The Nutcracker with Lisa Macuja-Elizalde

Audience young and old await the opening
Aliw Theater, CCP Complex, 2013 Dec 01

Photo Courtesy of www.lisamacuja.com

Lisa Macuja danced her final performance of The Nutcracker last December. Proceeds of her performances was set to benefit typhoon Yolanda victims. It made this event even more meaningful, she was very emotional after her single performance. 

 With remarkable grace and beauty it was entertaining to watch the prima ballerina perform the music of Peter Tchaikovsky. 

Book being read  of dad to daughter
(wish I have this copy)

Seated beside us is a dad and a little girl reading a book during intermissions. I adoringly sneaked a peek and smiled as  I picture our daughter in a few years.

Little Daughter wearing a tutu inspired skirt :)

Hopefully before Ms Lisa Macuja completely retires, my daughter could still see her perform.

New Year Rounds!

Rounded fruits for good luck in the coming year! 
Well, we were buying fruits last day of the year, not because of tradition, but because we love fruits! There is a wide variety in the market especially for new year's eve festivity.

We have been reading the book A Day in the Market (book and animated app version), it has been an enjoyable read for my husband and daughter. With excitement, the book captured the scenario in a market, especially because it is a local book. A bilingual book wherein my daughter's favorite words are bayad po and nanay

We literally opened the book and compared items in the market. We identified fruits and my daughter saying 'same' for every one that matches her book. It was a fun market day.

Keeping up with tradition, wearing polka dots, jumping and showering coins and making noise during midnight were the activities welcoming 2014.

Our daughter enjoyed running around to pick-up coins. :)

Pop-up Christmas Cards

We chanced upon Robert Sabuda's work and had so much fun reading the Night before Christmas pop up.

 

So we got another book, The Christmas Alphabet. We admired his work and went to Robert Sabuda's site and saw patterns and instructions. 

We waited till before she can get hold of the scissors for her age that says 2+. Learning to cut, she tries her own , as I do too. She puts glue and presses as we attach the pop-ups on the card.

Here is our attempt to do our own pop-ups with markers to finish off the cards.

St Nick Pop-up card using markers for color

Snowman pop-up card using markers for color

Side view of the pop-up cards

'Tis the Season of Play

Christmas poetry reading makes my daughter sit, relax and snooze.

This book is a combination of timeless poem, carols and stories.

Since the contents are written in 19th to early 20th century, it is refreshing how simple Christmas was being celebrated, family singing and gathering at dinner table, not the commercial jungle we are having now.

Though I would say I am not the best to sing the songs, my voice is still music to my daughter's ears. (Oh what delight!) so we sing with all our might, haha.

To relate to some stories, we wanted an experience of making a snowman. Since we are in a tropical country, we made our own out of clay. Add a spark of imagination, and a happy cheer, viola ,we have another Christmas moment with our child!

Anticipating Christmas

An advent calendar is used to celebrate the days in anticipation of Christmas or Christ's birth. 

In every significant event, we try to prepare and discuss what it is about. It makes the day really big for my daughter. We read Christmas stories and poems a day, we look at festive decors. And once a day, we put up one ornament in this pop-up advent calendar.

Well, she couldnt resist to hang more than one ornament per day, :)  so we open, hang and return it to its respective cards, then we add one more to the next day. :)

St Nicholas a.k.a Santa Claus

From what  I gather, Saint Nick was just a name among many variation of Santa Claus. Little did i know of the life Saint Nicholas led. We have been in the bandwagon of the commercial version of Santa Claus. Admittedly unprepared to celebrate this day, i made some quick reading about the bishop St Nicholas.  

Saint Nicholas Day is not very popular in the Philippines. Much of its celebration is in Eastern Europe & Germanic countries. His generosity and kindness to children has inspired many people around the world. We didn't have time to put shoes outside or hang stockings, instead, we read some classic Christmas poems and opened a gift with wooden barnyard playtime for our mini celebration.

For further reading on St Nicholas you may check www.stnicholascenter.org

Our 1st Christmas Book

It is the season of cheers as my daughter's birthday is December, it is truly a month to celebrate.

A heartwarming performance by the little drummer boy.
This is my daughter's first Christmas book, i didn't realize she would love a fairly long story for her age. 

Intently listening to every word, she plays the drum with us in this book!