August 5, 2011

And just like that, I’m busy again. I hope to be able to keep up with my daily posts despite my busy schedule. August is a bit nuts. I have a couple of very important trips. And already I miss my family. There better be wifi everywhere in India and in Mindanao.

I was working from home since Monday. It was nice and cozy with the kids. Storm days can be lovely especially when PAGASA over-estimates. We just stay home, there’s natural airconditioning, and I don’t worry about disaster. But a whole week of rain and gloomy skies got me all gloomy too. And I got cabin fever.

Finally, Mr. Sun was out yesterday. It was lovely.

A couple of nights ago, Sophia’s 7th tooth fell out. All her other teeth had to be pulled out by our dentists (Plural. My relatives are dentists – cousin, aunt, nephew). I was so proud of Sophia that she came to realize that these things don’t hurt. Somewhere in between the first and sixth tooth she developed a fear of needles and a fear of dentists. Now she says she’s ok. And oh yeah, the tooth fairy gave her a big amount for this one.

I received another signed book from National Book Store, this time from Samantha Sotto. Everyone has already written about Samantha, what else can I say? Her first book, published by Random House, Before Ever After was just released a few days ago. I got an advanced copy. I can’t imagine getting a book deal with Random House. The sense of accomplishment, wow! Coincidence, Samantha’s daughter and mine were in the same ballet class over the summer. While I was a ballet mom trying to squeeze in some treadmill time, Samantha was also being a ballet mom with a huge book deal. I will meet Sam after her schedule winds down, if it ever will, and I shall be asking her a thousand questions about the book.

The other day while I was having rainy day blues and cabin fever (not a good combination), I toyed with the idea of having my hair cut into a short bob again. I get that way. I go really short then I grow my hair really long, then short again. It’s just hair. I’ve always been low maintenance – no treatments, no colour, nothing. But I felt I needed a boost. So I got an appointment with Alex Carbonel of Studio Fix in Greenbelt. He trimmed my hair to relieve it of the heaviness. Then instead of a drastic cut, I asked him to colour my hair. It has been over 6 years since I last did that. I was pleased that technology has changed, at least at Alex’ salon. My hair colour involved no use of peroxide. So, Yay! To get technical there are two options in Studio Fix – either organic Essensity by Schwarzkopf or Revlon Professional’s Young Color Excel with 1.9% developer. Schwarzkopf uses beeswax as developer while apparently Revlon has the lowest developer and it can lift hair. Please don’t ask me if it’s completely safe. I’m not an expert. All I know is that it doesn’t have peroxide. And I’m happy with how my colour came out. It’s slightly brown. And barely visible in that photo. Pregnant and lactating mothers should consult their doctors. Personally, I stayed away from these things while pregnant.

And thank you The Bag Hag for this very cute and practical book, Parisian Chic by Ines de la Fressange. Whenever I get cabin fever in our little old wooden cottage, I pretend it’s a Brooklyn brownstone or Paris apartment. But sometimes it doesn’t work. Haha.

Hope you have a good Friday!

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August 3, 2011

It has been brought to my attention that there is a furniture maker and retailer that claims to be an authorized seller and maker of my Daphne chairs (particularly the ones in the photo).

1. Daphne Furniture® is sold at Rustan’s Makati. This particular design retails for P15,000.

2. All Daphne Furniture® bears a brass plate with my brand’s name on it. Those without the brass plates are fakes.

3. Another outlet that carries Daphne Furniture® is La Brea in LRI Design Centre, Reposo Street. Heima in LRI also has a few Daphne® chairs (same as above) though I’m not sure they still have any in stock.

4. Daphne Furniture® is not sold online. Should you be interested in purchasing from overseas, my partners can make arrangements. You can email furniture@daphne.ph

5. Daphne Furniture® is made by a top Filipino furniture manufacturer with decades of experience in manufacturing and export. My partners are well-respected in the furniture industry with all the necessary certification and accreditation. They are alarmed by this development and have reported it to proper authorities.

6. The “®” in my brand means that it is a licensed trademark. Anyone who uses it without my authorization (or misuses it) can and will be sued.

7. Liars will go to hell.

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August 1, 2011

I’ve decided to remove the Facebook “Like” aspect as previously mentioned in the mechanics. I thought I’d add some fun to the exercise while gaining more “likes” in my page, but some of you have expressed reservations about joining because of the campaigning part (popularity contest). I understand.

So to make things easier for you, there will be no Facebook campaigning.

But since I reserve the right to do whatever I want with my certificate from American Eye Center – which I could have given to my sister or any of my relatives – I will still select 12 candidates. Some have asked what criteria. Goodness, this is just a gift. So I figured, whatever story touches me – doesn’t have to be bleeding heart or desperate, doesn’t have to be with perfect grammar, no need for total English either. It could be shallow or completely life changing. I will try to choose 12 that represent various needs.

You can enter your comments in this page, until 6:00 pm today August 1.

The 12 candidates will be posted tonight. And I will do the final selection by random.

Winner will be announced by Tuesday August 2 before 12 noon.

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July 30, 2011

It can’t get any sillier than this. But it was a fun two days for me and my siblings. Thank you for coming in to rescue us. Trevor won!

So as promised, I’m raffling off one set of Daphne Linens to those who participated and voted for Trev. I wanted to show you how I do things when I use random.org so I took a video of myself doing the counting. I apologize for the shaky video and the seriousness of tone. I was maneuvering two gadgets while making sure the video was focusing. Anyway here goes…

Congratulations Sonny-Lilo Flores Carpio! Email me back and I’ll send you the bedsheets. Enjoy! And thanks everyone!!!

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July 30, 2011

Stella’s a two-year old now.

If you’ve noticed I haven’t said anything about the 3 parties I hosted over the weekend – Lily’s school birthday party on Friday, their joint party on Sunday, and Stella’s school celebration on Monday. I needed to catch up on my work life. And I needed to let some time pass before I could write this.

Lily’s little school party went well. The Sunday party was wonderful. Kids had so much fun. I went overboard and became with inefficient, so I was a bit stressed. But the looks on the faces of the kids were just priceless. Those parties deserve a blogpost and I will work on that. By Sunday night I was just pooped. But we still had a Monday party for little Stella.

I figured, there’d be nothing to worry about for Stella’s party. I would be simple and stress-free. I got a cake from a chain bakery and packed fried chicken meals from McDonald’s, just like Lily’s a few days before. All I wanted to do was show up and take pictures of Stella blowing her candles. We only had a 30 minute window – from 11:00 to 11:30 – to sing, blow the candles and eat. I sent the driver and one yaya to pick up the food at 10:30am. And here’s where the nightmare began.

At 11:00 our party was about to start and the food and cake were not at school yet. I phoned my driver. The cake was ready but the meals were not. “What do you mean there’s no food?” My knees went weak, my voice went high, my heart was throbbing so fast. “Mam, nakalimutan ng McDo yung order natin.” 3…2…1… I will spare you the details of what went on. To make a long story short, we got our packed meals past 11:30. A lot of the kids didn’t get to eat. They brought the chicken rice meals home.

The rest of the hour was a blur. I don’t remember what Stella did. I know she was cute and happy because while my head was spinning like Linda Blair waiting for the food to come, she was dancing around. At one point she pullled my hand and wanted me to dance with her. She was the only kid dancing. We dance a lot at home. But I couldn’t “be there” for her. I couldn’t even take her pictures. I was dealing with a pressing issue – the food.

This is what I have of Stella’s birthday dance.

I’m sure fiascos like this happen with other restaurants – fast food or not. I’m not the first and only person this has happened to. It was an unfortunate situation. But I couldn’t let this week pass without putting this out there. Especially since up to now I’m having a hard time writing a decent Stella birthday post.

So I’m trying to learn from this. And I figured I’d write this, not to bash a brand, but so I could learn and move on. The first thing I did after the incident was to write a formal complaint letter. I emailed it through their website – with no specific person or contact. I wrote the incident in detail. The next day, I got an email from the branch manager. I told her I wanted to hear from the corporate level. I felt this was more than a branch issue. So I heard from the head of consumer services, and still I wasn’t ready to talk. I was still very upset.

What did I learn?

1. It’s time to do homemade packed lunches for birthday parties. No more big chain quick orders.

2. Working moms & dads who order from chains like this should phone them the night before or the morning of, to reconfirm orders – because it’s never a sure thing.

3. Always write formal complaint letters through proper channels, not just through blogs. And I hope if and when you do, you get a proper response from them.

4. Try not to let these little glitches ruin your kid’s day – obviously this is something I need to work on.

A day after I rejected the head of consumer services’ apology, the president of the corporation emailed me a humble apology. I read and re-read it. I was clear about not asking for a refund or a re-do. And even more clear about not having anyone fired. It took me a whole day to figure out what to say back. At the end of the day, I accepted his apology. And now I’m working on trying to forget this.

Nothing can really replace lost moments. I’m still trying to rebuild memories from Stella’s 2nd birthday party. I still owe her a birthday story.

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