Thursday, March 22, 2012

Dress up for your graduation ball

Graduation day is coming and graduates are busy preparing for the last formal get-together before they go their separate ways so everybody wants to look and feel their best for their graduation ball.

Ladies are busy looking for the perfect gown that will fit their personality and flatter their bodies, while the men will be busy looking for the perfect suave outfit to compliment their partners.

But buying the perfect outfit for the graduation ball that fits your budget is easier said than done. With tons of available gowns and suits in the market and their outrageously high prices, graduates are lost in a limbo.

But hope is not completely lost because there is still Tutuban Center’s Oh My Gown! section, a unique cluster at the ever-expanding emporium.

The one-stop shopping mecca carries the latest local and international prom, bridal and party fashions suitable for the fairy-tale princesses and Prince Charming around. Romantic clothes range from ball gowns and cocktail outfits for the girls and barong Tagalogs and snappy tuxedoes for the guys.



Dresses come in swirling swathes of tulle and lace, satin and chiffon, organza and silk. There are demure designs for the conservative, while the adventurous can choose the more daring ones. Boys can’t be left behind, of course. They can be patriotic and don the barongs, or go dapper in three-piece suits.

Girls who love the limelight can select the dresses with a sprinkling of crystals, while the modest damsels can opt for the delicately simple creations. No matter what they ultimately want, they can be dazzling on their last get-together as students.

The latest trends indicate a strong preference for solid colors. Tangerine tango is the color of the year, but this might not be flattering for the kayumanggi skin, so better try on as many hues as you want.

Embellishments, heavy patterns and busy details are out for this season. Keeping it simple won’t make you and your partner any less stunning.

Don’t hesitate to ask for assistance from any Oh My Gown! sales attendants. They’d be too glad to help with their expertise. Try the outfits sitting down, raising your arms and dancing a bit. You’d be doing this on your Graduation Ball, Prom Night, Wedding Day and Evening Date, and these exercises would ensure that the outfit you’ve chosen will be comfortable on all levels.

Keep an open mind and try on a wide variety of gown and suit styles. Be ready with the accessories such as clutch bags, studs or pearl earrings and discreet necklaces. Footwear is also important. Comfort should be utmost as dancing will be one of the highlights of the night, whether the prom, the wedding or even a simple date.

You don’t have to worry that the outfits you love are beyond your budget. At Tutuban Center’s Oh My Gown!, the choices are not only varied and stylishly modern and chic, but they are definitely affordable.

Tutuban Center is located along C. M. Recto Avenue in the historic district of Tutuban in Manila.

Wednesday, March 14, 2012

Greatness Starts @Home

My son Charles is officially 3 years old today!

It’s just amazing how this little boy who once I can cuddle and carry with one arm is now a dynamo who can be a handful nowadays.  He still manages to elude me even with all my arms and feet on full throttle to chase him.

At his young age he's already shown that he’s a up to the challenges that life’s gonna offer.  He survived pneumonia when he was just 9-month old.  He convinced his doctor on Christmas eve that he is A-Okay that we were allowed to go out of the hospital after more than a week of confinement thus avoiding his first-ever Christmas to be celebrated in a hospital.



He has asthma but is always brave to battle it.  He drinks his medicines with just little arguments with us, asked for “good smoke” from the nebulizer and pray “Help me, Papa Jesus” when coughing becomes a bit intense for him.  We told him that swimming will help him conquer asthma.  Thus, he loves the water.


For a mom like me, I can consider these things as great accomplishments for such a young fellow.  I also made a list of his other top accomplishments to date:

1.    Pretend to read in his sixth month.



2.    He scored 90 while singing “Somewhere Out There” in his first try in Videoke.




3.    Finished Level 1 of  Call of Mini Zombies in iPad all by himself.



4.    Can do the Rockstar look and angst.



5.    Could be the youngest gold digger ever.


Those maybe just "cute" achievements to some but for me, they are priceless moments I am realy proud of.  I believe and hope that someday my son will be someone who can do good things that will benefit many people.  I don’t care what he'll decide to become when he grows up as long as he will be happy, productive and can bring out all the best in him.  I will support him all the way and I believe that greatness starts at home.


Tattoo@Home believes that nurturing a child’s potential can lead to achieving greater things. And what better place to start the road to greatness than at home!

Wednesday, March 7, 2012

UNIQLO is coming to the Philippines


Finally, the wait is over!

One of the most well-known international brand of apparel will come to the Philippines 
UNIQLO is a brand of Fast Retailing Co. (FR), a leading global Japanese retail holding company that designs, manufactures and sells clothing under five brands: Comptoir des Contonniers, g.u., Princesse Tam Tam, Theory, and UNIQLO.  With global sales of 820 billion yen for the 2011 fiscal year ending August 31, 2011, FR is the world’s fourth largest apparel retail company and UNIQLO is Japan’s leading specialty retailer.

Today UNIQLO has more than 1,000 stores worldwide, namely in the U.S., U.K France, Russia, China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand Korea, as well as Japan.  UNIQLO continues to open large-scale stories in some of the world’s most important cities and locations, as part of its ongoing efforts to solidify its status as a truly global brand.  UNIQLO operates an integrated business model under which it designs, manufactures, markets and sells high-quality, casual apparel in line with its ‘Made for All’ philosophy.

With a corporate statement commited to changing clothes, changing conventional wisdom and change world, FR is dedicated to creating great clothing with new and unique value to enrich the lives of people everywhere.

On February 9, 2012 at Tokyo, Japan, UNIQLO announces that it will open its first retail location in the Philippines, the UNIQLO Mall of Asia Store, in June 2012 in Metro Manila. The launch will reinforce UNIQLO’s rapidly growing retail presence in Southeast Asia, following the recent introduction of UNIQLO locations in Thailand, Malaysia and Singapore. The store will feature approximately 1,550 square meters of floor space within one of the region’s largest shopping centers, SM Mall of Asia, to offer Filipino shoppers all of UNIQLO’s latest fashions for men, women and kids.


UNIQLO is opening its first store in the Philippines in SM Mall of Asia, one of the largest shopping malls in the world, occupying a waterfront site on Manila Bay spanning 407,000 square meters. This massive shopping complex hosts a wide range of retail tenants, including a number of major fashion brands, and is a major draw for both tourists and local residents. The new UNIQLO Mall of Asia Store will be one of SM Mall of Asia’s largest tenants.

Asia offers enormous growth potential for UNIQLO and is a key regional focus of the brand’s global expansion strategy. By January 2012, UNIQLO’s network of stores included 851 locations in Japan and 234 in other global markets, of which 214 are throughout the rest of Asia. UNIQLO started opening its first stores in Thailand in September 2011, following its successful expansion into Singapore and Malaysia, increasing its lineup in Southeast Asia to 11 retail locations. Now, as the brand continues to accelerate its regional expansion efforts, the UNIQLO Mall of Asia is set to offer the joy of truly great clothing to shoppers in the Philippines.

To know about the latest information and regular updates about UNIQLO, tune in to UNIQLO’s official Facebook page at www.facebook.com/uniqlo.ph and its website www.uniqlo.com/ph.

Travel light with Acer Iconia Tab A501


Put an end to feeling bored or disconnected on the road.

The new Acer Iconia Tab A501, launched recently by tech pioneer Acer in 16GB and 32GB models, is your ideal travel companion. Slimmer than a magazine and weighing only 1.7 pounds, the amazing tablet device serves as the follow-up to the hugely successful Acer Iconia Tab A500.
This time, it’s even sleeker and faster.

The A501 boasts of Google’s powerful Android Honeycomb operating system, and includes the revolutionary NVIDIA Tegra 2 Dual Core 1GHz processor, high-speed Wi-Fi + 3G connectivity, the intuitive Acer Zones interface, and a 10.1-inch multi-touch display that’s poised to open up a whole new range of smart, easy, and joyful interaction possibilities.

These sophisticated technologies are housed in an elegantly designed metal aluminum cover brushed in alpine silver—making the Acer Iconia Tab A501 easy on the eyes and comfy in your hands. With dimensions of 10.2 x 7 x 0.5 inches, the travel-friendly tablet fits perfectly into your backpack, briefcase, satchel, or handbag; it’s certainly portable enough to be carried around as you head to the office, your favorite café, the shopping mall, the airport, or the beach.

Like its predecessor, the Acer Iconia Tab A501 also features a handy set of entertainment capabilities designed to ensure that you will never again have a dull moment, wherever you are and wherever you go. The tablet’s dazzling LED-backlit WXGA display—which comes with high-definition 1280 x 800 resolution, 16:10 aspect ratio, extra-wide viewing angles, and capacitive multi-touch screen technology for precise fingertip control—makes everything look so much crisper, brighter, smoother, and better than on any other device. Whether you’re watching movies, flicking through photos, reading an e-book, browsing the Web, streaming YouTube videos, or updating your social networks, you’ll be hard-pressed to look away from the tablet or put it down. But it’s not just the visuals: you’ll also love what you hear from the Acer Iconia Tab A501. Its room-filling stereo speakers integrate Dolby Mobile sound technology and bring out the best in HD movies and music.

Meanwhile, if games are your idea of fun, you can count on to the Acer Iconia Tab A501 to deliver hours of non-stop, hardcore, console-quality gaming. With a 6-axis motion sensing system (accelerometer + gyroscope + ambient light sensors), an ultra-low power NVIDIA® GeForce® GPU, and a long-lasting lithium-ion polymer battery, the tablet is a true game-changer. Three HD games are already built-in—Hero of Sparta, Need for Speed:Shift, and Let's Golf—so you can experience the tablet’s unique speed and power from right out of the box.

Of course, the Acer Iconia Tab A501 is more than a shiny new toy; it’s also an intelligent Web device that keeps you productive, informed, and connected as you travel from one place to another. The Android platform that powers the tablet includes a suite of touch-optimized apps that lift the burden and boredom off your shoulders: a lightning-quick Android Web browser (with support for Adobe Flash); an office productivity app called Documents To Go; the official GMail, Google Talk, and YouTube apps; geo-location services like Google Maps and Navigation; the Lumiread e-book reader; the smart Facebook and Twitter content aggregator called Social Jogger; plus the efficiency-boosting Acer Zones, a handy interface that intelligently organizes all your content across a fully customizable five-page home screen.

If you’re in the mood for more apps or games, you can connect via the Acer Iconia Tab A501’s speedy wireless Wi-Fi or HSDPA (3G) technology and download more from the popular Android Market, NVIDIA Tegra Zone, or Gameloft HD Store. No need to worry about data storage: a microSD™ Card slot, a full-sized USB port, and micro-USB sockets provide tons of space for storing your apps, files, digital media, and other downloads.

Rounding out the Acer Iconia Tab A501’s fully loaded hardware set are two convenient cameras: a 5.0-megapixel snapper at the back, with LED flash and HD video recording capability, for capturing your most precious travel moments and memories, plus a front-facing 2-megapixel cam for taking Internet video calls and fun self-portraits. The tablet also includes a micro-HDMI port (with Dual Display feature) and the cutting-edge Acer Clear.fi technology, a wireless DLNA-enabled solution for sharing, storing, and syncing your multimedia across a home network of devices.

Let the sleek and smart Acer Iconia Tab A501 guide you the next time you travel. A compact, lightweight Android device packing plenty of entertainment, connection, and information capabilities, the tablet is your license to travel—and to travel light, smart, and happy.

Tuesday, March 6, 2012

SNOE: A Summer Sunshine

Temperatures are rising, the asphalt is sizzling, and the sun seems fiercer than ever; it's a hot summer season. No doubt the sidewalks are clearer, people's sleeves are shorter, and umbrellas can be seen alitter. Don't be afraid of the sun, fight the fright with Snoé's latest in brilliant beauty buys.

"Did you know computers and indoor light, even cellphones emit UV radiation?" challenges Jen Diaz, co-founder of Snoé, together with Gen Gerodias. At the top of both girls' kikay kit lists is sunblock or makeup with SPF. The key being protection. Especially during these sweltering times, a little SPF goes a long way.

Try their Here Comes the Sunblock as a daily ritual, and don't forget to reapply (another important step many often forget.) The SPF 45 sunblock is fortified with bengkoang (singkamas) which also helps brighten, moisturize, and protect skin. The formulation is non-greasy and easy to apply, absolute musts for an absolute must-have. Try it with the StemCell SPF 30 five-in-one formula for the face, which also acts as a matte finish makeup base.

As Gen relates, "Sweating is inevitable. It is important to choose a non-greasy formula that would be easily absorbed, so that wearing your makeup over it would complement the skin and not be the cause of caking or creasing,” perfectly describing the S Skin StemCell.

For those even hotter days, or those inevitable beach trips, Snoé's Suntervention Serious Sun Protection is recommended. With over SPF 80, the screen is a broad spectrum block that also evens out dark spots and keeps skin supple.

Another secret: the BesoBalm, which plumps kissable lips, provides a coat of protection, soothes dryness, and even freshens your breath with hints of menthol and honey sweetness. Pair that with Snoé GlamJam in Goddess, a vitamin-enriched cheek tint/bronzer to give you a more natural sun-kissed look, without having to subject your skin to harmful rays.

Meanwhile, fun out of town adventures can sometimes spell extra stress, especially when you're preparing, packing, or even just bustling on the road for long hours. "Always pack light and organize," smiles Gen. Don't let the worry of readying for the trip hamper the excitement of the actual experience.

Besides the sunblock, Snoé offers some great-smelling body mists that help keep you cool while out in the sun, or even just as a quick pick-me-up of fragrant rejuvenation. The Scrumptious Body Spritz is a nutrient-packed mixture with a kick of antioxidants, which makes the occasional spray increasingly addicting.

To unwind and get the salty air out of your pores at night, try Happy White Ever After, Snoé's decadent massage and bath treatment oil, complete with rice bran oil to fight free radicals, almond oil to soften skin, and mulberry for brightening dark spots. The added bengkoang extracts help cool and fluff your tired skin back to life.

Sometimes, especially in the summer, prolonged sun exposure is absolutely unavoidable, but Gen chimes in with a helpful Snoé remedy: “Emu oil, açai berry, and singkamas have powerful healing

qualities when combined,” the way their Emuthology line does. “Emu oil for deep penetration, açai berry for antioxidants and vitamins to help recover from damage, and singkamas that is a whitening and anti-inflammatory agent.” For the hair, Snoé also has their Hair Heroes line, with varieties ranging from a Moroccan blend with wheat and milk proteins as well as Argan oil to revive brittle hair to a nourishing honey and olive combo that also reverses sun damage.

Thanks to their ever growing product offerings, Snoé is cementing its reputation as the country’s premium local beauty brand. A maximum attention to quality and ingredient formulation (“We don’t skimp on ingredients and use the maximum allowable percentage in our products,” says Gen.) has garnered praise from peers and customers alike. Pushing the limits further by bringing in new techniques and more active agents such as vitamin A-wealthy okra as a soothing eye cream or snail enzyme anti-aging creams, Snoé has gone beyond its colorful stores into a full-blown lifestyle of looking and feeling wonderful.

"I love cosmetics. I love the feeling you get when you find the perfect face cream, sunblock, etc. It can improve the way you look and feel and even change the outcome of your day," Jen Diaz relates. Summertime doesn't have to be a time to curse the heat when you've got the right mindset and the right set of look-good-feel-good products. The Philippines may be a tropical country, but Snoé knows how to keep it cool.