When We Were Six

About to blow her birthday candles while having afternoon tea with her neighborhood fairy friends. My little girls says that's what fairies like to do. So that's how she wanted to celebrate turning another year older. 

Here's a poem by A.A. Milne dedicated to the our resident six year old.

When I was one I had just begun

When I was two I was nearly new

When I was three I was hardly me

When I was four I was not much more

When I was five I was just alive

But now I am six, I'm as clever as clever;

So I think I'll be six now for ever and ever.

She's so much fun to have around, I do wish she would be six forever. I know it's not going to happen, but mamas imagine things like that occasionally.

When girls that age live with you, you'll have fairy wings fluttering all over the place.

Then a certain big brother and his cohorts will attempt to attack the fairies fluttering around with those wings!

But they are no match. February Birthday Girl told the rest of her winged friends: "Those are just guns. We are fairies! We have fairy powers!" 

Kaaaboooom! The fairies prevail. Oh, to be six years old. These days are so precious. They are to be relished, my dearest little girl. 

Peanuts and Philosophies

If you haven't already made plans to catch 9 Works Theatrical's production of You're A Good Man, Charlie Brown over at the RCBC Auditorium, I suggest you take the kiddoes along and do so.

I didn't know what to expect, only that it would be a welcome diversion for the boys. Call it a small window of opportunity or a desperate attempt on my part to expand their horizons.  Our one year anniversary from the time they firmly decided football would be king in our homes and in our lives is coming up.  They still wear jerseys at every chance they can get.  When they're not catching the games at the oddest times of times of the day on TV, or talking about who's being traded to what team or who's wearing the latest Mercurials,  they're on the field playing it.  They trained five out of seven days a few weeks ago.  I told you: crazy-obsessed.

Now back to the play. Surprise. Surprise. They loved it. They both sat at the edge of their seats laughing out loud at some point, I would have otherwise guessed they were watching Real Madrid clash with FC Barcelona. Ok, maybe not completely but it was good enough for all of us.

Mak and Tato were still talking about it days after.  Mak says the show is  not just funny it is really, really funny.  He's been asking when I'd be taking him to the next "episode".  He's also decided Happiness is the musical's best song.  Good choice.  Good times.  

Tato: Mama, Sally was so funny she kept changing her mind about her philosophy.  What's a philosophy anyway?

Me: It's asking questions and trying to find answers about things you don't know.  

Tato: Like what is good for me?

Me:  That's a  good one.  And if you don't know the answer to that right away, that's cool.  Many grownups don't even have the answer to that one. 

Tato: But I already know.  FOOTBALL. That's my philosophy: Football is good for us.  

Hmmm....

Human

Sorry, Brandon Flowers, you have nothing on us.  Tato covers Human and kills it.  Minus the trademark feathered shoulders of course. With special participation of musical director stage brother at the 24th second mark cueing "psst...cut the cord..." 

Human from Nana on Vimeo.

I kid.  I kid.  Giving the actual floor to the Killers.  Current favorite song over here.

We know what we'll be jamming to this weekend.  Thank God it's Friday. 

Candy Candy

I don't know if it started when I discovered the high you get when you eat condensed milk straight off the can or because Original Nana allowed us grandkids an all-access pass to her freezer with at least  ten different flavors of ice cream or that aha moment when you realize the milk you're forced to drink tasted so much better when you poured Brown Cow syrup all over it.  Whatever the case, I will happily devour anything that has way too much sugar.  Sick.  But true.

I started to notice dessert stations popping up here and there and thought I'd try it. 


Here is the one I did for the boys 5th birthday.  Nothing Amy Atlas or anything but it was fun putting together all their favorite treats. 

This was for Sis in Law's rocker themed baby shower

When I heard my godchild was having a Candyland-themed party a few weeks ago I offered to do her candy station.  The instructions were simple enough:  pink and yellow and dainty.  I haven't had much exposure to anything remotely girly and dainty given all that football talk and Legos and Tonkas I'm constantly surrounded with but I welcomed the break.  

So out came the old, reliable candy jars.  

Shopping for the candies was the easiest part.  Ms. Sweet Tooth, remember?  The night before the party I laid everything out on my dining table to figure out what went where. 

Made the day itself so much easier and so much more fun. Candy station completed. 

Defying Gravity 4.0

Turning 40 tends to bring out existential thoughts. Where am I? Where am I going? What difference am I making? Can you finally stop minding the Negatrons in your life? 

You also get big on Symbolism. So it was perfectly symbolic for me to have flown off to Singapore with the three coolest people I know, have a great time, try new things together and watch Wicked: The Untold Story of the Witches of Oz. 

It's the musical celebrating women who are different, who have to deal with people looking down on them and setting limits on what they can do… women who struggle to fit in, struggle more to find their themselves, test friendships, make bold decisions… then eventually start Defying Gravity.


Hit it, Elphaba...

Speaking of gravity, also daring to defy it is Rappler—a social news network testing the limits of new media in a time when people are still arguing about, What exactly is a social news network? 


Because I am symbolizing way too much here, my first feature for them happens to be a review of… that Wicked show we caught in Singapore! 

While the Lifestyle section is still a work in progress, Philippine news hounds should definitely check out the site. Rappler has a great team covering politics, the economy and business. Glenda Gloria is their Managing Editor. See how she kicks ass here. She also gets Thought Leaders like Theodore Te to enlighten us on the Corona impeachment proceedings, Gilbert Teodoro to assess disaster preparedness post-Sendong, and Maria Ressa to rap with Mon Jimenez on tourism campaigns for the Internet Age. And more! You can get them on your Facebook news feed here. 

In the future, I hope to rap more about education, parenting, self-help and culture. Wish Rappler luck Internet! It's a bold experiment in new media. Some people are already saying it's bound to fail. Good thing Nikka Version 4.0 is more willing to try and fail and dust her self up again. I've made quite a few mistakes in my life, what are a few more as long as they don’t kill me? 

Besides... If we don't risk falling, how else can we Defy Gravity? Let's do this!

A Nice Day

It's a nice day for a white wedding

  

It's a nice day to start again

Love that song.

Oh Happy Day

Just remember, once you're over the hill you begin to pick up speed. 

- Charles Schultz

Couldn't have picked a better person to be over on the hill with. Hope you're having the best day, Nona.

In the Loop

If you've been here a while, you'd know that I found out I had breast cancer twelve years, five months and ten days ago. (yes, keeping count) If you're pretty up-to-date on this part of our cyberworld you'd also know that I finally told the boys I was once diagnosed.  I hesitated for a while but felt like a load had come off as soon as I came right out and said it.

Mak, first-born twin, wanted to know the details.  Tato, born three minutes later, listened intently then decided  "we would not talk about it ever again".  I totally respect and get it.   The subject hasn't ever really come up again.  I'm armed and ready with answers just in case. 

Yesterday we were at a birthday party.  All the other little girls hounded the glitter tattoo table to get their arms all shimmery with fairy and princess designs.  The boys were next and many went for the lightning bolts and dragons.  Mak and Tato took their turns but they rushed off to the bouncy castle before I got a chance to see their temporary tats. 

When the boys finally emerged from every party's black hole - the bouncy house,  I saw a bright pink tat on Tato's arm.

Tato:  Look! I got a breast cancer ribbon.  It's for you, Mama. 

Aww. Sniff. Sniff.