Check-in was a breeze.  My children love the huge pool with slides. I made a short review and posted it on Tripadvisor,

If you have children who loves to swim, then this place is for you. I have 4 young children who loves to swim and hang in the pool for hours! It was no brainer that my children would fall in love with this place.

Nicely tucked inside Xavier Estates, Ridgeview Chalet are 4 chalets divided into single rooms and double rooms as well as family suites. The area of Ridgeview is vast and beautiful with nicely manicured gardens. My children spent more than one hour just running on the playground– the place in itself is safe and secure.

We stayed in a Family Room. It has 4 single beds, separate toilet and bath, tv, terrace and room fridge. By international standards, the room’s pretty basic. Beds are wooden framed ones with sadly a tough mattress. The duvet was quite dusty so I have removed them before my children went to sleep. The pillow was small for my taste and comfort. In terms of sleep quality, it was just so-so. Unfortunately when we went inside our room for the first time, we found out that the tv in our room was unavailable– no cable. After a quick check, they replaced our tv with telly from the other room and had it running in no time.

The in room cabinet door was unhinged to my dismay. But I did not bother to complain about it since we were not staying long term. However, things like these should be properly maintained and secure to avoid inconvenience and possible accidents.

To read the rest of the review, click here.

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SM- Cagayan de Oro (CDO) launched their 3D cinema with Avatar.  Thankfully we’ve never tried to see it as I was thought this movie was highly over-rated.  We went to the mall with the intention to watch The Megamind.  When I saw the 3D announcement, my kids and I decided to watch Avatar instead.  At the cost of P250 for the ticket, each moviegoer gets to enjoy Avatar 3D.

SM-CDO provided us with those 3D glasses as well as free pop-corn.  Since it was their opening day, the ticketing booth was slow and disorganized.  Seating arrangements have to be finalized since not all the seats have the vibrating features.  Given that we were a group of 5, an usher escorted us to our chairs and given VIP treatment…  lol  To the amusement of my children, they even helped them with their 3D glasses.  Pop-corn came 10-15 minutes after the movie started.

Needless to say, the movie which lasted for 2 hours was glorious.  I noted the similarities of Neytiri to Pocahontas.  At any rate, the movie Avatar showcased superb animation work.  It was truly an eye opener for me, watching as the whole movie unfold on 3D.  So, was the P250 worth it?  Certainly!  As most James Cameron directed movie, this movie did not skimp on animation costs as each finely crafted scene did not miss any single detail.

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Ever since my brother died, I have not been to his grave site.  Having settled back here in CDO, I am now able to visit both my mother’s and brother’s grave sites at least on their death anniversaries and during All Soul’s Day.  I found my relatives waiting under a tent with chairs and a table for the priest.  We all hugged and kissed and I headed to my brother’s grave and said a short prayer.

I am not the kind who questions death.  I believe that life on earth is fleeting and all of us will eventually face death one day.  My brother died at the age of 44 and has lived a full life.  Some would say it was too short, but his quality of life was good and he had fun and was loved deeply by people which I think why some of the relatives questioned God about his death.  The whys remained unanswered and I for one never expected an answer.

To me what was important was the fact that he did not suffer long and while alot was surprised about his demise, I guess they have stopped worrying about the whys now, perhaps in exception to my father, who continues to bawl like a baby whenever Joemen’s name is uttered.  Funny.  Perhaps I will never understand his reaction, but I guess alot of it has to do with guilt.

BAH.  So many questions on earth are left unanswered and there are simply some things that should be left as is.

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My children love Nutella so much they can polish 1 huge loaf bread in one sitting.  I try to referee and place myself in between the Nutella and their eager hands, all excited to dip and slap that all chocolate goo.  I try to put Nutella sparingly, partly because of its bad rap on calories but also because Nutella is a tad expensive here compared to local bread spreads.

So I bought a huge jar of Nutella from Robinson’s Supermarket and was shocked to learn from my eldest daughter that we had ran out of spread.  I looked and found the jar empty– yes empty.  In 3 days?  Something fishy is going on… So came another weekend– grocery day is now Sunday, and my children begged for Nutella again.  So I grabbed second jar for the month…  and after a few days, I found my Nutella culprit.

One early morning,  I was busy working and I heard someone getting a spoon in the kitchen– then silence.  I gazed suspiciously towards the kitchen and there was no sign of activity.  Hmmm. I walked towards the kitchen and found my youngest daughter, holding an opened jar of Nutella and eating the spread! OMG!  Anyway, I snapped a picture on her and got this.  lol

This brought me back memories, when my sister and I would sneak into the kitchen with a spoon to eat peanut butter.  I did not have the heart to get mad at her.  I just hunched over and dipped her spoon again and I took the jar from her and return it on the cupboard.

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New Discoveries

Blake Shelton-  this man does country and he was recommended to me by Jan a woman I met while playing Farmtown.  Her son works for Shelton and she lives in Nashville.  Country is not new to me.  In fact, I have learned to appreciate Dolly Parton when I was still with my husband.  So, anyway, I checked out Shelton on Youtube and fell in love with his own rendition of Michael Buble’s Home.  Now, I am looking for various ways of buying CDs by Shelton as I am sure they are not available here.

Piolo Pascual-  I have been always a fan of Piolo Pascual’s movies and has admired his dedication in helping the less fortunate through his own Hebreo Foundation.  I was quite amazed with his singing.  His voice is quite easy to the ears.  He is overly pleasing to the eyes already, so listening to him sing ballads and old songs brought back memories of my Mom and the songs my brothers like to sing when they were still living at home.  Comforting.

Music is a way for me to relax.  When I needed to de-stress, I listen to my relax and de-stress playlist.  This comprise of acoustic selections by Boyce Avenue and songs by Piolo Pascual.  When I needed to feel the urge to sing, I put on my Cool Selection and I sing along Miley Cyrus, Lady Gaga, Chris Brown, Taylor Swift,  Kelly Clarkson, Chris Daughtry, Carrie Underwood, Craig David and even Katy Perry.  I have a Disco selection as well when I feel like dancing upbeat tunes with my children.

I bond with my children with music as well.  They love dancing Black Eyed Peas and they sing along with me as well.  There was a time when I had to turn on BBC Classical Radio just to get them all to bed.  When I am down, I like to listen to soothing tunes and just like that, soulful songs lift me up and I am back on track.  Music has always have its healing and uplifting properties, and I continue to re-align my music with my mood and true enough, it does it work most of the times.  When I feel like listening to music in private, I plug in my headphones and I immerse myself to the beat of whatever I am listening.

What about you?  When you are down, what kind of music do you like to listen to?

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I used to play the piano as a child, but I love the guitar the best.  Although certainly no John Mayer nor a Gabe Bondoc or a Marié Digby, but I love the way a guitar sound and has always loved to sing along with an acoustic guitar as an accompaniment.  My love of music stemmed from my growing up with brothers who plays the piano and guitar.  There was always music when I was growing up.

I used to sing duets with my brothers.  We used to sing all those 80′s music, Roxette, Bruce Springsteen, some Barry Manilow’s and even Basia, Whitney Houston and Bon Jovi.  I started with the piano at the age of 6, and the guitar at the age of 14.  I was professionally taught piano-wise, but self taught with the guitar.  I started learning the guitar when I realized that the guitar is way cooler than the piano.  :)

Tomorrow, I am checking out Perfect Pitch to check the prices of acoustic guitars.   I want a black acoustic guitar.  I am also checking out online guitar sites.  Anyone have any suggestion?

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My love for reading began at an early age.  It started when I found an entire shelf of Nancy Drew and Hardy Boys hardbound books at the school library.  No one seemed to bother borrowing them, and although I cannot remember exactly my first Nancy Drew book, I remembered borrowing all the Nancy Drew and Hardy Boys books in our library.  From then on, I would pester my mom and my brother Joemen to get me books every month from the local bookstore.

My brother encourage my love for reading.  Although my parents did not understand it before, and thought of buying “pocketbooks” a total waste of money, my brother– also a book worm explained the passion and the advantages of reading.  He mentioned something about widening my vocabulary and strengthening my grammar and english skills, reading truly has helped me through school.

Reading think chapters from text books and learning the art of speed reading, this has helped me through high school and college, no doubt about that.  Writing essays and book reports was easy for me and has earned me some recognition in school.  I also became good in spelling and along with the passion of working on crossword puzzles, I have learned to be quick on synonyms of words and learned how to quickly answer crossword puzzles from easy to advance level on one sitting.  There was a time that I was so into it that I even have my own crossword puzzle book in the bathroom.  lol  Some keep magazines or newspapers near their crapper, me, I have my Sudoku and my Dell Crossword Puzzles.

My favorite books range from legal and psychological thrillers.  Kellermen, King, Grisham, Scottoline, Crichton are some of my favorite authors.  I continue to horde books here.  But it has expanded to personal finance, web design and some self help books which I have used with my counselor years ago.

I wanted my love for books to pass onto my children.  At early age, my children are rewarded for good behavior with books.  We have a selection of Dr. Seuss and Nancy Drew Books.  My daughters love books and like me, they are drawn to National Bookstore and BookSale.  I have learned to allocate at least P1,000 for books each month.  Books when taken care of last for several years and can be passed on to others.

Here are some of the benefits of reading:

• Reading helps children become smarter.
• Reading encourages your children to have longer attention span.
• It helps teach your child about relationships, situations, personalities, and what is good and what is bad in the world he lives in. Fantasy books provide material for his imagination and free play. Fairy tales fascinate your kid, and help him distinguish between what is real and what is not.
• Reading helps you prepare your children allay your child’s fears or prepare him for changes in his life. For example, you can choose books about using the potty, going to school, or moving to a new house when he is about to have these new experiences.

The best way to teach children to love reading is to be an example.  Let your children see you reading.  Read stories aloud to your children and let them choose the books they wanted to read.  As soon as you show this love and dedication to learning by reading, your children will love books and learn to take care and handle them with care.

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Coke, coke, we want coke!  With ice to the brim!

The school year is over and the children are all around the house and I wonder how I can get to finish all my work this time around.  So here are some of the things that I need to do before the week ends:

1- Plan and create activities for the children everyday.

2- Look for paid activities during the summer break.

3- Plan for Pascalis’ 9th birthday.

4- Plan for a short break probably to Cebu, Boracay, Davao or Bohol.

5- Check the video store and buy tons of videos for the children to watch during the break.

So what’s on your calendar for the summer?

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To cut the chase, the damn Cebu Pacific personnel, informed me that our flight to CDO was not the actual connecting flight to CDO. Wahaaat??? I almost scalped him… Then he explained that if we had purchased the connecting flight Cebu to Cagayan de Oro, we would have been scheduled to leave Cebu later in the afternoon and not aboard the earlier flight which we missed. Anyway, to make it even worse, Cebu Pacific insisted that I cannot rebook our tickets because rebooking is only allowed a day before the day of flight. He showed me the terms and conditions on our tickets, and I quietly asked after a long sigh…”Ok, how much?” He rattled and punched in several numbers on his calculator and after 15 seconds, he gave me the figure, “P14,090., Maám…”

Waaahat??? I quickly thought of our options: 1) take the ship 2) or just pay for the ticket and go home.  Remember, guys, I am traveling with 4 children!  I cannot afford to hang around the airport any longer!  So I went to the nearest ATM and paid Cebu Pacific (dirty finger!)

Happy with my new schedule and armed with another ticket, we went to check in our stuff and waited for our flight THEN another bad news… the storm turned up a notch and ALL flights to Northern Mindanao got canceled… Talk about super bad luck…  Along with other passengers, we went to the nearest Cebu Pacific personnel to ask if the passengers are booked someplace since our flight was canceled and the next flight out is the NEXT day.  And to my disgust, they said Cebu Pacific will only shoulder lodging if the flight is canceled due to plane malfunction or something, and since the problem is the weather, then Cebu Pacific is not liable nor obliged to book all of us…ARGGGHHH…

After spending P14,000 for tickets, I simply refuse to spend more…  Our next flight was scheduled very early in the morning– which was only 6 hours away.  I looked around the departure area. My kids were all busy playing and running around the airport.  Ok there were tons of stranded passengers and I silently cursed Cebu Pacific.  After 2 years of travel hiatus, Cebu Pacific really did it this time… I promise… I will never travel with Cebu Pacific again!  Why?  Simple.  Customer service is bad and yes, They SUCK!

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Anyway, my sister, along with her husband and family decided to come to Boracay for a week.  Since I could not afford to shell out thousands for the airfare and accommodation, she offered to pay our way.  So, who cares about the crowd?  Its a free trip and I have not seen my sister for over 2  years, what the heck…

Sunny Boracay

So, my sister booked us at the Residencia Boracay, a small hotel near my sister’s posh, Fridays Boracay.  Since I could not take a long week off and the children have school, we decided to stay 4 days in Boracay.  And did I regret it?  Course not… Boracay is a beautiful island.  The sand is powdery white.  The beach is calm and flat, and very safe for children to swim and wade.  Not only that, we went there when it was off season. It was not crowded at all.  So different from the usual Boracay videos that I found on Youtube.

My children– the water babies… love Boracay.  They stayed in the water from 6am til 6pm.  The beach did not have big swells and the children were pretty happy wading in and out with their cousins.

The Residencia Boracay was ok.  Our room was clean, and the sheets were good.  The only problem was to the dismay of my sister who paid for the rooms was that the photos from the site did not match the units.  ROFL.. what the??

Anyway, since we were there already and she had paid for the reservation fee, I told her the hotel will have to do.  It was not very roomy, but who wants to stay in the hotel when the beach is so wonderful???

Once I arrived, I checked out the internet connectivity of the hotel and touched base with my clients.  What was not so good was the wifi strength on the beachfront waned and the connection was intermittent.  Blast…  I was not too happy about that.  I tried to work as quickly as I can in order to catch up with the kids who were all busy wading.  The little one, Sophie was busy digging the white sand with Tyrell.

My sister hardly changed at all.  Except for a few finelines, and smaller waist line, she was a sight for sore eyes…  Two piece swimsuit… My golly… She was lean and tan.  Hayyy…  I was so happy to see her.  We were hugging and giggling like 2 school girls.  Our children were all getting to know each other once again and it was a blast.

So, what is so freaking great about Boracay?

1- its the beach.

2- if you hate the crowd, stay off Boracay during peak season.  Or if you like to party, but wanted some peace and privacy during the night, opt to stay in a hotel in Station 3.

3- anybody can afford to go to Boracay.  There are so  many hotels, hostels, resorts with promo packages.    If you cannot afford to take the plane— if Cebu Pacific’s fare is still high for you, take the ship.  I heard Aboitiz have a regular route to Caticlan.

4- if you are traveling with children, take alot of food, water and swimwear.  They will be out the whole day.  Heck, I spent the whole  day outside under the coconut tree watching over them.

5- don’t bother carrying too much cash.  There are absolutely lots of places to eat in Boracay.  From the high dollar rate restaurant to 65 pesos meal.  And besides D’Mall have more than 5 ATM machines so banking is not going to be an issue.

What are you waiting for?  Get off your ass and plan your next vacation and hit Boracay before Boracay deteriorates.

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