Ibyang
Ibyang

Charmed Life of a Mrs

“Me” Time Can Sometimes Be Sushi Time

I’ve been known to spending “Me” times with a cup of coffee or hot chocolate and a cake to go with it. But there are “Me” times of mine, I spend it with Sushi.

The Husband is out with friends tonight and so I went to the mall to see an Optometrist. Before I went home, I dropped by the sushi place and bought myself dinner.

Last night, I teased the Husband: “Yay! You’re going out, I don’t have to cook dinner and I’ll have the house to myself!!!” Hehe. I don’t mind cooking for us, but I have to admit that preparing dinner after arriving from work takes a lot of effort sometimes especially when I had a long day at the office. The Husband doesn’t pressure me to cook all the time, he actually eats anything I lay on the table. But I can’t bear not cooking and just buy take-away food. Once in a while I make an exception, but I really prefer that meals at home are freshly cooked and I know where the ingredients come from.

Anyway, since it’s only me tonight, I decided to buy sushi for my dinner as I enjoyed watching “Glee” on TV. It was the episode where they sang “Defying Gravity”, my favorite song from one of my favorite musicals “Wicked”. I’m one happy camper.

I had a productive “Me” time at the mall after work today. Pag may gimik si Husband, natataranta ako dahil parang ang dami kong gustong gawin o puntahan—hindi ko malaman kung saang mall ako susuot hehe.
This afternoon, instead of window shopping (that sometimes results to buying stuff I don’t need), I decided to finally see an Optometrist. I was due for a check-up in September but I’ve been putting it off (I have my eyes check once a year).
The main reason why I needed to see him, other than have my eyes checked, was because I broke my eyeglasses yesterday. So I brought it there to get it fixed and at the same time buy a new 2nd pair of glasses so I’ll have one for the office and one for the home or at least if something happens to either one of them, I’ll have a back-up. The bad news is the glasses I broke had to be shipped to some woop woop place because they don’t have a certain part for the glasses in stock, so that will take a few days to be repaired. The good new is they have put my new glasses in the “rush” list so that I can pick it up in a few days. They asked me if I can survive without glasses and I said “I think I can”. I’m just going to take it easy and give my eyes lots of rest so it can function normally for the next couple of days.
On my way home, I realized that I will be watching a musical tomorrow night and I need glasses when I watch stuff like that. Ayayay! Tomorrow, I’ll just drop by the chemist and buy temporary prescription glasses (the cheap ones). Hope that helps.
Other than buy new glasses, I had my eyes checked and the verdict was it is generally healthy. I was a bit worried because two weeks ago, I had an eye infection that lasted for almost a week (didn’t go to work for two days). I told the Optometrist what happened and he gave me eyepad cleansers for cleaning my eyelids. He asked me what activities I do that involves the eyes. When I mentioned to him about photography, he gave me this optical lens cleaner that he said might help in cleaning the viewfinder of my camera. He said hopefully it disinfects my viewfinder so the germs won’t get transported to my eyes. That was very nice of him.
What about you? Have you had your eyes checked lately? According to the Optometrist, our eyes should be checked at least once a year.
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Nearly Summer

The best thing about summer is the fabulous sunsets that the Australian skies produce. Such lovely colours, I can’t stop looking outside our balcony. Summer in Australia officially starts on the 1st of December but the country is already experiencing heatwaves and bushfires (not good) but otherwise, no matter how hot some days are, I’m glad that summer is here.
I just want to share how the sunset looked today. This was taken around 8:00PM.

Summer also means that the Husband and I have dinner while watching the sunset (between 6:45-8:00PM). Our dining table is adjacent to the balcony of our apartment so we have a great view infront of us while we eat and catch up on what happened to us during the day. Simply beautiful.

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Before We Say Goodnight

We pray and say thanks…

for a busy but productive week at work
for sunshines that gave warmth
for drops of rain that nourished
for sunsets that never cease to amaze me
for happy surprises in the family
for a chance to walk along the beach
for unexpected coffee dates with girlfriends
for being able to help organize two parties
for Thursday dinner at a Chinese resto with the gang
for Friday dinner with another group of friends
for phone calls from friends that asks, “How are you today?”
for positive messages that put a smile in my heart and comfort to my soul
for days that end when I come home to a cheerful home and a Husband who holds my hand til I fall asleep.

Thank you God, thank you universe.
Photo by Ibyang Sanchez 2009 – Sunset taken today.

Why the scarcity of blog entries? Life on my side of the earth has been busy. The Husband and I are juggling work and several personal matters at hand, plus the fact that Christmas is just around the corner. This week, I helped our two groups of friends prepare for our early Christmas parties (some of them are leaving for Manila on the first week of December). This weekend we’re rounding up our Christmas gifts and wrapping them so they’d be ready to be given away.
This week, we were also full-on when it came to gimiks with our barkadas: (1) Coffee date with girlfriends on Tuesday; (2) Dinner at a Chinese Resto on Thursday and (3) Dinner with FilOz Gang on Friday. Wow!!! We were in a roll this week aye? The late nights from these dinners were all worth it though as being with friends is always like a breath of fresh air for us, a good way to end a tiring day at work.
Work has settled down a bit but it is still hectic at times. I’m happy to say that our big project (a new training program for employees of our company) which we’ve worked on since the start of this year has been well-received by our trainess. There’s still a couple of things we’re straightening out (change is the only permament thing especially in Training) but the pressure has been taken off in terms of deadlines now that we had launched our new training program.
However, work is busy for me because I’m also preparing for a two-week leave from the office as I will undergo a medical procedure soon. My health is one challenging thing for me at this stage but I believe that I will be alright. I’m not worried as family and friends are praying for me and sending positive vibes my way and I know too that God will never fail me. He never did on the first time I had undergone a major surgical procedure so I know I he will never fail me now. God is always faithful.
On that note, health is a priority at the moment so at times when I need to rest I just rest and give up some of my time for blogging. In the principle of time management and prioritizing things, some things I have to let go of in order to give way to my goal of being healthy.
The forthcoming two weeks will be crazy and happy. Chris and I are looking forward to spending time with relatives and friends (we have three parties to attend to and I really hope we can attend all of them) and at the same time celebrate our 34th wedding monthsary (we’re excited because we’re watching a musicale). Life is good, really good, inspite of the challenges we are facing.
I wish you all a good night and a great week ahead. Smile and be happy!
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BananaQ “Me” Time

Because I had so many things to do today (even if I was on a day-off), I spent my “me” time during lunch over a cup of Camomile Tea and BananaQ.

I attended an appointment and some errands in the morning and as I was on my way home, I passed by the Filo resto and saw that they were selling BananaQs today. I bought two sticks (one for me and one for the Husby) and was surprised to know that it cost AUD$3.00 per stick–mahal!!!!! If I convert that to PHPeso, that’ll be approximately P120+. Mygulay! Magkano na ba ang BananaQ sa Pinas ngayon???? I seriously wanna know.

Oh well, I bought it anyway and savored it to the last bit while I drank a cup of Camomile Tea.

My “me” time today was very unusual as I spent it having lunch, watching “Ellen” and doing a batch of laundry. Usually, my “me” times are very sacred, as in no TV, no electronic machines buzzing on the background and most importantly, no household chores involved.

I had to bend the rule a bit and be more flexible today as I really have my hands full at the moment. October is just so so so busy for me and the Husband both at work and in the household.

I’ve been working on a big project at work as my team and I are about to launch a new training program next week (D day is 2nd November). I’m excited and I’m all wired up about it–some days I’m exhausted but I can’t sleep much because I can’t stop thinking about it. For the past week, I’ve been spending more time at the office or I bring home work with me just to beat deadlines–which is another rule I’m not following right now.

Husband, on the other hand, has been blessed with so much work as well. He has a project involving their company’s branch in the UK. The past weekend was crazy as he was on-call from Friday night until Sunday. Some days, he works on UK time too, hence, he sometimes finish work at home by 2AM and then he still has to attend work in Sydney. Crazzyyyy.

As for the household, we’ve been juggling managing the home and attending parties :). This month, our weekends were spent mostly partying with friends and relatives–we attended housewarming parties, birthday parties, a welcome party, a debut and a wedding. Quota na kami!!! hehe. We’re really grateful for the invites we received–for us, those were all blessings. We’re sorry for the ones we weren’t able to attend (yes, sa lagay na yan, hindi pa namin lahat napuntahan. Sorry talaga). And one more thing, we also hosted dinner for a friend who visited from Manila.

So there, a little update from our little world out here. That’s why I’m sometimes delayed with articles and photo uploads. I’m sorry if I haven’t been visiting blogs. I will surely bloghop as soon as things get back to normal.

Sending out positive vibes to you. Have a great and productive week! 

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Celebrating Milestones at the Night Noodle Festival

Spent late Thursday afternoon at the Night Noodle Festival. Been going to this festival since 2006 and I wouldn’t miss this for anything. Very convenient as it goes on for two weeks and starts at 5:00pm. Perfect for people who just came out of the office.

It’s also but fitting to end my workweek by having dinner at the park and pre-celebrate with my Husband two happy milestones: my 4th anniversary here in the Land Down Under and our 1st anniversary in our first ever “munting tahanan” (yes, 1 year na kaming nagbabahay-bahayan!!!:)), both events incidentally happened on the 16th of October 🙂

On to the Night Noodle Festival, as soon as we got there, we lined up to get these free bags from The Sydney Morning Herald. Inside it were a couple of promo catalogues for Crave’s October Festivities and some pins. Nothing much really but the recycle bags are useful and pretty enough (the shade was Olive Green which I love).

Then we got a few free Ferrero Rondnoir chocolates, Ferrero’s newest chocolate. If you’re a fan of dark chocolates, this one is for you.

After that sugar rush, we lined up to get our real dinner. Off to the Dim Sum Station we go to have our Yum Cha fixes.

Fresh from the steamer Pork Buns and Pork Siomai and fried Vegetable Spring Rolls.

For our noodle craving, we had our last stop at Thai Express for some Pad Thai and Satay Chicken.

With dinner on our hands, we found our spot at Hyde Park and had a laid-back dinner as we wait for night time to appear. Thank God for the great weather. Still cold and windy but at least the sun shone that day and that really helped.

I loved our simple dinner immensely. We were in a festival and yet I felt so peaceful just sitting on the grass, surrounded by trees and a fountain, of happy people and of course in the great company that is my Husband. Our dinner was sort of a Thanksgiving for the four years that I’ve been in Sydney and for the 1st year of happy, peaceful living in our first home.

After dinner, we explored Art & About where you’ll see the finalists in Sydney Life, the much-loved exhibition of large scale photographs depicting Sydney.

This is my favorite photograph of all. This is a photograph of an old Filipino Couple who finally got married in church 75 years after their civil wedding ceremony. I like it because it was such a moving photograph, really speak volumes.

When you say large scale photographs, this was how big the photographs were.

The Husband took lots of photos that night…this was my favorite. Somehow describes a lot of things going on in my life on my 4th year here in Sydney: ever-changing, ever-vibrant, ever-challenging but always ever-fabulous.

For more photos, please click this: Night Noodle Festival and Art & About 2009.

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