I sooo heart family reunions!

I sooo heart family reunions! I really do :) I love catching up with family and hearing how they have been. I love reminiscing the funniest things that had happened in the past even waaaay, way before I was born. I love hearing legends and epics, adventures and misadventures of everybody as well as sharing mine, too. I love sharing meals with them-- stuffing ourselves with so much food enough to last for the entire week! I am soooo pigged-out I can't even think of eating for the entire day today (sheesh, there goes my nth attemp to go on diet). I have been consistently gaining a lotta weight since I got back from Thailand and my tummy looks disgusting! Flabs everywhere... YUCK! Chinkey you're such a piggy!! Oink!

This weekend was such a blast! Didn't went anywhere last Friday night. I just had dinner with the dudes (while listening to a sucky band) and then came down with a splitting headache from nowhere (prolly from the sucky band haha). I had to cancel a night-out with the other dudes (sorry, guys... I just had to). By the time I got home I was so friggin tired I went straight to bed and had fallen asleep instantly. That's kinda good because I was advised that we are leaving at 9am the following day.

I woke up so early (around 7am) on a Saturday morning. Ghahh, I hate waking up early on a weekend but, hell, they (family) is dead-serious when they said they will leave me behind if I came late. Man, that was nasty :( So, yeah, I got to my dad's house on time and we drove off to pick up Uncle Ben, who just got back from Chicago last week. This trip was actually planned out especially for him.

Meeting place is at my grandparent's house. J has actually planned on bringing his Honda just for experience; plus we also thought that there will be a lot of oldies who will be joining the trip as well. We don't wanna get cramped at the back seat of whichever car we are bunking into. Hello, leg room! Getting stuck in a 3-hour drive cramped at the back would be really awful we'll not at least to me. My legs are short anyway. Nonetheless, we found out that it will just be only a few of us joining the trip. So we convoyed with just the *new* CRV (whattafab!) and the Prado. Guess what, I was voted to seat at the back because as I predicted they would say I would fit in there... my legs are short anyway! Meeeh!!

So cramped at the backseat, we traveled for a couple of hours and pit stopped at Liliw, Laguna to buy some shoes! Maaaaaaaan, i so adore the shoes there and the bags, too. They sell it really really cheap! We didn't have much time so I wasn't able to really chose which I like :( I only had time to buy one. Awwwww... well at least Tita bought it for me. Neat-o!

We had lunch at this nice resto somewhere along the way to Caliraya. The resto is supposedly a place overlooking Laguna de Bay but the landscaping was so bad the trees blocked the view. Food was not so great but didn't like the calamares and gindara :( but i liked the kare-kare (but my brother's kare-kare is the best).

It didn't take a long time from the resto to the resort by the lagoon. The 3-hour drive was worth it! The view there is fantastic. The place is really peaceful and relaxing. Although the facilities are very spartan (just the pool and some boats), I really liked the place and would want to go back there to spend an entire night.

I invited my dad to go with me to the dock and sat there with my feet playing with the icy cold waters. It was sunset that time but too bad the weather was cloudy so I didn't see my sun :( otherwise everything is purrrrrfect! Calm lagoon, cold water on my feet, peace and quiet. It was really sad that we didn't stay there longer :( Too bad i wasn't able to bring my camera but thankfully my cousin never leaves home with out. So here are some photos.

We got home quite late as the traffic was awful but it was a great trip. I'm so glad I came.

The following day is another family get-together. It was some sort of a welcome home party for both Uncle Ben and Uncle Jr, who came from San Diego. We came late, actually, as I couldn't bring myself away from my beloved bed. So with much coercing from my brothers, I quickly showered and dressed. We went first to my sister-in-law's grandma's birthday luncheon and ate really fast, shared small talks, and went to my grandparent's house.

Food was prepared by Aunt Ising, who is famous for her dinuguan and Filipino dessert. Yuuuuummmm! Again, we pigged out and spent the entire afternoon trying to get 100 with the magic sing. Insentive: 100 USD (Of course, that was never done no matter how "great" they can sing :P Bleh, i can still here Beach Boy's Kokomo ringing in my head. Some of the photos here.