Welcoming 2022 at my sister in law’s house with a blast

Happy New Year to all! It’s the first day of the year and I was absent in this platform for the past days. It is because I was busy preparing for our new year’s celebration. This year, we didn’t spent it our house because I thought it’s gonna be lonely since it is only me and my boys. So a few days back, I asked my sister in law if we could spend the last celebration of the year with them. She agreed without a doubt.

Yesterday, I planned to wake up early because I need to be at the market to buy some fruits of 12 different kinds. It’s been a yearly tradition that most Filipinos never failed to prepare during New Year. Unfortunately I wasn’t really feeling well the moment I woke up. Headache and cold is such a pain in the a**. I thought going to market early is a good decision, thinking there would be less people but it wasn’t as people flock around in every corner of it. So I didn’t stay for long, went home right away after I was done.

When I got home, I keep on sneezing so I had to wear facemask even inside the house. I also drank a lot of water and some medicine to find relief. I told my husband about it, and he told me that if I didn’t feel good until later we could just stay at home and order food outside. I insisted that I just needed a good rest, so I slept for about two hours after our conversation.

I feel refreshed after I slept so I prepared the food I am going to bring at my sister in law house. I asked my kids to get ready. I message my brother in law to fetch us at 7 pm. By 630 pm my father in law arrived to fetch us, as usual he came early, glad we’re all ready. We got inside the car and proceed to their village.

By 730, we got there because of some congestion at the road. I brought some medicine just in case I needed it. When we arrived at my sister in law house, she told us that we’re going to attend mass at the nearby parish church. We arrived just in time before the second mass begin. We were able to get inside the church too. The priest said that one of our tradition during new year is to change our curtains, bedsheets and many things inside our home. He said that as we change it, we should change some of our attitudes as the new year comes.

When we got home, we took some pictures and ate our dinner after. We change into our pajamas and the fun started. My sister in law’s mother is now living in Japan so every new year they always had parlor games to make the party more exciting and the prize is sponsored by her. I am glad, my boys had participated last night.

The first game was candle blowing challenge. The mechanics of the game is to blow the candles in one blow. There’s a corresponding prize to every candle you blow. It was a great game, however no one got the 1st prize.

Since no one got the first prize it was added to the second game of the night. Flip cup tic tac toe challenge was the second game. The players group themselves into two groups. The mechanics of the game is to flip the cup and then row it like tic tac toe, but since we don’t have paper, the first team who flipped the cup first wins. Each group had a hard time playing this game, so the prize was doubled. The winners took 100php each after the game.

The third and the fourth challenge was very easy one. I don’t know what’s the name of third challenge but let me state how it goes. A total of 1000 php bill was exchanged to smaller bills and then put into a bucket. Each player was blindfolded and asked to get money from the bucket. The game continues until the last money from the bucket is gone.

We have to stopped the game for a while because the clock strike at 12 which means it’s time to welcome the year 2022. The fireworks started outside the neighborhood. The honks of cars of motorcycles are getting louder as well. After a few minutes, we all went to my father in law house to greet him.

When all the noise is gone, the game was resume. The last but not the least game was the viral “sandok challenge” I know most of you are familiar with this game, so for those who aren’t the mechanics of the game is to get the money using a ladle. It looks easy but it’s really hard once you tried it.

We spend our first day of the year with the family and very happy. Though I know it’ll be more happier if my husband is here. As usual he wasn’t able to call because he is on duty during that time. I got to talk to him this afternoon. He said he spent his new years eve by sleeping because they will be very busy in the next day.

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Lead Image source from Unsplash and the rest of the images used are mine.