the lovely way there

written @ midnight before easter

today was lovely.

i woke up to the sound of my brother knocking on my door, telling me that mama said we're going out to eat and shop at Paseo. It was my older brother's birthday recently and because he wasn't home the entire time, mama wanted to take advantage of the weekend to buy him something nice.

We had brunch at Cafe Breton. The ambiance and the food was lovely. I didn't bring my camera, and I don't regret it one bit. At times like this a good camera phone would be handy, because I'm simply not willing to lug a giant camera around and ruin the moments as they come. I kept thinking about Emmy and how interesting he would find the place to be, being an actual Breton himself XD I imagined him picking the menu apart... He certainly wouldn't miss the "Bon apetit" on the very cover ^^

We went around to look for jeans for Nikko, but the heat was unbearable and we ended up just getting some groceries (in my case, going around and around and around looking at interesting stuff at True Value after showing them where the dog food was), deciding to just do the jeans shopping tomorrow. However, on the way home Nikko asked mama if she could just treat him with the game he wanted to buy in the first place XD

She agreed, so after going home, Nikko and Monji went back to paseo to buy rice and Nikko's computer game.

Shortly afterwards, Fr. Ernie and a friend of his arrived to have lunch at our place. I prepared a simple salad for them. And then shortly before them leaving came some of our relatives who wanted to go to Tagaytay, who ended up just staying over!


I set myself to write ten pages each day from Today 'till Thursday, but obviously this first day didn't really go as planned. I spent most of the afternoon hanging out with the kids, who I wished, but didn't think, were coming. The teens and adults of my generation hung out at the balcony to drink in a circle.

(from abbie's IG tengs abi)

I joined them too, for a little while, but I mostly just feasted on the snacks and gulped a bit of sprite-vodka and had some laughs and weird discussions about hilarious and inappropriate stuff before I was asked to watch over the kids who wanted to come back upstairs to my room... I love these kids (and it felt weird to drink at a time like this anyway) so of course I came upstairs with them again, and hung out some more. In case you have NO IDEA what "fun stuff" a 22-year old can possibly do with a 5, 9 and 13 year old, there's a lot!:

• weird, surprisingly dangerous bowling with 2L mtn dew bottles and a stuffed soccerball
• a lot of Flow Free (a game which Nica, the 5 y/o was FREAKISHLY good at!)
• while talking about A LOT OF STUFF
• potential creepy, ghostly scenarios
• life in general
• hilarious stuff that happened to us in school (im so happy i can remember a lot from gradeschool)
• embarassing stuff that happened to us in school
• hilarious everything else (kids are funny okay)
• adventure time of course
• some brilliant drum-tap-thing with pens
• drawings

So yeah! Now my room looks like this:

(eep im so happy about the way this nook turned out! there's like, a pathway for the bathroom door haha)

I went downstairs to check on Sansa and saw her in her cage, lying on her back, stretching her front paws towards me like a baby reaching up to be carried. Haha! It was so freakin cute and hilarious, I wish I took a picture! After realising that the belly rubs weren't making her fall asleep, I decided to let her out and rubbed her belly after making her lie down on one of her usual spots beside a sofa. She still wasn't feeling sleepy. She followed me around for a bit as I poked at things in the kitchen and made myself some tea, and then she went to the rug and peed properly. As if it wasn't enough, I opened the side door and she went out to poo at her spot outside!!!! I had applause go off in my head I was so happy!

GOOD GIRL!

And so yeah, even though I probably won't finish 10 pages before I sleep today, sitting here in my spot (well, lying down on my belly right now), thinking about the wonderful day that just came and went, I can't help but feel calmer and not too focused on my ultimate dream of graduating so much that I lose sight of what's important in life and the little dreams that keep coming true every day.

Great family day full of fun activities, having my nieces and youngest cousin around to play and have fun with, seeing my older cousins have so much fun together by just sitting in a circle, having a room I love to bits, being able to borrow a laptop 24/7 even after losing my own, great food, being able to eat healthily even though I'm stressed (fruits in a blender a-plenty), having the special gugo bark shampoo my mom gave me (thank you so much mama) after finding out that my hair was falling out due to stress work SO FREAKISHLY WELL, having an inside dog that is so awesome and loves me so much ~~~ the journey towards the goal certainly is lovely.

It just feels that being able to graduate isn't really for me anymore, because I'm really fine. This life is good to me. Finishing school would be a way to give back to my mom, who has provided me with everything I need and so much more. And that's what should drive me. It's the least I could do, to make her proud.

I really hope I make it!!! Please send me ALL of the good vibes you can muster. I really need them!

xxx

PS: these kids are funny even while asleep. two are sleep-talkers and one is a snorer. hahahaha