So you ask, what have I been doing New Year’s Eve? Well, aside from obsessing over this video (HAHAHAHAHA), I spent the eve of the first day of 2012 preparing and eating a simple dinner with my family.

Traditionally, the holidays are spent with the De Barrases (meaning my dad’s sisters and brothers and my cousins) but this year we opted to have New Year’s Eve at home. Yes, we love fireworks and we can so tolerate noise up to 180 decibels or more, but we were also surprisingly content with our refined dinner set in lola’s antique China.

Sitting in an intimate dinner with my family also got me thinking. Although we are very close, the moments we spend together are also very limited. I am now back in Luzon, my dad and sister are left in Cebu, my brother is still in Dumaguete and my mom flies from Cebu to Cavite from time to time to check on my lola. It even had to suck big time that with the given two weeks we could all spend together I had to go ahead and spoil the first week by being at the hospital (thanks, Typhoid fever, thanks).  

Anyway. A lot of things can happen in a year. No one can tell where the heck in the world I will end up by the end of 2012. I have so many plans in my life and with the recent blessing my parents gave of letting me go wherever I want (HAHAHAHA), I might be unstoppable. And because of that, I don’t know, it may take a long time before I get to have another New Year’s Eve dinner with my dad, mom, brother and sister again. So I tell you now that I extra-savored the moment.

Now to put it in my dad’s words:

This is the best way to start the year right. This I learned from my nanay and tatay and now passed to my kids. The family that prays and eats together stays together.

Happy New Year, everyone! :)