Can extract sunshine from a cloudy day!

Join the great company of those who make the barren places of life fruitful with kindness. Carry a vision of heaven in your hearts, and you shall make your name,your college, the world, correspond to that vision. Your success and happiness lie within you. External conditions are the accidents of life, its outer wrappings. The great, enduring realities are love and service. Joy is the holy fire that keeps our purpose warm and our intelligence aglow. Resolve to keep happy, and your joy and you shall form an invincible host against difficulty. ~ Helen Keller
L❀VE ♥´¯`•.¸¸.• ♥ •´¯`•.¸¸.♥Fiat Lux ♥´¯`•.¸¸.• ♥L❀VE ♥´¯`•.¸¸.• ♥ •´¯`•.¸¸.♥Fiat Lux ♥´¯`•.¸¸.• ♥

Wednesday, October 21, 2015

(✿◠‿◠) ❄ The Royal Touch Gourmet Cafe with Rowie

Roselle Quin with Rowie Barnes 
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I'll have to head back to SM Aura to see for myself! 
According to our friendly server, the "Carolyn Robb Royal Touch Gourmet Bakery" underwent a conclusive critical concept change in their original place! 
Oh...Noooooooo'...that cannot be! I was all eyes and ears agog!

"It's a seasonal thing, cupcakes," she said, "so the menu was spruced somewhat,  I couldn't help  a decibel of distress, "Oh, but surely it's still the same cup-cakery as here, noh?!?  "Well, um,ah..." with bated reluctance, "...it's all kinda' different now," she tsks' to that and nods! 

Quite alarming. I truly must venture. 

There was always the notion of going back of course, but life happens - it always does - and then a year. - I remember sweet how I heaved and sighed at my first bite of that strawberry chocolate red velvet cupsy! Pleasure of pleasures!  I'm not a cupcake gal by any stretch but, wow, was I definitely sold!  Which makes this changing - concept  a trifle upsetting. 

If the cupcakes are no more, then there's a Change.org petition on the mount, haha! 
(✿◠‿◠) ❄。¨¯`*✲ ´*。.❄¨¯`*✲。


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Must admit I never did take  particular notice of the good lady, Carolyn Robb.

I was under the peripheral impression she was  likely (just) your regular fancy dessert professional, hall -of - fame cake and  bake pastry winner -  too' smartsy' like that - totally far and above my league in the sweet creativity  arena + hailing from  a land far-a'far somewhere turned super mega - upsy' trillionaire  crafting ribbon-nette  twines of fancy butter creamy mini cakes in paper cones served with coffee or tea, hehehe! :D

Credit to my rosy grey cells, my perceptions weren't all that off mind you, but a little added twist to who she is endeared me a tad bit more.

As it so happened, I was early for my meet at 'Resort's World' with good friend Rowie.
Strolled a bit, and after a search for the perfect quiet to sip the morning up, I came across
"The Royal Touch"    a step behind Cafe Maxim's. 

Roselle Quin - The Royal Touch 

Rowie Barnes





 I had the charm and quaint all to myself and fancied a cup of coffee to while - the - while in writing. 

While waiting my eyes scored, scanned and roamed the entire place resting on the picture of the framed acclaimed woman from whom all frostings flows.

Carolyn Robb, it read,
"Chef to the Royal family herself...preps food and luscious cakes for royal parties..taste the wedding cake of Prince William...etc..etc!
T'was all  tweetum' glory!

Aha'... okay...so that's who she is, brings new meaning to the phrase creme - de la creme, haha!

Dawned on me she must be quite the international celebrity - interesting! Haven't looked her up online but it would be a cute curiosity to dig a'more about her story. I always have a thing for a fine true  life tale.
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Needless to say, the day was marvelously memorable!  My friend, Rowie, and I immensely enjoyed the tea served us. Astonishingly superlative, relaxing with whiffs of petals and woodsy berries swirled with hints of orange vanilla. 

Wait...enjoyed is an understatement!   
We adored both teas we sampled! Some days this good 'ol'   universe plops  you with a refined surprise, in a cup,  and  we sure had a respectable much  of  it! 

A shame tho' that  I can't for  good sense sake recall what teas we savored. There were three choices, so if you're ever by the place, two of those were what we had, haha! 

Jhing,wish you were with us!  If you're reading this, know we're planning a pre -Christmas rendezvous-  this November or early December. The full brunch, lunch, theater, dinner and perhaps even an overnight stay. Missed you here so a take two is pretty most definitely on the works! It'll be quite the party! 
Hasta luego mis amigas! 
(✿◠‿◠) ❄。¨¯`*✲ ´*。.❄¨¯`*✲。

Tea at The Royal Touch

Tuesday, September 29, 2015

(✿◠‿◠)The Sunflower Bench✿

Roselle Quin



“Sometimes since I've been in the garden I've looked up through the trees at the sky and I have had a strange feeling of being happy as if something was pushing and drawing in my chest and making me breathe fast. Magic is always pushing and drawing and making things out of nothing. Everything is made out of magic, leaves and trees, flowers and birds, badgers and foxes and squirrels and people. So it must be all around us. In this garden - in all the places.”~ The Secret Garden
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The afternoons are of no use - it rains. It rains - a - lot. No space for garden work during the monsoons when the 'noons are drenched in pettite' pours and shimmie' plops at precisely indeterminate timings. It's here, it's not - simply no telling when the skies will water except that it happens after lunch! --- No, this isn't my garden, heeha! :D
Roselle Quin at Sonya's Garden

These pics were taken last summer when friends and I went 'summering' in Sonya's Garden. A pretty garden to roam in still, but the presence of too much folks, compared to the first I strolled the place, was quite off putting. - Nevertheless, my sweet glams and I  savored the moment spent and had  the time of our lives taking turns photographing each other, haha!

What I adore in Sonya's garden, are the little twisty paths that tempts one to explore. As a profound lover of paths and inner dirt roads be it stone cobbled, pebbled or grassed, these twinee' diversions are lavish enticements to me. 
"Come, take a step, get lost in life and find another," it murmurs. Reality taps on my shoulder reminding, "there isn't time." 


Agh, there isn't time, always the time! I turn to a leaf and instruct it to be till time creates the occasion for another visit. I sit down for one last shot in the Sunflower Bench, a sublime throne of flower power. 

-- An ardor  of petal-ish' joy overpowers my senses.
What a pleasant attack, I feel! 
Nature assaults most  juicily. 

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Tuesday, September 22, 2015

It Only Takes One Star: Persistence

Roselle Quin ~ "Afternoon Tea at The Shang" 
September seems to be a month of recurring challenges. The first week alone saw a trip to the hospital with the hubby slumped in a bout of nasty flu. Sporadic allergic feelies' have descended on me after that episode - not surprising - the onset of the "Ber"months have always been a pesky trigger to my seasonal rhinitis. Agh' just talking about this makes my left eye spasm and twitch! Thank goodness I don't feel as weakish' - I remember years  ago how frighteningly soggy'I  went, half breathing, wheezing and teary  red eyed  from inhaling.  ------ I've been dawdling with a low'vibe energy these last few days; a trailing elk'from the nasties'. Good to know, 'cause at least I'm  much aware that this'ill - turn 'round pretty soon. Meanwhile, I'm doing my bit to carry me out of this stupor, First thing is to reminisce on happy occasions represented by these pictures here. Been awhile since I've done something this dainty cute' involving violins and mini conciertos'..I could, in fact, I probably should,   to get me'self tuned up. I will.

"It only takes one star to pierce a universe of darkness."
~ Richelle E. Goodrich
Roselle Quin ~" Afternoon Tea at The Shang"
Right now tho'there are  things I need to 'start'and follow up and put in order and launch. A myriad mix of the mundane and exciting. There's nobody to do the WANTS I want done , so I'm counting on me', the Holy Mother and St. Therese in petitions to the dear Lord. 

If I get on the move, I'm up for little victories, Victories, whatever scale deserve sweet cute celebratory whoohoos' and that's where the plans come in. Oh, I need my quirky rosie' imagination to get me going. It's all grey in me right now - but as they say, it only takes one star to pierce a universe of darkness.  And you know me....ever always all about the shine. 

Sunday, September 13, 2015

How To Make a Smashing Week

Roselle Quin photo:
"Tea by the Pool"
Write it on your heart
that every day is the best day in the year.
He is rich who owns the day, and no one owns the day
who allows it to be invaded with fret and anxiety.
Finish every day and be done with it.
You have done what you could.
Some blunders and absurdities, no doubt crept in.
Forget them as soon as you can, tomorrow is a new day;
begin it well and serenely, with too high a spirit
to be cumbered with your old nonsense.
This new day is too dear,
with its hopes and invitations,
to waste a moment on the yesterdays. 
~Ralph Waldo Emerson
Felicitations to a new week! 
My best brightest self welcome's Monday with a favorable juicy feel for the positive. Major compelling realizations have popped and  shape shifted in my mind. I am soaked in plans and dreams and decisions. The heavens will be my guide, my inspiration, my connection. Yes, no  mortal muse can entice me.  My plans are as a big and venturous as never before!
There is work to do, but make no mistake dear me, there is no room for drab or dreary. Labor will be intensive but suffused with relish and recreation. One must be in love with one's work. One must be in love with one's days - the minutes, hours and seconds not left to dawdle by itself - there is harm in that. 
How does one make a smashing week? 
Specially after having dealth with the naughtiness of  past weeks gone? Why,  by blessing the what-not's of  troubles a - visiting and thanking them all for lessons learned, stamina built and new hopes aroused. If it were not for the challenges of the past weeks, I wouldn't have had this vision for a future I desire to experience. I can almost feel it. I am almost there. 

Much to scribble, even more to scrawl and I am compelled to begin. This particular rumination, I bring to conclusion with the burning thought that I should write it upon my heart that each day is the best day of the year. 
Alive. Daring. Brave.



Thursday, July 23, 2015

Remembering Persi

Like my hands were hogtied and my cute floaty cells braided into humidity frazzled strands of exclaiming question marks. I'm saying it's been a very VERY - infinitesimally -> very long time since I was last seriously here. Pictures are from a light year ago left marinating in juicy tenderness of blog blandness. 

     I've been to cute corners of my life's here and there since I last hitched this site none of which have seen the spotlight of a post. BUT, no worries, my alternate me, (hehe!) because your's  truly intend to flower power this oh' too quiet corner. There's about half' a dozen drafty' writings in the dungeons on hold, and, yes, I do intend to allow them  the light of day.
Persi staring at me. Ya' should've kept to my good side! 

Meanwhile I take high sweet pleasure in pics of last year's flowers, vased on top of last year's white decoupaged table top, which I gave away to our trusty' village handyman. And the cat picture above is "Persi"..who left me one morning never to return again. I still don't know why he did that. To be honest, I'm hurt, quite slighted and a little bit hoping.

He was the epitome of persistence which earned him the name, Persi as a fur ball teenie.  I never do allow garden cats inside the house, mind you, but noh, this little black creature would claw and paw and bawl whinny screechie' lamentable meows behind my closed screen door until the drums o' my ears bled bad and I've endured enough insane ruckus. His royal kitty' cuteness had the run of my house, climbing here, crawling there, nuzzling asleep wherever he wanted to. 

He would never  leave my side. That is,  until a stranger cat, huge and imposing and quite dramatically roughed up  enough to possess a touch of that street Puss n' Boots' type. 

Well, this villainous character came a'visiting often enough, more frequently when I wasn't around to shoo his tail off. I noticed how he'd  walk into the gate with a mastered  swagger, giving sly put down glances on Persi coupled with the under breath of that slow grating moewrrr hiss of his...Most likely he bullied and teased how such a sissy Persi was all clean and pampy inside a proper boring house, when the streets are action filled and food is a' plenty. Alley living on the edge is what a true cat's life is, I bet he mocked and enticed.

I sawPersi walk off with the scheming feral Pied Piper Tom cat soon after, nary a glance back, never to be seen, heard or found again. 



There must be about 30 something black cats in the neighborhood,  more than half a dozen a true Persi doppelganger. 
Whenever I'd come across one, I'd halt my steps and stare into the cat's luminous eyes, much to the poor creatures bewilderment. I must look quite the fool, so I make sure no one is around when my sleuthing kink kicks in. I do so want to know where he wandered to but all points lead to nowhere, tsk! 


Life has given me 2 new garden cats to pamper. They were both born in my garden so I'd say nature has an uncanny way of plopping creature responsibilities on me. A man I hired to tidy the garden suggested that if I starve them enough they'd move away. A horrid idea, and I had to kindly show how mortified I was by reminding him that I had a pulse..and heart! Plus, brains.



And thats THAT about cats fer' now. 


 Meanwhile, I'm posting this old pic below to remind myself that I luved' this book. Must dig out from my now cluttered cabinet of books and re-read again. I've done some book shopping a week ago. Me' thinks my collection now rounds up to 270 + and so. 


Wednesday, April 15, 2015

The Enchanting Legend of the Koi Fish

Roselle Quin photos taken at Koi pond in Greenbelt, Makati - Philippines

Being a true mermaidy'  Piscean, I hugely adore pools of any sort and remember fondly how sweet and  lovely my grandmother's koi pond was! She had an interesting 60's wood slated sliding door in her Asian inspired home that splendidly opened to a gleaming water garden - a tranquil spot in the far end corner of her living room. I can see it still, in my mind's eye, how the home had an airily lit, shall I say - chakra point - illuminated by the buoyant murmuring presence of  water,  color and nature.

Several sizable birdcages also graced the garden, its cheery tweetie' occupants being dozens of lovable lovebirds the sight and sound of which was adorably amazing! Fronting the bird cages was the mini zenish' black pearly' pool  lorded by what seemed to little girl me,  hundreds of magnificent Koi fishies' - an auspicious sight, both enthralling and mysterious. 
An authentic bonsai masterpiece theatrically mounted in an auspicious corner of the Greenbelt pond. 
It was one of the happiest places to be, standing there, fascinated by the leisurely graceful swimmy' moves of spotted yellow, white, orange golden Koi's  creating gentle concurrent ripply waves as they gingerly sashay towards you in anticipation of bread treats. 
A feisty swarm of Maya birds seem to fancy these bushes. It was quite an entertaining sight.
And those were the days, as they say. 
Nowadays, I get my unrelenting 'Koi fix' from public gardens, a most accessible favorite spot being the verdant Greenbelt fish ponds. I have languid afternoons seated at the adjacent Museum Cafe' - sometimes with a friend, at times merely me, - where for a moment's cup of coffee, life is nary a care but for the fishes to see. 


Koi's have quite an enchanting legend.  Story goes that when the greatest sage, Confucious, had a son, a certain important king presented him with a black carp called a Magoy. According to legend, that particular Magoy was 'the great ancestor' to all present day Koi's.
Interesting. 


I'm in the throes of Koi pond envy and would sure like to have my own (tiny) pond in my little garden. Video tutorials are a' plenty in Youtube, all I have to do is coerce, I mean convince my husband that maintaining the fishies' would be manageable. :D








Saturday, April 4, 2015

Art in the Park Photos: A Collection



Two ( or is it 3?)  Saturdays ago, I had the pleasure of a  great summer afternoon viewing the most fascinating display of paintings and artworks by up n' coming Philippine artists. My bit of adventure was made more fun by the presence of my youngest son who accompanied me.

I snapped a volley' of pics' as we meandered from one folksy' stall to another. There was a LOT to see and the place was bursting with all smiles curious  people!  The event was dubbed ' Art in the Park' and here are my favorite sets.

Being a super flower lover, the bloomy' galleries were more my kinda' thing. These flower paintings are lovely! There was a lot to look at, and I wish I took more time going through everything. 
This was a really cute birdie' eye treat! :D

And this lady 
that makes you see
 3 is 
fascinating!