Another Sneak Peek

It was little J's first birthday party yesterday :) Now, you know why I am so harrassed :o Organizing two events can make anyone go crazy.  We all enjoyed the party though, was great to have a break from work.  Here's a photo I'd like to share with you. Will post more soon :D 

Happy birthday, little man! *hugs and kisses* from mama and dada

Stress Levels Are High!

Dear readers,

Sorry for the lack of posts. I've been very busy, running around like a headless chicken.

Will try to post before the store opens, and will disclose that soon here :D

Wish me luck and support FOREVER21, k? 

Super thanks!

XOXO,

Jane

My Secret's Out!

Finally, I can announce to the world what I've been busy with 
for the past 3 months!

I have another baby, and it's the international fast fashion chain—Forever21! It's what been keeping me up and awake at night, more than little J—who's been a very good boy. I'm so excited to share this bit of good news with you; and we're opening real soon in SM Megamall! Will share with you more details as soon as I have confirmation.


And oh, for those who want to know what I'm doing for the company (it's SM group, btw), I'm the Marketing Manager ;)

And please add us up in facebook and twitter :D

Happy Father's Day

I'm really lucky to have a cool dad :D 

Treated him and the family to a lunch at Bistecca in Joya, Rockwell. Service was a bit of a disappointment, but food made up for it :D Will share photos in the future. Really sorry about the short post :o Will be busy until July 2, you'll know why soon... wait for my posts this week to find out ;)

Have a great week! :D

New Toys for JJ

My parents went on a trip recently, and they dropped off some goodies for little J earlier tonight. Of course, my mom bought me some clothes too ;)

Can't wait for little J to play with them tomorrow.  

Our parents are the spoilers of our kids, aren't they? ;D

Have a good weekend, everyone!

Catching Up

If you've read the latest post in my other blog, you would have known by now that I got to the Penguin launch in Rockwell tent pretty late.  But it was all good, I got to catch up with friends.

Me with Mai Kaufman and Rima Otswani. Aren't they pretty? :)  
Looking at Mai's and Rima's uber long hair made me miss my own long hair. sniff sniff...

What I'm wearing: Penshoppe shift cotton dress, rhinestone and chain necklace from 168mall, red suede peeptoe booties from Korea, and my parents' latest gift/pasalubong from HK—a red Fendi bag ;)

PR man Chris Cahilig approached me for a potential project that might need my help.  Keeping my fingers crossed it pushes through. God is good :D

Here I am with Judah Paolo, who coincidentally shares the same wedding anniversary date with me and hubby. Only difference is that they got married a year after. And his wife is due to give birth soon, just like me a year ago! Bambi Hernandez and I were schoolmates back in Ateneo. We were both quite active in our organizations then. She's launching something exciting very soon, I can't wait for that ;)

I wasn't able to take a lot of photos, since it was pretty hard juggling taking shots and catching up with them. Among those were Liza Ilarde, Brent Javier and his lady Karen Pamintuan, stylist Ton Lao, model Valerie Santos, and host Rovilson Fernandez who reads this blog (Thanks, Rovi!) :D To check out the amazing stage setup of the show, click on this link.

It's JJ's Night

This will be a short post... gotta get some sleep.  Full night for me, as I drove straight to church from work to attend a baptismal seminar for little J with hubby—I met him and our good friend She, who will be little J's ninang, there.  We had dinner after and got to catch up a bit.

By the time I got home, I was too beat to write my column for this Friday.  I tried, but little J woke up.  His nanny is on an overnight-off, and hubby tried, but he dozed off trying to take care of little J.  Sigh!  Oh well, he tried...  It's 1am, and I just finished putting him back to sleep.

On another note, I'm sure all you parents will agree with me with: 

we enjoy looking at our children/babies while they sleep hehe :D

Wish me luck later!  I hope I can finish my article before lunch :o  I have yet to master the art of juggling and functioning/excelling despite the lack of sleep.  Working moms, how do you do it?

What I Wore to Fashion Week

Going back to work, and attending events as a fashion and beauty columnist, made me realized how much I've missed dressing up.  For fashion week, I have designer Jan Garcia to thank for this awesome nude cocktail dress. 

I paired this with purple accents to give it a shot of color: stingray cuff, Fendi bag and platform pumps. A lot of people kept asking me who made this fabulous dress, and compliments kept pouring in as well. This outfit even made it to Stylebible, Cosmo.ph, and Daryl Chang's Phil Star column that weekend :D

Coincidentally, Jan presented his collection that night, and had an after party at Icon (the bar in Intercon Hotel). I just had to drop by to show him his creation, and to thank him as well. Here I am with the very talented designer.

For appointments and inquiries, you can get in touch with Jan at 0917-5872293 or through his assistant Miks at 0916-3911199 :D

JJ's Joy Ride

Yay!  Little J brought me to work yesterday morning, and picked me up after, too :D My parents lent me their car and driver again ;) I got trigger happy in the car. Here are some for your viewing pleasure :)

Oh my! Looking at the photos above, I just realized he looked like he gained a bit more again. Look at his cheeks and his arms :o But I like it. How about you? Is he too chubby now?

Here he is, fooling around. He's super active. Yaya (the nanny) and I have been having a hard time keeping him still lately. But it's all good, as long as I get to hang with the little man ;)

Enjoy the long weekend! I won't have one though, since I have work tomorrow. Sigh! Oh well, will try to make the most out of my Saturday work ;)

Birthday Balloons

Got to talk to my Uncle Allen earlier today regarding balloons for little J's party.  He's cousins with my dad, and has been in the balloon business for over 20 years!  He provided the balloons for my youngest brother's party more than 20 years ago hehe...

We brought little J with us last Saturday to his second branch in E.Rodriguez near New Manila area to check out what we else we needed:

So many balloons in one little store. Their main branch is in Sto. Cristo, Manila.

They even have balloons with artwork. We're still thinking about this. It costs P700 flat to have one made.

Oh, looky! Disney Cars—our theme :D

This big one is nice, too! But the venue we picked won't allow us to hang balloons or any decor.

I was having a hard time thinking of ways to decorate the place. Good thing Uncle Allen texted and we were able to talk over the phone. He has some cool ideas, and has assigned his graphic artist to do a layout for me. Can't wait!


For those who wish to get in touch with Lollipop balloons, here are their contact numbers: 410-0136 and 410-0306

Of Reunions and Sweet Shakes

Browsing through the photos I took recently, and decided to share this photo with you.

More than a month ago, one of our childhood friends, Malou, came home with her "new" family for a month-long visit here in Manila. From a small gathering, it became a free-for-all and whoever-wants-to-join dinner thing. It was great to see old faces, and new ones (their respective partners). We spent a good amount of time catching up, asking how everyone is, who's based abroad, who works where, and who has the most number of kids haha...

On another note, I am amazed at Malou and my other mommy friends who live abroad. They do everything on their own, without a nanny, without household help! I'm not used to having a maid as well, but hubby and I needed to get one when I was close to my 7th month. And we're very grateful to have very nice and trustworthy help :)

I already had dinner, so I only ordered this watermelon ice cream shake. I know, it sounds like a weird concoction right? But it was surprisingly good. If you like watermelon and ice cream, then you'll like this combination ;)  


Really sorry, but I can't seem to remember the name of the restaurant, but it's this Japanese resto in Annapolis Street :o Can anyone help me here?

A Sweet Tooth

I realized I've been flooding this blog with updates about our little J.  Obviously, I'm missing him a lot, and I'm a little stressed over his first birthday party.  But let's take a break, shall we? 

I had one of the softest and yummiest mamon yesterday :P

It's no ordinary mamon; it's bibingka flavored! And it's from one of my family's favorite bakeries: Costa Brava

This isn't my first time to try their mamon. My mom bought some goodies from Costa Brava at Power Plant mall a few weeks back. They're not in the mall every weekend, so it's best to give them a call. Their "headquarter" is in Bel-Air village, pretty near the area.

We also got to bring home their ube cake. Hubby and I loved this one, too! It has ube yam filling inside.

If you like Hizon's and Estrel's, then you just might like Costa Brava, too. My all-time favorite is their mocha, and their caramel cakes/cupcakes. I always "ration" them to last me a whole week. Good thing hubby doesn't like them as much as I do, so I get to eat more haha... Their icing melts in your mouth, and it's not too sweet so it's perfect for those who have high-sugar like my mom. We also love the texture and the lightness of the cake—the ultimate softness of a "chiffon" cake ;)

How about you? What's your favorite pastry/cake and from where? :)

Gimmicks for the Children

Last weekend was all about parties... for the kids, that is.  Our Saturday night was spent in Jollibee (North Greenhills branch) for hubby's nephew who turned 3 years old.  Here is JJ with "the bee"—he wasn't scared of the mascot at all :D

And yesterday afternoon, we went to Events 55 in Scout Rallos (near Tomas Morato) for hubby's friend's daughter's first birthday party. It was quite packed! They had an "animalandia/jungle" theme. They even had live parrots, and pythons for the kids and the young at heart to have fun with. But it seems more of the adults were scared of the snakes hehe... Hubby included ;)

Check out their souvenir:

It took me some time to realize that this bag (it had a strap) is actually a seat! haha... Isn't it cute?

Attending all these parties made me and hubby realize that we only have a few weeks left before little J's big day! I'm almost done with my to-do-list. Hubby's in charge of the food, and being such a lover of food, he still can't decide what to include in the buffet :o I gotta bug him some more this week!

A few minor bookings and we're done! Yay!

How was your weekend? :)

JJ wants a dopie!

If you've checked out my fashion and beauty blog, you've read our review on dopies. Guess who wants one also?

His laugh is so contagious!  Hubby and I were amused that he kept laughing when he saw the dopies.  Can't wait to see him walk on his own.

If only they had baby dopies, now that would be awesome!  For now, little J will have to wait.  With the way he's growing (fast!), we're pretty sure it'll be soon :) 

Happy weekend, everyone!

Just Chew

Had a slightly stressful morning, but I realized there's nothing I can do about it but wait for feedback.  Sorry, but I can't disclose more than what I've already typed.  To help me relax, I kept on chewing bubble gum—freshly bought from yesterday's grocery shopping.



Did you notice the brand? It's BABBLE JOE haha... I have a feeling they played with the words Bubble and Bazooka Joe. Remember that brand?

Oh, in case you're curious, I chewed on about 7 gums in within the first 30 minutes of my arrival in the office. Here's hoping everything will be fixed tomorrow! Cheers to yummy bubble gum — you make me smile :D

How about you? What keeps you calm and relaxed?

JJ's Almost One!

Less than a month to go, and it's little J's birthday :o I met hubby and little J at the grocery after work, to buy some goodies for his party loot bags.  We also needed to buy his milk.  He's a growing boy!  If you're a frequent visitor, you would know that from his latest visit to the pedia, he weighed 12 kgs already—that's 26 lbs :o  The average weight of a 1-year-old is 9 kgs, and he just turned 11 months old! 

Here we are, waiting for dada as he pays for JJ's loot:

Took a few more shots of the little one:

We've already bought our giveaways a few months back. Way before I started work. These complete the loot bag line up!

Yay, almost done! We're so excited! :D

Why I didn't go home straight from work

Got home close to midnight.  Went straight to Power Plant Mall to watch SATC 2.  Thanks to Kristine Lim of Bench, and Pia Abad of SM for inviting me.  Though it was sponsored by the Velvet channel (under ABS-CBN Publishing where I used to work also), they ran out of tickets.  So, I was pretty grateful that Kristine had an extra ticket for me ;) 

We barely got in time.  Gate opens 7:30, but we couldn't not eat.  So we all got quick dinner sandwiches from Oliver's.  We even had our photo taken hihi...

My goodness! I didn't know my face was oily :o Wasn't able to bring my makeup kit since I thought I wouldn't need it.  It was a last minute thing, and how could I say no to SATC 2? ;)  Here's another group shot: Clockwise from me, Pinky of SM, Jasmine Mendiola of ABS-CBN Publishing who used to be with SM, Pia Abad, and Kristine Lim. Oh, and looky! Pia and I have the same H&M shoes: mine in powder pink and hers in snake skin-print.

Good thing we were able to find good seats, nothing way up front. The movie started around 9pm, and ended 11pm. Pretty long movie. And there were tons of movie previews, but a lot of them are good. Can't wait to watch them with hubby or with the fam.

Going back to SATC 2, I got teary-eyed a couple of times. It hits close to home for me, about not having enough "sparkle." But I will leave you readers at that. You can watch it, even if you're not into fashion. And for those who love to dress up like me, you'll enjoy the SATC 2 all the more. 

Come back and let me know what you think of it, k?