where the moon shines

Merry Christmas!

Christmas in the Somebang Compound was very simple this year, but also very happy. Who can help being happy when there are kids around?

When I was little, we would sleep on the afternoon of the 24th so we could stay late for Christmas Eve. Papa used to dress up as Santa when it was time to hand us our gifts. There was a time that Lola dressed up as Santa too. Last night, it was my turn again to call out the names and hand over the gifts. No, I wasn’t wearing a Santa suit, but I was wearing a red shirt. Haha

The food table last night wasn’t as filled as Christmas 2007′s table was. But it was good food, and everyone had their fill. There were still some leftovers by the time the party was over.

The kids had a blast with the games we had all night long. As usual, I was game master, with help from cousin Ton. Apart from the games, they also enjoyed singing – even AJ was trying to hog one of the Magic Sing mics!

We brought down the TV from my parent’s room, and my brother also setup our stereo with the speakers, so we can have Magic Sing fun.  Like in previous years, we spent hours singing along! As a Christmas gift to my parents, I gave dad funds to buy a chip for additional  songs for the Magic Sing yesterday. They had been wanting to buy one soon after they got it, Christmas was a good time as any. It was perfectly timed because the songs that everyone wanted to sing were mostly found in that new chip. Although Adam (8) was quite disappointed that Evenascence’s Bring Me to Life was not on the list. 

In reality, the cash donations for the prices wasn’t huge,  I just had most of it changed to 5 peso coins so we could enjoy them longer. That was a great idea! 

Near the end of the evening, I was complaining because I did not get anything – having been the one facilitating the games and not joining any. At that point we passed along a cup for everyone to chip in for a raffle. We put everyone’s names and one lucky person would take home the pot. The donations came in coins, so there wasn’t much, but it was the spirit that more important. 

On the first draw, we found out that not everyone’s names were entered. Butchik would have one but we had to redo the whole thing. Guess who one eventually? I did! Hahaha. All 140 pesos of it was mine! Hehe. 

The last draw was strictly for the 8 kids. The funds were from Esban’s dad, who had won 300 USD from a raffle at a Christmas party. We had been teasing him all night to give away 10% of his cash. He gave away only 300 pesos though, hehe. I added a few more to the pot so all the kids would have a price, rather than just three. 3 received 10 pesos each, 2 got 20 pesos each, and three more received 100 pesos each. Again, that doesn’t sound much, but it shouldn’t take much to keep everyone happy

It was a great family night that ended at 5am for me. I am going to miss this on New Year’s Eve.

Christmas is about the only season that I have Starbucks coffee on a regular basis. One reason is the Peppermint Mocha (hot and cold) that’s been my favorite, the other is to complete the stickers for their famous planners. I first used Starbucks planners in 2007. It was a bulky one, with a leather binder. It’s actually reusable. You can just tuck in a new notebook inside. I’m not sure why I didn’t decide to continue using it. It must be the volume of the thing. I loved the 2008 planner even more. The soft leather cover made it lighter. The pages were also just right. 

This season, Starbucks discontinued Peppermint Mocha. That was really disappointing. In a way though, it was a perfect excuse NOT to get a Starbucks everyday Another excuse: I don’t really find the 2009 planner all that attractive. It has a hard cover, in three colors: blue, red and black. None appealed to me. The pages looked a lot like this year’s though.

So I decided to just reuse the 2008 soft leather cover. I made new pages for it, using the digital scrapbooking supplies I’ve accumulated over the year. This one wouldn’t have fixed dates/days on the pages themselves. I find that I don’t write for each and everyday. So to save space, and ultimately on paper, I have dateless pages that I will just label on a daily basis.

I still haven’t figured how I’m actually going to print these out, back to back. I’m sure I’ll find a way though. I’ve designed a cover also. I have yet to make the month-view calendar. I also saw these cute date planners at the bookstore this morning, and I’m thinking of adding pages like that and making identical ones for two of my girlfriends. The idea is to set dates for various activities with someone and plot them throughout the year. 

Here are the pages to my personalized Starbucks planner, still a work in progress:

I was so excited to test these out, I went to buy colored printer ink. I came home disappointed though because there was none on stock for my kind of printer. I’ll probably get one of those compatible inks instead, I’ll just have to get the exact cartridge number. Tomorrow, I’ll be putting together the other parts

I’ll post credits for the stuff I used soon.

Alfred’s family is hosting their annual reunion this New Year’s eve. It will be held in Bicol though, so there’s no chance of me being there. He did ask me to make their banner so I scrapped a layout using the Sunshine Girls original Winter Wonderland freebie from last year.

Most of the stuff I used are from Flergs, Ellie and Franziska Altman.

For the past thirty days, the following Entrecard members have dropped the most cards on my widget. Thank you for the visits! 

I’ve realized that though I may have visited this sites and dropped ECs, I haven’t really spent time reading through their posts. Sad. So that’s what I’m doing now. Visiting, reading, and commenting too.

So Alfred came home at around 3AM earlier, from having a long night out with his friends. Which set of friends, I’m not really sure of.

He didn’t seem to be all that drunk. He remembered to brush his teeth, and then head back downstairs to check if he left the fridge door ajar.

He did fall asleep easily, after just a few minutes of chatting with me.

Maybe after an hour or so, I felt him get up and open the door. I figured he went to the john. Then the next thing I heard was the stand fan crashing!

I got up and saw him right there at the foot of the bed, on top of our shoe rack and the electric fan!

I pulled the plug on the fan because though it was cracked so many places, it was still working. Thank goodness it didn’t cut off any of his fingers or what! The shoe rack seems damaged too, but I haven’t assessed it yet. I pulled him up – quite a feat – and he went straight back to sleep. I was wondering if he had passed out, I think he just really fell asleep while still standing? I mean, he was snoring!

So I checked on the fan hoping to get it up again, but it wasn’t possible. I left it right there, in the exact state as they were when he fell, so he can see them for himself when he gets up.

I’d take a photo to share but I’m too lazy to go down and get my phone cable so I can transfer the photos to the laptop.

Aye, his been drunk before but this is the first time anything like this has ever happened!