31 Things I am Thankful for in December 2014

Happy New Year!

I had 365 days of being grateful in 2014. Having a grateful heart (even if there are days I have to force myself to be grateful)  does a lot of wonders.

December is the most wonderful month of the year for me and a fitting culmination of a blessed year.  It is a month filled with joy, hope and love. I hope you had a wonderful December as well.

Here are 31 things I am grateful for this December:

1. Christmas spirit. Butuan lit up and I forgot about it until I heard the fireworks. I would have wanted to shoot (take pictures of) fireworks.

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Photo credit: Jakem Jakem III

2. Comforting treat. I nagged my cousin to treat me somewhere when he received his 13th month pay. It had been raining. I craved batchoy so off we went for my treat.

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3. Two-inch loss. I was regularly exercising and watching what I eat using an app called myfitnesspal. I lost 2 inches off my waistline. Do not ask for the weight. It seemed it only budged a little.

4. Preparation for Ruby. Knowing how typhoons can wreck havoc on anything on its path, I was glad I saw the city really preparing for the possible entry of the Typhoon Ruby. Classes and work suspensions were announced in advance.

5. Ruby passed without incident in the city. It looked like a regular day.  Thank you, Universe.

6. Nice read. This article spoke to me. This line is a challenge and I have slowly expressed how people meant to me:  “You ruin your life by desensitizing yourself. We are all afraid to say too much, to feel too deeply, to let people know what they mean to us. “

7.  Knowing how to take a better selfie.  Taking selfies takes a lot of bad rap because some people overdo it. (I can be guilty of that!) It does make me a little narcissistic.  To justify my selfie shot, I am going to share how to take a clear one.  Take a selfie early in the morning near a window. The warm light will illuminate your face. Of course, since it is early and you might have just woken up, don’t forget to wash you face and dab a little powder. If you want to apply lipstick, go ahead. Prop the smartphone or tablet on the table.  Set it on a timer. Take the shot.

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8. Photo tricks. My cousin took awesome photos using his ipad and he shared how he was able to come up with good photos. For now, it would be our little secret.

9. Time for errands. I checked the schedule and there are a lot of holidays this month. This meant that banks and offices would be closed and I need to settle my bills early so I would not be doing this in the middle of Christmas rush.

10. Good news from cousin. Cousin messaged me that she might be visiting us in 2015! I hope it pushes through.

11. Good news from my aunt.  We are on a roll here. Because of this good news, she treated us to ice cream. It is really hard for me to say no to ice cream.

12.  Shopping for tops. There is a dress store near our place and whenever we pass by the store, different outfits are being worn by the mannequin. Although the clothes are affordable, I have resisted buying anything because I have not cleaned my closet. I wish I can be like Steve Jobs and Mark Zuckerberg where I can wear the same type and color of clothes every single day.  One day, I will try that for a year and let us see how much I would save in money and in time.

13.  Catching up with friends. With the holidays coming up, we have been exchanging messages of our plans for the long vacation.

14. Motivation. I realized that I have exercised for 7 straight days.

15. My friend’s internet is back. Connectivity has been a must in this modern world. My friend has been quiet on viber and it turned out that her internet was down.

16. Working with friends. I had documentation work the following day and I was glad to find out that I would be working with friends.  Work would be a lot easier.

17.  Fun work. It was a light workshop with a fellowship in the evening. My friend and I had a chance encounter. She was invited to the party.

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18. Report done. I was feeling productive that day.

19. Finished what I have planned to do for the day. It helped that I wrote them down and I crossed each item when it was done.

20. Confirmed details of the get-together. My friend has a friend who knows the owner of the venue we have chosen. We were trying to book the place in the background and when we got the confirmation, we immediately sent Facebook invitation to friends.

21.  Umbrella found. My friend gave me an umbrella a year ago and I love that umbrella because of its nice shape.  Plus, it is sturdy. It is still working after a year.  hehehe I brought it to church but I was already home when I found out that I left it in one of the pews.  I quickly went back to church to find my umbrella. I was disappointed when I reached the church I did not see my umbrella. A churchgoer saw me pacing back and forth looking for it that he called me and he asked me what I was looking for. It turned out that he kept my umbrella for safekeeping from other prying eyes.

22.  Marathon painting done. My friend would be coming home and I promised to give her some of my paintings but I wanted to surprise her a bit by giving something I have not posted on Facebook.  (These were posted on instagram.)

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23. Final arrangement for the get-together was done. I accompanied my friend to make reservations for the food and other necessary arrangements.

24. Christmas preparation! It was a simple celebration so it was a no sweat thing for me.

25. Time with Adriane. They say that Christmas is for kids so off we braved the mall crowds to make the little one happy.

26. Get-together with friends. It is a nice reunion with friends I have not seen for a long time. It is nice that I still get to be friends with these people even if I went to a different high school than them. I am an outsider but I did not really feel like I was an outcast.

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27. Field trip with travel friends. My friend, Ayet, is in town and we took this opportunity to meet up and check out a new resort. It was a memorable trip since we did not know that the resort does not serve food. We had to go the market to buy food and have it cooked for us.

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28. Time to rest. I was in bed all day. Except for the time I went to church and ate my meals. When night time came, I tested some photography tricks that my cousin taught me. It did turn out the way I wanted to but I posted it anyway… on instagram (less critics than Facebook! hehehe)

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29. We survived the storm. It was classified as Tropical Depression Seniang with 55kph winds. Honestly, we were not prepared. There was no sense of urgency in the news, even from PAGASA. We were dead wrong. When we woke up in the morning, winds were howling. It was scary. By noon, we were flooded. It was sad but we were okay. We were not prepared but we were not hurt. We had food. We had each other.

30. Lights were back on. We were clueless of what was going on the whole day. We were busy with the clean up though. In the morning, I had photography duties. My cousin’s friend needed a photographer for her brother’s wedding. This is just one of my shots of my output.

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31. Water slowly trickled back. I have not showered for two days. We have cleaned the house from all the muddy residue just in time for New Year.

Hello, 2015!

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