The Royal Wedding

[tweetmeme source=”ibethyap”] I have to admit that I am one of the fans who swoons over the details of the royal wedding. A few days back, I started reading tidbits about on the royal wedding. I even went through the guestlist of the royal family and looked at each of the pictures to be familiar with the royal family. It was such a fun thing to do. I got to know the Duke of Edinburgh and the rest of the viscount, viscountess, countess and princes. It was like the regency coming into life.

A few hours before the wedding the title of Prince William was announced, he’s now the Duke of Cambridge on top of his Prince of Wales, Earl of Strathearn and Baron Carrickfergus titles. I was so happy with the title that you would think that it was I who earned it.

I was so excited to watched two live streaming: CNN and The Royal Channel side by side, to see the events in different angles. I’m so happy that the internet connection wasn’t much disrupted and my computer cooperated well.

The first celebrity I saw was David and Victoria Beckham, since I love them both. Seeing them made my heart stopped and I started swooning over David. He looked so handsome. In my opinion, he’s the most handsome man in the crowd.

I love the scenes where it shows the royal family going to Westminster Abbey. I almost cried when Prince William and Prince Harry showed up. They were waving to the crowd throughout the ride. It was so touching to have compassionate princes. I also noticed that their car is really spacious. They also have a logo on the top of the car. It was so cute. It bore the sign of royalty.

I also like the part where Queen Elizabeth arrived with the Duke of Edinburgh. I’m so glad to see the queen so healthy and happy. There was a part, not sure if intentional, when they reached the Abbey. The car door for the queen was opened but she exited through the other door. I was surprised to see her do that. But it’s a minor detail. I love the Queen.

When Kate left the hotel and entered the car. I was mesmerized. She looked so beautiful and elegant. Like a princess. I so envy her. I like the way she waved and smile to the crowd. She looked so kind, like Princess Diana. I almost cried seeing her. Her gown looked simple but amazing. It looked so beautiful. When she finally stood in the altar with Prince William, she showed the sweetest smile. They look so in love.

Although I didn’t see the kiss in the balcony live, I absolutely loved it even during replays. It was so romantic, standing in front of your citizen and giving your wife a kiss, not one but two kisses. The kiss looked so amazing. I super envy them.

This is truly a fairy tale wedding for me. I enjoyed seeing the clips. My heart beat was unstable as I was watching the whole event. I’m so happy to be in love with England. Their culture is really rich and they place looked so amazing. I can’t help but wish to visit the country someday.

Here are some of my observations in the wedding:

• All ladies must wear hats. Some of the hats are really disturbing while some looked pretty nice.
• The princes looked dashing in their uniforms.
• England people love their royal family. It’s such a touching sight to see the citizen supporting the royal wedding.
• Prince William and Kate looked good together. They are so nice to the people. I love the fairy tale touch in their wedding. Somehow, it gives hope to other people.
• I didn’t see a lot of handsome guys in the event. I guess, the heroes in the books are trapped there. I didn’t see somehow who looks like a rake and I was quite disappointed.
• The parade of the cars to Westminster Abbey is likely similar to the carriage ride to balls during regency. Seeing it live is the next best thing for me. The mini bus/van were a bit disturbing especially when the passengers are royalty. They should have arrived in style. British royalty is a fan of Jaguar.

Action steps from this wedding:

• Buy myself a hat to start feeling the English life
• Support England football team – David, you really captured my eyes

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Suzanne Enoch – Lessons in Love

[tweetmeme source=”ibethyap”] I’m back to book reviewing. Lessons in Love captured my attention because book 1 is titled “The Rake” and since I’m into falling in love with rakes these days, I’ve decided to give this book a try. I am happy that I did try reading this series.

I like the idea of the ladies trying to find a notorious student to teach them on how to be a gentleman and in the end, they all fell in love with their student and married them. It’s a fun idea, by the way, listing the things you want to see in a guy and hoping that one day, you would actually see it in them.

The Rake – I like the contrast of the personality of Tristan, being notorious and lovable at the same time. I love his devotion to his family, ensuring everyone is safe and their future is secured. Although he doesn’t show it a lot, he’s a sensitive man who kept a memento from 6 years ago. I like the realization that his stupidity cause him to lose someone important in his life. The only drawback is he doesn’t have money. I don’t admire plots where the heroes have to rely on the downy of the heroine. It’s a turn off for me. Nevertheless, I admire Tristan’s love and devotion for Georgiana. It is super sweet, especially when he realized that she’s the one. The bickering between Tristan and Georgiana is super funny. I like these kinds of events, where they keep on fighting only to realize they love one another.

London’s Perfect Scoundrel – I super love Saint, he’s fun and wicked. I was scandalized by the “adventures” of him and Evie. I like his humor. He was so funny especially on the sonnet part. Made me read and re-read that part of the book. I can feel his loneliness, the mere realization that someone won’t miss you when you’re gone is a bit tough. Saint was super sweet and makes it a point to do everything for Evie. I was disappointed with the ending of the book, it was not enough for everything that Evie and Saint went through. I’m just glad that somehow their story is continued in the 3rd book. I could wish for a better ending for this book. I was not a fan of the kidnapping scene, I agree, it was one of the big twists but I just wasn’t a fan.

England’s Perfect Hero – Since The Rake, I have been fascinated with the personality of Robert, he is so mysterious. I like the idea that he danced with the wallflowers, making them feel special and in the end, his knees hurt. I find his sensitivity appealing and not. I don’t like overly sensitive guys, but what do you expect from a person who’s traumatize. He’s trying to forget a hard past slowly and I was so happy when he finally succeeded. I like the suspense in the series, it was actually adventurous that made me want to know what happened immediately. Being sensitive, he draw a shield around him. Hiding him from the rest of the world, when that barrier finally cracked; I love how he reached out to the rest of his family. Aside from Robert, I also liked Edward, he’s so sweet. Supporting Robert in anyway he could and would like to help out his family even if he was only 10 years old. I love how Robert tries to protect Edward and makes it a point to not disappoint him. Their relationship is super.

What this series lacks is an Epilogue. I guess I was used to seeing the life of the hero progress after the ending. It made me want to know what happened to the characters after the story.

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Justin Halpern – Sh*t My Dad Says

[tweetmeme source=”ibethyap”] I found this book really entertaining, hilarious even. I love the humor of the dad. This book is a collection of anecdotes and quotes from Justin’s dad. Someone who curses a lot but have a lot of insights in life. I find his teaching inspirational. Maybe I’m like the dad minus the cursing part. I curse, mind you, not to the extent of the dad where in a sentence there would be more than 3 F-words.

I found Justin’s dad really sweet, a bit harsh in words but overall a good dad. He makes it a point to support his son in everything. May it be a small employment or a small achievement, he encourages his son to do his best no matter where and no matter how.

Whatever the dad was saying makes sense if you think about it. Just ignore the offensive words for the faint hearted. But those words are really deep and useful. As the things happen in everyday lives, it becomes easy to understand the message the dad is trying to impart.

After the book, I’ve decided to follow Justin’s twitter as well as read some of the website. I still find the dad amusing. It’s nice to read about the anecdotes, it’s funny and educational. Teaches a lot about life and how to go about it.

This book is a bit short, I read it in less than a day. It was really entertaining.

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Royal Wedding Anticipation

[tweetmeme source=”ibethyap”] I’m super excited about the Royal Wedding. April 29,2011 marks the wedding date of Prince William and Miss Catherine Middleton. Since my love for Britain is blooming these days. I can’t help but be excited on this historical event. It’s like a fairytale coming into life, I wish them a fairytale ending as well.

Every girl has dreamed of their own fairy tale wedding, where marrying a prince is part of it. This is what Disney is installing in the minds of little girls. Kate is so lucky to have hers come true. But I guess there’s a lot of pressure on her part also. She became a public figure where everyone is watching her every move. Admiring, criticizing and judging her along the way. This makes me think, how much can a person endure. It is just the start, once she’s in the royal family, more eyes would scrutinize her. It’s just like in the movies, it must be really hard to be part of the public eye.

I’m half jealous of the grand celebration, a part of me wants to experience the same where I can have my dream wedding without any restrictions. The other part of me wants to have a simple wedding where the people important to me would be able to witness it. I guess, I’m envious because I want to see the inside of Buckingham palace. Who wouldn’t want to live in a castle. I guess, I’ll just save up and live in a castle for a day to experience it.

I admire Kate’s love for William that she can endure a lot of things. People are closely scrutinizing her, what she wears and what she’s like. I’m an advert of not paying attention to what other people are saying. But in her case, where millions are watching, it’s a bit hard to ignore. And sometimes, what they are saying are a bit painful. At least she has William and it should be enough. I like seeing their pictures together, they look happy and in love. I really wish they would last forever, so that people would continue believing in fairy tales.

I may not wed in the luxury of royalty and I believe that Kalvin would forever be my prince. Can’t wait for my own fairy tale wedding to come. Less than a month.

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Regency Ton

[tweetmeme source=”ibethyap”]
Duke
Simon Pearson, Duke of Leighton – Eleven Scandals to Start to Win A Duke’s Heart (Sarah Maclean)
Simon Basset, Duke of Hastings – The Duke and I (Julia Quinn)
Anthony Courtland, Duke of Tremore – Guilty Pleasure (Laura Lee Gurhke)
Edward Penteith, Duke of Dinstable – The Perfect Rake (Anne Gracie)
Rhys de Winter, Duke of St. Cyres – The Wicked Ways of a Duke (Laura Lee Gurhke)
Ransom Seymour, Duke of Ainsley – Waking Up with the Duke (Lorraine Heath)
Greydon Brackenridge, Duke of Wycliffe – The Rake (Suzanne Enoch)
Simon Tremaine, Duke of Foxwood – Only A Duke Will Do (Sabrina Jeffries)

Marquis
Gabriel St. John, the Marquess of Ralston – Nine Rules to Break When Romancing a Rake (Sarah Maclean)
Christopher Malory – First Marquis of of Haverston –  The Present (Johanna Lindsey)
Jason Malory – Third Marquis of of Haverston –  The Present (Johanna Lindsey)
Michael Halboro, Marquis of St. Aubyn – London’s Perfect Scoundrel (Suzanne Enoch)

Earl
John Stirling, 8th Earl of Kilmartin – When He Was Wicked (Julia Quinn)
Michael Stirling, 9th Earl of Kilmartin – When He Was Wicked (Julia Quinn)
Marcus Marsden, Earl of Westcliff – It Happened One Autumn (Lisa Kleypas)
Morgan Lyons, 8th Earl of Westcliffe – Passions of a Wicked Earl (Lorraine Heath)

Viscount
Anthony Bridgerton – The Viscount Who Loved Me (Julia Quinn)
Nicholas Eden, 4th Viscount of Montieth – Love Only Once (Johanna Lindsey)
James Malory, Viscount of Ryding – Gentle Rogue (Johanna Lindsey)
Tristan Carroway, Viscount of Dare – The Rake (Suzanne Enoch)
Anthony Dalton, Viscount of Norcourt – Let Sleeping Rogues Lie (Sabrina Jeffries)

Baron

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Dreaming of Regency English

[tweetmeme source=”ibethyap”] I woke up with a desire of wanting to experience the Regency English time where everything is simple and lovely. Where I can find an incredible rake, fall in love with him and make him fall in love with me. I believe in the saying “once a rake falls in love it is forever” and I certainly would want to experience that myself.

I’ve always envisioned my rake to be the tall, dark and handsome. I’m also assuming that they have nice bodies. Funny, dependable and super sweet. Not in the normal ways of sweetness but in a way of doing things out of the ordinary, making the ladies feel special, super special. Romance novels almost always make the rakes fall in love with a spinster or shy girls. I guess the authors do that for the contrasts and it makes the fairy tale sounds sweeter. I’m not a spinster and I’m not shy. Hmm, can I make them fall head over heels over me?

I’d like to experience the 4 PM afternoon tea like it’s the most important event of each day. Nothing can be more relaxing than drinking tea and reading a book. I prefer reading a book since I can’t sew and I don’t like gossiping much. I also would like to see a duel where men fight for the ones they love. I’m a hopeless romantic I’m afraid. Reading about horse back riding and doing things that are inappropriate for a lady sounds intriguing. I like to try it all very much. Somehow, I’m unleashing my adventurous side.

I like the concept of dance cards and the idea of dancing the night literally. I think it would be super nice and sweet to be swept off your feet and make you swoon. It is my dream to see someone who can stand as my rake. I’m not a shopping person but I like the idea of choosing gowns for a ball or something. It’s like preparing for a wedding but only on a more frequent basis. To add to my excitement, I’ll get to choose the accessories to go with the gown.

I want to be trapped in Regency English, even if I won’t have the luxury of technology. I’ll take it all in exchange for a super nice and lovable rake. Living in Regency is luxury in itself because they are spending their time in balls, parks, garden, opera like there’s no problem in the world. Leaving everything to the ton to solve the financial problems. If I get a chance, I would like to oversee the financials also. Afterall, I’m an accountant.

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What I’ve Learned from my Wedding Gown Designer

[tweetmeme source=”ibethyap”] Getting a designer who lives near you have it’s own advantages. Over the past few months, I’m almost always in my designer’s store. Fitting my gown, waiting with my entourage to fit their gowns or checking accessories and stuffs. I’ve learned some of the inside info in the designer’s world and I would like to keep it in my blog.

1. Length of studying fashion design is variable. They have a quota of the drawings so if you draw fast, chances are you would graduate earlier. The school would also ask you to compile all your drawings so when you graduate you already have a portfolio. It’s normally finished in 3 years time.
2. There’s really no school for bead working. It’s normally acquired through practice. The best way to do so is to start in a small piece of cloth, draw your designs and start to sew beads into the pattern. Mind you, there’s a counting that needs to be followed. It should be precise to the counting otherwise the beads would be loose.
3. For the beading process, the designer would draw it in the paper. And then pass the dress and the paper to the one who would do the beads. They would draw patterns in the dress. Afterwhich, they would send back for the designer’s approval. Once it’s okay, they would start the beadwork.
4. If you want to start learning about sewing, start with sewing handkerchief and then difficulty should progress.
5. Wedding gowns would be dirty after all the people touching it, sewing beads to it or fittings. The way to clean it is to soak it in Ariel and clean it off with a brush to make the gown white again.
6. As a designer, you are not expected to do everything by yourself. You just have to get good staffs. Someone’s who good in doing measurement, sewing, beading and looking for accessories. But it is a must that you know how to do the rest just in case something fails, you have to fix it all by yourself.
7. The normal places we visit, Divisoria, Greenhills becomes the designer’s haven as they are able to get prices cheaply.
8. Designers have their own suppliers that’s why even if  those suppliers won’t sell the cloth in retail, you can get it from the designer.

I love Emil Ocampo, he’s simple, down to earth and really talented. He thought me a lot of stuffs and he’s super patient with me with all my requests. I got to admit that some of his drawings look familiar. But you can choose your own design and make him modify. I’m glad that our style matches that it’s easier to talk with him. He’s super nice even if you have lots of revisions, he ensures that the quality of the dress is good. And thinks of ways to improve the dresses. I think I found my permanent designer. He’s also not super costly.

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HP K110A Deskjet 2060

[tweetmeme source=”ibethyap”] In order to print out envelopes for the wedding invitations, we went out to find a printer. Main considerations are the usefulness of the printer. We are looking for an all in one. Printing, scanning, copying and hopefully faxing. But since faxing capability will make our printer go over the budget, we’ve decided to let go of that facility and focused on the rest of the capability.

One of the other considerations is the price of the cartridge. Upon canvass, HP 704 proved to be the cheapest, colored ranging from 400 and black and white around 300. Other brand cartridges ranges from 600-900. I think this really captured our attention, HP was advertising that they are 40% savings in the cartridge compared to other brands. Come to think of it, we won’t use the printer much. I’m more excited to use the scanner.

The initial setup of the printer is easy. You just have to remember not to connect the printer and computer until it prompted you to do so. The instilling of the cartridges is also easy. They have picture guide as well.

Test print is fairly fast, but when it comes to the actual printing, it’s a bit slower but still manageable. Size of scanning is really big, but color wise, it’s a bit dull. I tried scanning in 300 DPI, the speed is decent. But I’m not a bit fan of the scanning quality.

One of the frustration with this printer is with regards to envelope printing. We can’t perfectly print all the envelopes and it’s irritating. One time it would perfect, you won’t change any format, yet the second time the envelope would print, it would be above or below the perfect layout. It’s also having a hard time picking up the envelope. Maybe, envelope printing is really intended for laser printers, to attain consistencies.

Copying is also easy, same speed as the scanning. I didn’t try it a lot since it’s a bit wasteful.

Overall, I’m okay with the usage of the printer. It’s just not that user friendly in envelope printing. I was frustrated to print and re-print several of the envelopes. Hope we won’t have similar issue on mass printing of other documents

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How to Setup Shoe-Rack

[tweetmeme source=”ibethyap”] Setting up a new house has its own advantages. Today, I’ve setup our expandable shoe-rack. This shoe-rack was given by Kalvin’s family. And it was so easy to assemble the rack. This time around there was no instruction guide but a picture on what items are available and how to built it was shown. This way anyone can set it up. It took me 10 minutes or so to complete the shoe rack.

Step 1: Insert the base cap and the top cap in the stand.

Step 2: Screw 2 bars to one side of the stand. You may tighten the screw upon securing the place of the bars.

Step 3: Secure the other end of the bar to the other stand. And tighten screws.

Step 4: Voila! Here’s your shoe rack. Adjust the length of the rack to desired.

This one is really easy to do. Upon trying out the new shoe rack, we discovered that slippers and flat surface shoes slips. Now the bigger problem. How do we keep it from slipping… hmmm… I’ll let you know when I figure it out.

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Daiso Face Brush

[tweetmeme source=”ibethyap”] Finally, I was able to find an affordable face brush. Muji introduced me to the product. But since it was a bit expensive, I didn’t buy it. Daiso solved the price issue. It was worth 85 Php and the quality is really good.

What is a face brush? Honestly I don’t know! I’m just curious on what it can do to help me clean my face. I guess the concept is similar to a tooth brush. It slightly massages the face and try to clean off dirt. The bristle looks stiff but it wasn’t. It was gentle on my skin. The immediate effect? I wasn’t able to see. But after washing I feel like my skin is cleaner. I’ve used it together with Etude House Facial Cleanser.

I’ve originally intended to use it to solve black heads and white heads problems. Let’s wait and see if it would truly be addressed.

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