our early arrival

she wasn't due until the 4th of November. born at just 34 weeks, our little girl is finally here!

100 months

yup, we're celebrating our 100 monthsary today! nothing special planned really (he even had to remind me it's our monthsary today). at least i didn't have to cook dinner and got thai take-away instead. given how busy our lives are at the moment, not having to cook dinner means a lot.

we also had the worst dust storm in sydney celebrate with us today. imagine waking up to an orangey-red sky. freaky...it was like there was an alien invasion or something. the sky only turned blue after lunch. check out the photos from smh: dust turns sydney sky red.

thirty three years and counting

happy anniversary papa & mama! thank you for being such good role models to me and eric and my sisters and brother. it's true what they say that it's easy to get married but hard to make the marriage work. eric and i are at the point now where we are trying to balance being partners and parents at the same time and it's no easy feat for sure! you've truly showed us that it is possible to make marriage work as long as we work hard for it...together. we love you very much!

christmas shopping

one of the (many!) things i wanted to do before i give birth is to buy christmas presents for my nieces and nephews (bahala na my uncles and aunties and cousins, kids muna) because i'm pretty sure i won't have the time when little baby arrives. especially that we'll be spending our first christmas in sydney, i don't have any excuse not to give them presents!

we started "stocking" on presents arleady whenever there's a sale going on. i've ticked some on our list already and have ideas already on what to give the others. oh, and we also have a christmas present for the kids already (aidan and little baby). i'll post photos once it's been set-up. i'm sure aidan will love it (the little baby too eventually...). i'm so excited for my little man!

i can only dream

we decided to get a capsule for the litte baby. we didn't get one with aidan since we thought it was just a waste since you'll only get a good couple of months using it. but now that i have to think about how to manage daycare drop-off with the little baby (i couldn't just leave little baby in the house can i?), best option would be to get a capsule so i don't have to take little baby in and out of the carseat all the time.

i did my research and narrowed my choices down to these (i was looking at hiring one so initially i just went for the low-end ones):

fisher price capsule

steelcraft cruiser capsule

but i found out that this is available and it was love at first sight:

bugaboo takata carseat

perfect for my bug but is not available in australia. :-( so i searched for another capsule compatible with my bug and found this:

maxi cosi cabriofix in mystic brown

i've seen people around sydney using this but apparently it doesn't meet australian standards yet even though it has passed europe, united states and canada standards. i'm so tempted to get one though since the review is very good (even looked into european baby websites that ship to australia).

and then decided eventually on this since it is compatible with my bug not to mention available in australia (yay!):

peg perego viaggio in papaia

anyway, i went to target the other day and found the fisher price capsule on clearance at 60%! i couldn't resist and got the last available one in stock. another mom actually approached me and told me how she got hers just recently since it was so cheap although she hasn't used it yet.

i'm still thinking if i should get the peg perego one. i could always return the fisher price but for the price i got it for, it's such a steal and too hard not to use such a good buy.

if only i had my way, i'd love to get the bugaboo takata carseat so i'd have the complete travel system.

spring has finally sprung

it's officially the first day of spring. i'm back from hibernation (not to mention the fact that i don't want one whole year to pass since my last post).

so much has happened the past 9+ months.

but the cherry on the top is that i've been busy growing a baby in my belly. yup, we're 30 plus weeks now and i know the baby's gender but eric doesn't.

touchdown

we're finally here! pr210, the flight from sydney to manila was far better than i expected. i guess it helped a lot that mama was with us during the trip. aidan pretty much just slept and ate during the flight.

i've always been excited coming home to the philippines but this trip is extra special since i'm bringing aidan with me. this will be the first time my sisters and my in-laws will meet our little man.

as expected, it was very hectic the moment papa picked us up from the airport. we've only been here for a little over a week and so far we've been to greenhills (twice!) and trinoma. went out on a date with my sisters to watch hairspray the musical at the star theater in ccp complex. i had my manicure, pedicure, footscrub, haircut and diamond peel already (things that are a luxury back home). met with all the titos, titas and cousins from my papa's side of the family already (as send off to aris, jen and enz and welcome to me and aidan). mommy, ate gigi and tricia also passed by malingap already to meet aidan.

we'll be going to montemar at the end of the month during the long weekend. in preparation for our dos palmas trip after christmas, we're still deciding if we want to do a practice dive in anilao around the first week of december. we're thinking of checking-in at shangri-la for my birthday on the 10th. eric will be only be joining us here in manila a couple of days before christmas so he's missing a lot! aidan will also be celebrating his 8th and 9th month birthday here so we're thinking what celebration to do while he's with family in manila.

hectic? this is the longest vacation i'll be having in manila eversince we moved to sydney and i sure intend to make the most out of it!