[design folder]

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CONSCIOUS LIVING - green design

SPACE LIFT - makeovers

DESIGN SPEAK - styles & schemes

DESIGN TRAIL - travel

DIY - design-it-yourself

& other idea files.

This Manila-based site is all about design. All the ideas shared here by professional architects & interior designers can help you spruce up your lives by improving your own little space.

Explore now & enjoy...

[braids]

My girls collaborated on this. They wanted to capture the look of photos in fashion & styling blog posts.

And I love how this picture of KIRSTEN in braids turned out.

Separately,

& in a collage

Hairstyle, photography & editing by JILLIAN


I tweaked it a bit using PicMonkey.

[little miss BARBIE turns 2]

My goddaughter ANIKA recently turned 2  & she celebrated it BARBIE-style.

Here's the cute celebrant

kissing BARBIE

with her nanay & tatay.
Jollibee & Hetty

with  MOMMY FLEUR & her mom, TITA WINNIE;
I'm with my girls, KIRSTEN & JILL

at home & still in her tiara, ANIKA opens our gift

Happy Birthday, ANIKA! I hope & pray that you grow up into one fine lady...

[PEP TALK FOR TODAY series: #37]

[PEP TALK FOR TODAY series: #36]

[nature in a gadget]

This is cool!

source

[a cousin's blog]

Hop on over to my cousin Karen's NEPACENA blog. It is all about home design stuff - latest  finds, design inspirations & DIY projects. 

I particularly like her section on DIY because she's the one who actually makes them. That's one area of frustration for me because I'm not artsy-craftsy enough to come up with furniture projects. Tweaking rooms & turning them into interior eye candies  is more my thing. Though, it wouldn't hurt if  I go on into DIY in the future. ;) 

She's really so creative just like her mom, Tita Lita, the Martha Stewart of the Bautista fam. 

Look at some of the things she DIY-ed.

source

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Check out her other sites on bags & photography which I have already mentioned when I featured her & her sister, Kristin here.

[pendants]

A pendant light, sometimes called a drop or suspender, is a lone light fixture that hangs from the ceiling usually suspended by a cord, chain, or metal rod. Pendant lights are often used in multiples, hung in a straight line over kitchen countertops and dinette sets or sometimes in bathrooms. Pendants come in a huge variety of sizes and vary in materials from metal to glass and plastic. 

I go more for pendant lamps, not just ordinary luminaires. I use them as focal points to light up the space  (pun intended) where they are installed. We actually have them here at home.

living area

dining area

main stairs landing

family area 

I bought three of them custom-made (images 1, 3 & 4) from  A&F Lights, a specialty store for lighting fixtures found along  Granada St. Quezon City. The name of the shop from which I got the other one slips my mind at the moment. What I know is, it is also along the same street as A&F.


Look for statement pendant lamps so you can create spaces that are worth second looks, like these :

ENTRY/HALLWAYS

STAIR LANDINGS

LIVING AREAS

DINING AREAS

BEDROOMS

BATHROOMS

KITCHEN AREAS

modern kitchen design

Browse HOUZZ for other ideas to steal.

[hiatus]

The last 4 days of Holy Week served as a weekend hiatus for our family. 

Day 1: Maundy Thursday VIA CRUCIS

We drove all the way to Silang, Cavite to do our yearly VIA CRUCIS. The place, La Salette Seminary, is a one-stop Stations-of-the-Cross venue for devotees. It's already our 5th annual visit here ever since we discovered the place. 

15th Station

From La Salette, we went to the Pink Sisters Convent in Tagaytay. We stopped by to visit, meditate & offer prayer requests which we wrote on small pieces of paper & slipped inside envelopes provided there.

source

Next stop was the Picnic Grove in Tagaytay. We ate picnic-style in the park grounds & enjoyed our packed lunches of native vegetable salad & chicken pork adobo.

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Before going home, we had a lay-over at the new SOLENAD 2 in NUVALI, Sta Rosa, Laguna. We ordered light meals like the Kaya toast, pork floss toast, fishball soup with our brewed coffee, ginger lime sodas & milk teas at TOAST BOX. The restaurant is still in its "soft opening" phase so the place was  in a slight disarray.

food service counter

2 kinds of MILK TEA & GINGER LIME sodas

Singaporean FISHBALL soup

KAYA toast

PORK FLOSS toast

the art of making COFFEE

Day 2: Good Friday lunch get-together with my in-laws & coffee time at Bonifacio High Street

We spent Good Friday in my husband's hometown to visit my mom-in-law who just got out of the hospital.  After a filling seafood lunch prepared by my in-laws, my girls spent the rest of the afternoon playing with my sister-in-law's 2-year old tyke, JV.

From there,  off we went to Bonifacio High Street for some coffee time at FIGARO & viewed the WALKWAY Stations of the Cross.

Day 3: Black Saturday lunch get-together with my side of the family

Here at home, it was a luncheon get-together with my mom, my siblings with their families & a birthday celebration of sorts for my brother & his almost triplet sons.

FB file photo

Day 4: Easter Sunday Mass at the Chapel of the Eucharistic Lord & dinner at AMICI

We attended the 3:30 pm mass, after which was an early dinner at AMICI, Megamall. We each had a pasta   dish & shared a vegetarian pizza with a pitcher of soda.

Linguine al Prosciuto e Tartufo

Spaghetti Aglio Olio e Pepperoncino

Margherita Pizza

Ravioli di Pesce Mousseline

Ravioli di Spinachi 

Thanks to long weekends,  families like us get the chance to take a respite & bond with each other.

Belated Happy Easter everyone!