Oh right, the birthday party.

So after the swim meet yesterday, we drove for an hour and a half back by home in the opposite direction, to Malikina.

There we went to a birthday party for a One Year Old.
Now, we had already discussed that we weren't going to go to any more of these parties. We've seen how they're run, they aren't generally that much fun because we don't know anyone but the hosts and really, it's usually far to go for Filipino food and entertainment. But we went to this one.
In Virginia, my parents manage/run/lead the choir and music program at St. Michael's Church in Annandale. A while back, a couple of the choir members started dating and eventually got married. He's American, she's Filipino. We went to their wedding. Then they had a little girl and we went to her baptism and her first birthday party. Another little girl came along and she just turned one. Her mother wanted Isabel to have a party with her Filipino side, so to Manila the family came, and last night was the party. Seeing as are here, we were invited.
There was a Faery theme with loads of entertainment and food and the entire evening was in Tagalog. Our family stuck out just a bit, but at least the kids made their mark. Katherine sang Happy Birthday while the clown held the microphone. Nicholas sang the ABC song into the same mic. An incredible feat, if I do say so. My usually shy boy sang the entire thing and perfectly clear. Rebecca sang Happy Birthday in Tagalog, and there was an audible gasp from the rest of the guests. I guess last year's ISM Filipiniana Week was all worthwhile! She received a hearty round of applause.
Rows of little plastic chairs had been set up so most of the time the kids were sitting watching the clown, a puppet show, and listening to fairy tales, all in Tagalog. It didn't bother them much. Ian and I kept our good humor as best we could as we'd all had a long day and the party ran four hours. Isabel slept for a good chunk of it and missed the dinner of lechon, baked macaroni and barbeque (meat on a stick). Oh wait, that wasn't dinner, it was merienda because it was only 5 p.m. though we had no intention of eating yet another meal later. Isabel also missed her cake. The kids were too tired to eat any cake so they collected their goodie bags and gathered some balloons and we said our goodbyes with the other guests who were streaming out at the end.
Thankfully the ride home was about 25 minutes and everyone was ready for sleep (except Jonathon who had taken a long nap in the car earlier).