Mel and the New Normal

I really wish I had taken more room shots of Hotel Elizabeth. It was a really pretty place, and worth it's price. Back story here is, we were supposed to stay at our house in Baguio. My cousin, who was an hour ahead of us on the road, saw that the road leading to the house was being renovated. Since it was a narrow and winding road, we decided not to stay in the house instead, especially since it was late at night already. We didn't want to have to deal with figuring out if the electricity and running water had any kinks. I had read about Hotel Elizabeth in a magazine, where they featured the owner. I saw online that they had a 50% percent sale on the prices! It came out about P2,500/night. Ordinarily J and I would stay at a lower priced place, but when we're the kids we're concerned about safety and cleanliness. We were relieved that they had available rooms. At 11PM, we were tired and ready to just pass out on a clean place. Luckily, Hotel Elizabeth was beaut...

It's been years since we visited Camp John Hay. We were surprised to see a part of it was developed into an Ayala Land mini-hub kind of thing, with a call center and all. And around the call center? Restaurants galore! There was Fruits In Cream, Yellow Cab, Starbucks, etc! We had eaten dinner already though, so we decided to try a place that had desserts, called "Everything Nice." Well-lit entrance Menu of Beverages J and Josh lining up, checking out desserts. Clean interiors. Waiting for our hot chocolate and cakes Chocolate Mousse Their version of Hot Chocolate J said he was pleasantly surprised by how good the desserts were! Pasalubong shelf All in all, I think we were happy with the desserts! We had their chocolate cake, chocolate mousse, and hot choco, and all were good. Reasonably priced (think Starbucks rates) and a lot of people were going in and out. It's definitely worth checking out, instead of going to the o...

Before trekking home, I insisted on having some Starbucks. We were leaving Subic at 5:30PM, and had to stay awake to make sure we were heading the right direction. The kids bought some cream-based choco frappes and goodies as well. 

The next day, after arriving home from Subic, I immediately had meetings in Fort area. After several attempts to visit the place, we finally got to see SM Aura! Previously we were caught in the traffic going there, so we never got the chance. On a weekday, parking was effortless. The food court - not much to see here yet. 

As this was an impromptu roadtrip, with no specific days on a particular location, we had to play everything by ear. So.... we didn't have a place to stay in Subic when we got there. This is unusual for us, since we usually book our places wayyyyy in advance because I want to find dirt-cheap places that are clean.  When we got to Subic, while eating our late lunch, I used my Samsung S4 to find nearby hotels with high ratings in Agoda. Unfortunately, it seems that the expensive resorts were the ones with high ratings! The rest had low ratings! I was ready to check in a hotel (sorry forgot the name) that was P3,000 a night, but on the way there, almost across the street, we saw this building -- Mango Valley. J said it looks nice, maybe they have rooms. The place across was their's as well. We left the kids in the car in front, and went in to check out the place. The lobby had cold aircon and had a welcoming air to it. We asked the rate per night -- P1,600! They sai...

To an amazing dad, thank you for taking on the on the challenge of being a wonderful provider and father, even if we were just kids ourselves when we became parents. I'm sure our kids could not ask for a cooler techie dad/punching/pinching bag/Mr. Clean lookalike/driver. Happy Father's Day!!

While I was pregnant, I made a list of things that I missed doing. I missed doing them because I was stuck in bed, and physically limited. This included eating at my favorite restaurants (the smells made me sick), doing things with my kids outdoors (well, this was rare to begin with, we were more of aircon people), and jogging (insert FEELING here bwahahahah). I think I just missed the freedom of movement. This gave rise to another list eventually, the things I WOULD do and I have NEVER DONE BEFORE if I made it thru without physical problems. There's a separate mental list of things Kat and I would do if she made it thru, but I never had the heart to write it down. Anyways, the list of things I WOULD do included: 1. Surfing at Baler. (I know, I'm so FEELING talaga. Whales don't surf! But I tried it once and I liked it. By once, I mean, a surfboard hit me on the head once in Punta Fuego. It was love at first hit.) 2. Learn how to DJ. (This is a long story in itself.) 3....