DIY Mommy : Narwhals and Mermaid -- the #AngTwins turned FIVE
Time flies super fast! As I was going through my old blog posts where I documented the birthday parties of my twins, I realized that I have yet to share about their 5th birthday celebration and here we are, just half a year away from them celebrating their 6th! Ackkk..teka lang!
As you know, we have been resorting to full DIY house celebrations since 2020 since we can't go out and meet our families to physically celebrate with them. We're blessed to have such supportive relatives though who were all game enough to always join us as we do a virtual candle blowing for the past 2 years. Last year, as they celebrated their 5th birthday and as restrictions were starting to ease up, we were lucky to be able to go on a trip to make it extra special for them.
Since I was in between career shifts, we took the opportunity of me being on a one-month work break to fly to our favorite city in the world -- SINGAPORE! Make sense, right? The place where we will always feel right at home, where no major navigational skills are required because we know the city by heart and where we have family and friends whom we miss so much.
As early as July, I have been asking the twins what theme do they want for their birthday and it seems like they were still hooked on Octonauts given that they had so much fun during their 4th birthday that they wanted to do it again. As much as I try to give in to their requests, I proposed that we tweaked it a little so as to have some sort of change. Thus, we agreed on having Narwhals and Mermaids -- J and L's favorite underwater creatures respectively.
I'm lucky to have N and my brother in law A of Printooza PH who were always so game to get creative with us! From their personalized shirts, to their class loot bags and to their cake toppers, we were all so in theme and this made the birthday celebrants very happy.
Their birthday celebration started a few weeks early as we flew to Singapore for a two week long trip. It was a very chill and relaxed trip and our main goal really was to take them to Legoland in JB as well as to the Singapore Zoo and the SEA Aquarium in Sentosa. We opted to skip Universal Studios as we feel we should visit that when they're much more older. We made the right choice as they enjoyed the trip so much. In fact, I think and I hope that it goes into their core memory as to this very day, they can still remember the main highlights of that said trip from the names of their playmates in Singapore, to the things that they saw at the zoo and in the aquarium and of course, how can they forget their Legoland experience? More about these in my next few blog entries.
To make our trip extra special, we had a short family photo session by THE Pio Pascual who happen to also be in Singapore while we were there. The initial plan was to have it at the Marina Barrage as it overlooks the beautiful Singapore flyer and skyline but it was raining all night so it wasn't very ideal to have our photos taken there. We changed our venue to the indoor observatory of Gardens by the Bay and I realized that this was a better choice as it's always good to be in a cooler location when shooting with kids. Less fuss, less tantrums, more pretty photos. It was also a big plus that Pio's amazing with kids! They easily warmed up to him so they were both very cooperative during the shoot. It's been a while since we had a family photo shoot and I'm glad that we decided to go with this to commemorate the twins' 5th birthday and our first family trip after the pandemic.
Back in Manila, we prepared party bags for their classmates and I loved how N and A have designed each bag. It really helps that we're always in sync. I just told N my plan which is to have a customized tote bag per kid and the boys will get a narwhal-designed bag while the girls will have a mermaid on their bag. It contains, as usual, a couple of snacks and an art kit that they will work on together during their e-class celebration. I felt a bit emotional putting this together as it was the last time that my twins will be celebrating their birthday with the same set of classmates since they're both moving up to their respective big schools soon.
I also ordered our favorite Cha Misua from The Lazy Susan and they were so kind to set the shrimps and nuts aside knowing that J has allergies toward these two things. They truly have one of the best cha misuas in town and having them during birthday or whenever we feel like it is something that the family looks forward to.
We were supposed to have our family lunch on a Saturday following their actual birthday but the weather did not cooperate with us as it was raining so hard on that day. Sadly, we had to cancel our reservation at a Chinese restaurant and I was scrambling around to look for a restaurant that can still take us in given that there's about 30 of us the next day. Luckily, I found Mesa in Tomas Morato and they have a private room that can fit all of us in. Just as the past years, we had foil balloons prepared to dress up the place and a blue foil curtain that we used as backdrop. I love Mesa and it's one of my favorite Filipino restaurants. They have sets perfect for big groups so it made ordering our meal a breeze.
The main highlight was the cake! We decorated the giant Hizon's Mocha Heart-shaped Cake which was given to the twins by their Kimpo and Kukong and to align it with the theme, their Atsiak A and Auntie N came prepared with customized cake toppers made by Printooza PH! Look how pretty it turned out to be. I didn't had to have a special cake made to match the over-all party theme. At least, with Hizon's, we're 100% sure that everyone will love it and thanks to the pretty cake toppers, it perfectly suited the theme too.
It was a simple birthday celebration but what's important was that my twins were happy to be with the family. They also enjoyed our trip to Singapore and learned so much as we visited the zoo, aquarium and they got to play with their new friends too.
I have a pretty idea what their birthday theme will be for this year but I'll keep that as a surprise till then. ;) I just wish that they will allow me to prepare and plan their birthdays for as long as I can. ♥
For more birthday ideas, take a look back at the past birthday celebrations that we've had for the #AngTwins:
Tutti-Fruitti First birthday at Vikings Jazz