afraid that they bumped into my daughter so after a couple of “photo shoots” with our photo enthusiast/photographer friend. We headed back to our hotel to take a shower and rest for a bit and off we went to Capilano Suspension Bridge. We love the view, we love the place. From the name itself, it is a long suspension (hanging) bridge and there is mini hanging bridges all over the place. The park’s attendants were all wearing clothes inspired during the 18th century. The décor and the place itself looks “old” but with lots of history behind it. In general, this is one of the most nicest place we’ve been to. Again, after series of photo shoots and basically enjoying the whole place, we went to another park (didn’t get the name) and again we enjoyed the view and took some pictures. It was drizzling so temperature is kind of chilly but we managed to enjoy the place. Stayed for another hour or so and off we went to our friend’s house for a much deserved dinner at 8pm! Filipino dishes (lutong bahay) were overflowing in their dining area – monggo, igado, chicken, fried galunggong, pancit, buko salad – YUM! I sooo missed this! I was so bloated after the dinner and made chicka chicka to our friend’s wife and called it a night by 11pm! We were sooo tired and Ella is already snoring in the car. Didn’t have time to check our pictures from our camera as we were all ready to zzzzssss….

On the sidelight, after all these activities, no one would ever think that I was suffering and survived a major stomach flu (read: LBM!) that day!

4 more days to go……. (to be continued)

What to give hubby on Father’s day?

Been giving him father’s day gifts since we had Ella or actually even before we had Ella. I remember Fathers day of 2007 when I gave him one gift he still can’t get over with until now… It is a Father’s day card with the following text “Happy Father’s Day to a father to be!” and I enclosed two “positive” pregnancy tests. He was soooo elated when he held it. Too bad I didn’t video taped it. It was one of our emotional moment as a couple. (sob)

I remember one Father’s Day when he gave me a list of all the gifts he wanted to received which was arranged according to his priority to have that year. I think it was 2008 when he did that. I remember he wants a DVD collection of Godfather, which I immediately bought for him as it is the only less expensive must haves in his lists! He wants an Ipod, which I later bought for him as well then he even mention about BMW M3! Which I think is crazzzzyyyy! He knows that I can’t give him a sportscar! Tag Heuer, Bose headset (which he just bought one recently), and the list goes on and on…

But this year, I am not sure what to give him for Fathers Day… I was sneaking some information from him last week and he’s not giving me a straight answer. He was telling me he only wants a sportscar, a 350Z or G37! In which again, I am not rich to give him that! I’m sure if I request for a sportscar for myself, he won’t give it to me either. But then again, going back to his lists, I know he still wants a Tag Heuer watch. 2 months ago, we were at this store and he was checking out a Carrera Chronograph and he was telling me he wants one very soon! Its not that he doesn’t own a watch, in fact he has 5! But he just wanted a Tag Heuer! Period. Well, we both liked Tag Heuer but when he got me my bag for Mother Day, he let me choose between having Tag Heuer or a bag, and of course, I chose the latter! Hihihi! Anyway, if I give him his dream watch (which will cost me close to $2200!). I know I will get the same reaction from him when I handed him the pregnancy tests 3 years ago! But the only difference is, 3 years ago, it didn’t cost me $2200 for that gift. In fact, I just peed on it and gave it to him! Unless….. naaaahhhhhhh… I am not ready for another kid in the house yet =)

My Mother’s day gift… to last for 3 years! =)

Hubby got me this as a Mother’s gift and I know it costs him huge bucks!!! But who cares, I know I deserve this and I use it everyday to work. I love, love my new bag!

Renovations and more renovations!

Summer is coming and aside from spending more time outside the house, summer is one season you want all your home renovations done. And for this year, we decided to extend our deck and build a lower patio for a more spacious place for barbeques and now that we just recently bought Ella her new playhouse, we needed a space where we could put it.

Another renovation in the list is our front yard. We didn’t touched it last year when we installed our sod for the backyard as I am planning to hire a professional landscape specialist to do our front yard. I already have landscape designs and ideas and can’t wait to discuss it with our landscaper. (Will post pictures later on)

And lastly, although we already started changing our beds, and flip our living area. We now decided to give it more color. Before we did the flip, the color of our furnitures were all monotone (either black leather sofa or brown). Now since both myself and my hubby are into HGTV network (he is more addicted to it than me!). We added some colors and now bought some pieces that will stand out from the crowd of boring earth tone furnitures. One example is our newly bought leather red ottoman to go with our leather sofa. And for storage, I bough some antique chest which can function as storage for Ella’s toys and decorative piece in front of our fireplace (which is the focal point of the house). I am doing some window treatments as well and changing our curtain to a stylized vertical fabric blinds. I’m not sure if I’ll be successful and if I could convinced my hubby but all I know is, I want more color now and this is the year to do it! (as per my horoscope! J)

Calgary Stampede '09

First time after 3 years that I got to experienced Calgary Stampede! It is an annual event here in Calgary (more of fiesta in my native land) but the theme of this event is cowboys, horses, wearing cowboy clothes and hats, etc. It is a 2 week event beginning every 1st friday of July. It is a non-holiday event however, most of the offices (especially in Downtown) were participating in the parade so pretty much, every one is either on vacation leave (to give time to go to events) or companies are more lenient to employees and allows them to watch the parade or go home early so they could enjoy this event. As always, Calgary is decorated in accordance to the theme of the event in which you could find cowboy hats or horses in every establishments or sometimes as simple as a "Yahoo" text in the windows of some offices.

You could find free breakfast sponspored by companies or groups anywhere you go. In fact, in our community, they had 2-day FREE breakfast in our neighbourhood. But, I wasn't able to attend to these since they held it on a weekend and they usually starts at 9am (which is I am still on dreamland during this time). And If I remember it right, they held the 1st FREE breakfast on the day of my birthday (which is we went out of town).

The funny thing is, you could see people wearing checkerd polo shirts/blouses with boots and cowboy hats everywhere! It's like a costume party on a summer. We somehow did our "costume" part by wearing a hat. Didn't have the guts to overdo it =)

Just before the Stampede came to an end, Noel and I decided to go and experience it. We went to Stampede ground near the Downtown and we enjoyed ourselves (along with Ella) playing games (we actually won 2 LARGE stuff doll for Ella) and just watching everyone in their cowboy costumes. It was really FUN! There were rides for everyone, foods are overflowing, and it was over crowded that I guess half of the Calgarians are there to celebrate! And not to mention that the temperature that time is over 20C! Super H-O-T! Overall, it was fun and my daughter loves it! Looking forward to 2010 Calgary Stampede!

My bday trip

It was a nice Sunday morning and since we were quite tired from our trip to the amusement park just before my birthday, we slept all day and woke up at around 12-ish. And I was coming back and forth to the other room where Noel is sleeping (He doesn't sleep at our master bedroom because Ella and I is occupying it, my daughter is not used to sleeping in her own room! We are just using it for her clothes and toys. So, Noel has no choice but to move to the guest room and sleep there since my little girl sleeps and moves like a "torpedo"). That time, Noel is still asleep while my daughter just woke up and watching her favorite morning cartoons on TV. I headed downstairs and prepared brunch for us and asked Noel to go for a shower so we could start moving. There were some delays (as usual) but we finally hit the road at 2pm and I was beginning to feel cranky. I was telling my hubby that my birthday is almost done and we haven't started our trip yet. Of course, Noel is still very positive that we will have a good day despite our late start. We drove for 2 1/2 hours and as always we missed our stop again... which is a result of non-stop talking while he is driving. And we could have gone all the way to Vancouver if I didn't see the sign saying "Welcome to British Columbia!" huh?!! We actually left Alberta! But it was fun, although I am very, very hungry but I guess as what Noel is always telling me, nothing is really precious if you spend it with your loved ones. Awwww!

So, finally we reached our destination. Lake Louise is as always breathtaking. The mountains, the lakes, the flowers, everything is perfect as if you are looking at a post card. We took some pictures and we headed to Fairmont Hotel (a five star hotel just in front of the lake! wow! TRIVIA: during our honeymoon days, Noel and I went to Fairmont Hotel in Banff and it costs us almost $500/night!). So, we had our LU-NNER (lunch and dinner) in the hotel and the food was great! First time after a long, long time that I had an alcoholic drink (Long Island). It was ok, although I specifically instructed to make the alcohol minimal ("just a touch of alcohol -- I said") but I think they forgot and they still gave me a quite strong liquor... somehow I guess they knew it was my birthday! =) So, we had great food, good conversation as always and we resume taking pictures inside and outside the hotel.

Before going home, we stopped by at Banff and ate dinner and headed home. There were some stops, as Ella is getting cranky and wants to get out of the car so we stopped for a while in an overlooking area where we took some pictures again. And we're home by 11pm and called it a day. It was a very simple celebration but mind you, it was one of the best birthday I had =)

Our backyard!

Here are some pictures of our newly built backyard. It is still a work in progress but overall, I am very happy with what has been done so far especially the sod which is a "project" of my hubby. More renovations to come but for now, just enjoying our backyard and looking forward to a well deserve vacation somewhere else for my birthday =)