The Rules:
1. Link back to the person who awarded you: Thanks, Jo and Marta!
2. Answer the questions
3. Award other blogs
The Questions:
1. What is your favorite fashion magazine?
I honestly don't have one. *gasp* I know it might sound strange but being a huge bibliophile, I find magazines to be a waste of money. I'd rather spend for a good book I can re-read even 10 years from now instead of splurging on a magazine that's only trendy for the month it came out. If I really had to pick just about any magazine, it would easily be Reader's Digest. I grew up reading it!
Ahh, good times. Laughter is the Best Medicine and All in a Day's Work were the first things I'd read!
2. Who is your favorite singer/band?
I don't have just one. But the album I have on repeat right now is 21 by Adele. Love her voice! (And her taste in nail polish!)
3. Who is your favorite YouTube guru?
Before I got into this nail polish business, I really enjoyed watching makeup tutorials. The easier to replicate, the better. I had never worn make up till a few years ago so I had a lot of catching up to do! One of the best I've seen is Michelle Phan's channel.
4. What is your favorite makeup product?
Blush! I love how just one swipe can make the difference between sickly and refreshed.
The blush that had my own mother thinking it was my natural flush.
5. Where would you like to live?
I've lived both close to the equator and far from it so I've been lucky to have had the best of both worlds in terms of climate. I would, however, love to live somewhere with a tradition and culture that will be interesting to learn from. Top of my list is Japan. (Studio Ghibli and a ramen museum? Yes, please!)
6. What is your favorite film?
A Walk in the Clouds! I'm a huge Keanu Reeves fan (Speed/Matrix days) and I love how the plot revolved heavily around family and acceptance.
*swoon*
7. How many pairs of shoes do you own?
Honestly? I have no idea. Do boots count? I'd guestimate it at 20 pairs.
8. What is your favorite color?
BLUE. (If you didn't know that by now then I'd be really sad.)
1. Link back to the person who awarded you: Thanks, Melissa!
2. Answer the following questions
3. Award 10 other bloggers
The Questions:
1. What's your favorite song?
Current favorite is Adele's Set Fire to the Rain. Just the Way You Are by Billy Joel is close to all-time fave status mostly because Mr. J sang in during our wedding reception. Complete surprise! (And he usually doesn't sing though he can carry a tune fine.)
2. What's your favorite dessert?
Crème brûlée! There's this awesome fusion cuisine restaurant in Calgary called Alloy where I had blueberry and ginger crème brûlée. One of the best I've ever had! And pretty much anything with chocolate.
Seriously, who'd be able to resist THAT?
3. Who's your favorite pet?I grew up around dogs and last I counted we had 5. My favorite is this shaggy-haired dog that my sister named Maiki (pronounced mai-kee). She's the least energetic of the lot and just likes to be cuddled a lot.
4. Black or white?
Black.
5. What's your biggest fear?
Heights. I'm deathly afraid of 'em. So yeah, I'm not exactly the best person to go to a theme park with if you aim to ride till you puke. I'm perfectly happy with my feet on the ground, thankyouverymuch.
Me after you suggest I should try the roller coaster to get over my irrational fear.
Me if you force the issue.
6. What's your best feature?My shoulders? I used to hate them since they're so bony but I've realized lately that having them that way is actually a good thing. Personality-wise, I'd say I'm honest. I say it as I see it. I don't tend to mince words so sometimes that gets me in trouble but at least you always know where you stand with me.
7. What's your everyday attitude?
Que sera, sera: Whatever will be, will be. I'm generally an optimist so it takes a lot to get me down. Mostly, I try not to worry too much about the future I cannot control and instead do something about the present that I can.
8. What is perfection?
It's an ideal not a reality. The moment you realize that difference is the moment you really start living.
9. What is your guilty pleasure?
That's easy: Nail polish
The Rules:
1. Link back to the person you got it from: Thanks again, Melissa!
2. Tell 7 things about yourself
3. Give the award to 10 bloggers
7 Things About Me:
1. I married the same guy twice. We did our church wedding in the Philippines and did another reception here in Toronto. It was the only way to make sure that everyone was happy on both sides of the families.
2. I love to bake. While in university, one of my friends' mom (a pediatrician by profession) asked me if she could pay me to bake her cookies to give away to her patients during the holidays. My semester just ended so I figured it would be a great way to earn extra cash. I ended up taking way too many orders when other people heard of it and just broke even at the end of the day. Plus, it took the fun out of baking (imagine baking for 50 boxes of half a dozen cookies each within a day by yourself).
3. I have big feet. I wear a size 9.5-10 which are HUGE especially for an Asian.
5. I didn't wear makeup until I was 24. But I've been wearing nail polish since high school.
6. I'm the only sibling in my family who was never in any sort of school varsity team. I was invited to join my high school women's basketball varsity but my overprotective father refused to let me play in contact sports so I didn't join them. But my little sister got away with it and was part of her high school's volleyball, basketball and badminton varsity.
7. This is only my second winter here in Toronto. I used to live in Calgary and before that I lived in Manila.
The Rules:
1. Each person must post 11 things about themselves on their blog.
2. Answer the questions the tagger set to you in their post and create 11 new questions for the people you tag!
3. You have to choose 11 people to tag and link them on your post.
4. Go to their blog and tell them you have tagged them.
5. You legitimately have to tag 11 people. No tag backs!
***Thanks for the tag, Sophie!
11 Things About Me:
1. Mr. J and I are foodies of sorts. We love to try new cuisines and are eager to "discover" new to us restaurants.
2. I'm the shortest in the family (not counting my mom). My brothers are both over 6 feet and my (not so) little sister towers over me by at least an inch last I checked (and she's still growing).
3. I can speak a bit of Spanish. It was a required subject when I was in elementary and the Filipino/Tagalog language has a lot of words that are derivative of Spanish words. For instance: "¿Cómo está?" is "How are you?" in English. In Filipino we say "Kamusta?" or "Kumusta?" to mean the same thing.
4. I've been wanting a dog for a pet for a while now. But Mr. J says it's not practical for us to have one just yet.
5. I was named for my great-grandma who my mom was named for, as well. Her name was Carmen.
6. I love to eat fruit. Whatever is in season but my must have at home are bananas. I need me a banana a day.
7. Mr. J and I just saw In the Heights last Saturday. It's a Tony-awarded musical and it was so much fun!
8. I love to experiment with my hair. Once, I chopped it all off on a whim. It was so short that the part at the nape was shaved off and my brothers started teasing me by calling me "kuya" (big brother).
9. I started cooking at the age of 6. My mom was a firm believer in letting kids help out in the kitchen if they were so inclined albeit with proper supervision, of course. I had to stand on a chair to see what I was doing.
10. I bought a sewing machine in hopes of sewing my own custom-made curtains. But cloth is so expensive that it made more sense to purchase curtains ready to use.
11. I wear glasses but I was so in denial about needing them for the longest time. I only decided to get them when once day, I thought I saw an old friend walking up to me so I enthusiastically wave hi. As I get closer to him, he wasn't who I thought he was, after all, and he looked at me really weird when we passed each other. Awkward. So glasses were definitely in order, yeah?
The Questions (for me to answer):
1. What is your favourite season? Why?
Winter! I'm still not over how magical snow is. Plus, I get to traipse around in boots.
2. What country would you like to travel to?
Japan. (see above)
3. Did you make a new years' resolution? How is it going so far?
Nope! I don't believe in such things. Either you do or you don't. No point in making resolutions that you'll end up breaking before it even gets to June.
4. What do you think of acrylics/gel nails?
I'm generally not a fan of them. I prefer natural nails as I don't care for how obviously fake they can look. Especially if they're done too long, flared out or in that very long and thin stiletto style that's just an accident waiting to happen.
It was a shimmery dark purple. The "edgy" color at the time when black polish was unheard of.
6. Did you ever bite your nails? How did you ditch that habit?
Nope.
7. What is your favourite food?
Filipino comfort food. Nothing beats a hot steaming bowl of Sinigang on a cold winter day.
8. What is bigger: your nail polish collection or your makeup collection?
Easily my nail polish collection. I usually try to pare down to essentials on my makeup collection and I'm paranoid about expiry dates so I regularly do purges. Not so with my nail polish.
9. Winter question: Do you do winter sports? Skiing or snowboarding?
I've tried snowboarding and it wasn't as fun as I thought seeing as I spent about 80% of the time on my butt. Mr. J and I went mushing once. Now, THAT was a whole lot of fun and the dogs were beyond adorable!
Genmaicha or Japanese brown rice tea. Love the light flavor of it!
11. I found this question so great, I have to steal it: What is your biggest dream?
To win the lottery, retire early with Mr. J on some island paradise knowing all my (future) kids are doing well on their own. Haha!
The Questions (for YOU to answer):
1. What hard to find nail polish did you eventually find? How?
2. What nail polish color would you love to wear but can never pull off?
3. How did your nail polishaddiction collection start?
4. What is your favorite childhood memory?
5. What song never fails to put a smile on your face?
6. Who is your biggest celebrity crush?
7. Where would you have your all-expenses paid dream vacation?
8. If you won $100M in the lottery, what would you do with it?
9. A cosmetic company wants you to be the face of their brand. Which company is it and why?
10. Do you believe in Fate, faith or choice?
11. What is one thing you've always wanted but know you can never have?
Whew! That sure was a long one. I really should remember to do these as I'm tagged so I don't end up doing everything in one huge post. If you got this far, Hammie and I applaud you. We hope this doesn't scare you away with TMI (too much information)! :P
As for tagging people, we'd love to tag all of you, lovely readers! You don't need a blog to participate, just leave a comment with answers to whichever question(s) strikes your fancy. We'd love to hear your thoughts! But I suppose it would be good to tag specific people as well (considering it's part of the rules). Fair enough. So for those specifically tagged below, feel free to do 1, 2 or all of the awards! :D
Sophie of It's Nails, Not Rocket Science
Jo of Northern Nails
Melissa of Swatch Me Now
Cristina of Impoverished by Polish
Mary of Swatch and Learn
Marta of Chit Chat Nails
Magda of Makeup by Magda
Carolina of Colores de Carol
Liz of Beauty Reductionista
Marisa of Polish Obsession
Thalie of Glazed Talons
Happy Weekend! We hope this weekend is tons better than the last! :D
1. Each person must post 11 things about themselves on their blog.
2. Answer the questions the tagger set to you in their post and create 11 new questions for the people you tag!
3. You have to choose 11 people to tag and link them on your post.
4. Go to their blog and tell them you have tagged them.
5. You legitimately have to tag 11 people. No tag backs!
***Thanks for the tag, Sophie!
11 Things About Me:
1. Mr. J and I are foodies of sorts. We love to try new cuisines and are eager to "discover" new to us restaurants.
2. I'm the shortest in the family (not counting my mom). My brothers are both over 6 feet and my (not so) little sister towers over me by at least an inch last I checked (and she's still growing).
3. I can speak a bit of Spanish. It was a required subject when I was in elementary and the Filipino/Tagalog language has a lot of words that are derivative of Spanish words. For instance: "¿Cómo está?" is "How are you?" in English. In Filipino we say "Kamusta?" or "Kumusta?" to mean the same thing.
4. I've been wanting a dog for a pet for a while now. But Mr. J says it's not practical for us to have one just yet.
6. I love to eat fruit. Whatever is in season but my must have at home are bananas. I need me a banana a day.
7. Mr. J and I just saw In the Heights last Saturday. It's a Tony-awarded musical and it was so much fun!
8. I love to experiment with my hair. Once, I chopped it all off on a whim. It was so short that the part at the nape was shaved off and my brothers started teasing me by calling me "kuya" (big brother).
9. I started cooking at the age of 6. My mom was a firm believer in letting kids help out in the kitchen if they were so inclined albeit with proper supervision, of course. I had to stand on a chair to see what I was doing.
10. I bought a sewing machine in hopes of sewing my own custom-made curtains. But cloth is so expensive that it made more sense to purchase curtains ready to use.
11. I wear glasses but I was so in denial about needing them for the longest time. I only decided to get them when once day, I thought I saw an old friend walking up to me so I enthusiastically wave hi. As I get closer to him, he wasn't who I thought he was, after all, and he looked at me really weird when we passed each other. Awkward. So glasses were definitely in order, yeah?
The Questions (for me to answer):
1. What is your favourite season? Why?
Winter! I'm still not over how magical snow is. Plus, I get to traipse around in boots.
2. What country would you like to travel to?
Japan. (see above)
3. Did you make a new years' resolution? How is it going so far?
Nope! I don't believe in such things. Either you do or you don't. No point in making resolutions that you'll end up breaking before it even gets to June.
4. What do you think of acrylics/gel nails?
I'm generally not a fan of them. I prefer natural nails as I don't care for how obviously fake they can look. Especially if they're done too long, flared out or in that very long and thin stiletto style that's just an accident waiting to happen.
(Image Credits)
Just..no. There's even what looks like a penny on one of the nails..!
5. What color was your very first bottle of polish?It was a shimmery dark purple. The "edgy" color at the time when black polish was unheard of.
6. Did you ever bite your nails? How did you ditch that habit?
Nope.
7. What is your favourite food?
Filipino comfort food. Nothing beats a hot steaming bowl of Sinigang on a cold winter day.
8. What is bigger: your nail polish collection or your makeup collection?
Easily my nail polish collection. I usually try to pare down to essentials on my makeup collection and I'm paranoid about expiry dates so I regularly do purges. Not so with my nail polish.
9. Winter question: Do you do winter sports? Skiing or snowboarding?
I've tried snowboarding and it wasn't as fun as I thought seeing as I spent about 80% of the time on my butt. Mr. J and I went mushing once. Now, THAT was a whole lot of fun and the dogs were beyond adorable!
This was from the exact same company and trail we went on!
10. Winter question: What is your favorite tea flavor?Genmaicha or Japanese brown rice tea. Love the light flavor of it!
11. I found this question so great, I have to steal it: What is your biggest dream?
To win the lottery, retire early with Mr. J on some island paradise knowing all my (future) kids are doing well on their own. Haha!
The Questions (for YOU to answer):
1. What hard to find nail polish did you eventually find? How?
2. What nail polish color would you love to wear but can never pull off?
3. How did your nail polish
4. What is your favorite childhood memory?
5. What song never fails to put a smile on your face?
6. Who is your biggest celebrity crush?
7. Where would you have your all-expenses paid dream vacation?
8. If you won $100M in the lottery, what would you do with it?
9. A cosmetic company wants you to be the face of their brand. Which company is it and why?
10. Do you believe in Fate, faith or choice?
11. What is one thing you've always wanted but know you can never have?
Whew! That sure was a long one. I really should remember to do these as I'm tagged so I don't end up doing everything in one huge post. If you got this far, Hammie and I applaud you. We hope this doesn't scare you away with TMI (too much information)! :P
As for tagging people, we'd love to tag all of you, lovely readers! You don't need a blog to participate, just leave a comment with answers to whichever question(s) strikes your fancy. We'd love to hear your thoughts! But I suppose it would be good to tag specific people as well (considering it's part of the rules). Fair enough. So for those specifically tagged below, feel free to do 1, 2 or all of the awards! :D
Sophie of It's Nails, Not Rocket Science
Jo of Northern Nails
Melissa of Swatch Me Now
Cristina of Impoverished by Polish
Mary of Swatch and Learn
Marta of Chit Chat Nails
Magda of Makeup by Magda
Carolina of Colores de Carol
Liz of Beauty Reductionista
Marisa of Polish Obsession
Thalie of Glazed Talons
Happy Weekend! We hope this weekend is tons better than the last! :D
Iloved reading this post it's great to get to know the person behind the blog , even though we tweet some things are still not said and as for the Tag ( bugger) I will take the butterfly award as i think i have done all the others lol
ReplyDeleteThank you for the tag! I enjoyed reading this. Oh, creme brulee! I totally forgot about that one for the dessert. I actually really love that stuff, it's so good. And I absolutely love Adele. Her 21 album is the one of a few that I can actually listen to repeatedly.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Jo! :) We were hoping it wouldn't scare people away with all that info/trivia. Hahaha! Oops, should I not have tagged you? ;) Hope you have an awesome weekend ahead!
ReplyDeleteYou're welcome, Melissa! I look forward to reading your answers! It's always nice to know more about the brains behind the pretty nails. :)
ReplyDeleteIndeed. I can have it everyday and not be sick of it! I've even been seriously considering getting my own mini torch so I can make some myself! :D
True! I have to admit though that sometimes it makes me a little sad just because most of the songs are about broken hearts and all that. But still a very strong album, for sure. Grammy-approved, too!
Thank you for the tags,Carmela! I enjoyed reading your answers! I too am a big fan of Keanu Reeves.Have you seen him in "The Lake House" with Sandra Bullock? Definitely worth watching.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Thalie! I loved Lake House because I always secretly wanted Sandra Bullock to end up with Keanu after how awesome they were in Speed. :D I have to admit that he looked his best in his earlier years though. Or it could be that he's just looking a bit too gaunt for my tastes lately.
ReplyDeleteLooking forward to reading your answers! :D
Hahahah...Now I know more about you in 15 minutes than I did in the last two years...my bad! And aside from Ann Rice, didn't know you are also a Keanu groupie! Hahahah.....P had to hide the picture frame I had of K that used to be on my night table somewhere.....dunno where he put it...ahaha.....
ReplyDeleteand Creme Brulee ....loved it ever since P made it for me when we first started dating when he used to work at the Bull. Now I guess we arent dating anymore so it's not a requirement...ahahaha....
ReplyDeleteAnd ahahaha...Readers Digest....hmmm...that's the first thing I pick up when I am at the Doctor's office waiting ahahah.... dont tell me u love McGyver too! Heheheh... :P
ReplyDeleteYay for Keanu groupies! :D Oooh, is it still here? I'll try to look for it. ;) Haha!
ReplyDeleteAww, that's so sweet! :D Well, technically you don't really stop dating so maybe we should remind him of that. :P I've actually been tempted to buy a tiny torch to see if I can do it myself. I'm told it's not that far off from Leche Flan.
ReplyDeleteYes, I loooove McGyver! That's probably one of the few TV shows I remember watching when I was much younger. I think my dad was a fan so we'd always have it on when it was still showing. :D
ReplyDeleteNo, I am pretty sure I brought it with me but I think after the move last year, I don't know where it is..Oh well. P always tells me to take the pic down anyway. Hahhaha.
ReplyDeleteI've been called Sir with short hair. Hahhaha.
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