INSTABITS : May 2017

It’s almost the end of June so I should probably finish this entry that’s been sitting in my drafts. May was a pretty eventful month, but this entry’s not too long since I’ve mostly been posting on IG stories these days. You can still see what I posted there since I compiled them all into a video (which you can find at the end of this entry).

I ended my last INSTABITS with photos from our office workshop in Camp Benjamin, which took place on the last day of April. Here are two more photos from that event:

Before leaving the resort, we took advantage of our free time to explore the farm. We had to cross this pretty bridge to get there. This was also where my week 14 self portait was taken.

On our way back to LB we dropped by Nuvali to have lunch at Wing Stop.

Amie and I went to UPD to request and pick up some documents on May 10. The last time I was in UPD was about a year ago, so I felt a little nostalgic. We passed by NIGS, which was where we spent a huge part of our MS life.

After finishing all our errands we went to UP Town Center to grab a late lunch at Ramen Nagi. It was my first time in UP Town, so I was pretty excited.

After a long day of walking around UPD, Amie and I rewarded ourselves with some ice cream.

We met Jason in UP Town and we decided to do a bit of shopping before we head back home

I ended up buying a new pair of running shoes. I still love my bright pink ones, but these were on sale and they were too comfortable to pass up :p

My parents celebrated their anniversary this month. I posted this cute photo of them pretending to be captains 😀

As part of their celebration, we went to Estrella de Mendoza in Laiya for a quick beach resort getaway

Since I’m so behind on my 52-week project, I grabbed this opportunity to shoot several self portraits at the resort. I packed about 5 outfits for our 2 days there :p I wore this one for week 16/52.

Week 18/52 : See the line where the sky meets the sea? It calls me~

This photo was from my first beach trip this year. I have my mom to thank once again for this shot, and my parents to thank for the vacation. I tagged along on their wedding anniversary celebration and grabbed the chance to take lots of photos. I asked my mom to take a few pictures of me playing in the water. I felt a little awkward at first becauses there were lots of people at the beach (there was some sort of team building event happening), but the sun and the water felt so good that I ended up not caring after a while.

Europe 2016 : Santorini and Mykonos

This is another photo-heavy post from the next three days of our cruise last July. In my previous entry (read here) I talked about our visit to Crete, Mykonos and Athens. In this one we explore Santorini, Mykonos (again) and Corfu (again … sort of).

When my dad signed us up for this cruise, one of the places I looked forward to the most was Santorini. I’ve read a lot of blogs and watched several videos of people visiting Santorini on the internet and it always looks amazing, so to finally have the chance to see it for myself felt unreal.

When we arrived in Santorini we had to use the tender service to go ashore

Hello Santorini

After about a 20-minute boat ride, we made it to solid ground

We met our guide at the port and she showed us our bus which would take us to our first location. On the way there we spotted several buildings with blue domes which Santorini is famous for:

As I mentioned in my previous Mykonos entry, we were told that these blue domes indicate that these churches. There are a lot of them not just in Santorini but many parts of Greece because it’s common for rich families to own private churches.

Our first activity for the day was wine tasting. It was the middle of the day and that was apparently the best time to get drunk :p

We tried three kinds of wine : white, dry red and dessert. Personally I like the white wine the best. The dessert was pretty good too but *way* too sweet.

They served plenty of olives, cheese, and bread there to combat the sweetness:

There was a view deck nearby so after getting our fill of alcohol we headed over to take some photos

We could see our cruise ship from there 😀 Hello Princess!

Our next stop was the town of Oia. When people say “Santorini” this is the place they probably have in mind – the one that appears in postcards and travel photos, the one that has the three famous blue domes. Unfortunately we weren’t able to find the exact spot that would give you the best angle of the three domes, but you can sort of see them in this shot:

And here:

(They’re kinda small in the background though)

Week 17/52 : Weekend please stay

This was another shot my mom took of me during our short stay at Estrella de Mendoza in Laiya. This one was obviously taken next to the pool 🙂 We arrived around noon on a Friday so there weren’t a lot of people yet. When the weekend came the place was packed and there was no way I would have been able to get a shot like this without having to clone out at least 20 people in the background.

Week 16/52 : Estrella

This was taken about two weeks ago during my parent’s wedding anniversary. To celebrate we booked a room at Estrella de Mendoza in Laiya. The place was really pretty so I grabbed the chance to shoot several self portraits while we were there. Thanks so much to my mom for being my photographer. I only brought my 50mm lens so I know she had a hard time getting the focus right, but in the end I’m quite happy with the shots she took of me. This was taken right next to the showers by the pool, can you believe it :p I thought the plants were really nice so I asked my mom to take a photo of me there.

Week 15/52 : Don’t annoy the crazy person

A quick photo I took a couple weeks ago which I once again never got around to editing. I only ended up opening Photoshop again because the electricity went out at our house, which meant no internet for me – AKA no distractions. Fortunately my laptop was fully charged.

I love the pop of colors in this photo. I normally work with muted tones in my self portraits, but I thought the bright colors were really fun in this one.

Week 14/52 : We build too many walls and not enough bridges

This was another shot taken during our office workshop at Camp Benjamin. Dustin took this photo of me on our way to see the farm at the resort. We had to cross this pretty bridge to get there so we figured we might as well pose for a few pictures. I felt really awkward posing here because there were about 10 of us at the time and they were all watching me (because they were waiting for me to finish so they could cross the bridge :p)

(Quote in title is by Sir Isaac Newton)