Merrick’s Colorful 3rd Birthday + El Nido, Palawan

Heyo Family and Friends,

We have finally caught our breath after the wildly busy past couple months. Summer has officially come to a close and rainy season is here. As I type, the afternoon thunderstorms are raging around me. It’s a welcomed sound. At the moment, we’re enjoying life at home, getting back into routines, and spending as much time as possible with friends, since we’ve all been busy traveling for the summer. Arden is on the move, has much to say, and is literally the happiest baby on the planet. Merrick’s imagination is growing exponentially, as is his ability to communicate what he’s feeling… which is a lot of big feelings. His age is both challenging and super fun. This past Thursday, we experienced the strongest earthquake we’ve had while living in the Philippines. At a magnitude of 6.3, it originated just south of us (~75 miles) in Puerto Galera. Over the weekend, we had a team harvest our mangoes. YUM! We also celebrated a few accomplishments in our friend group and Father’s Day as a family. Now, on to Merrick’s colorful birthday party and his birthday trip to El Nido, Palawan.

Knowing this will likely be our last full year in Philippines, we wanted to celebrate Merrick’s birthday in true Filipino style. This essentially means you go “all out”. We figured, we’re never going to have this kind of space or opportunity again so why not?! On Mother’s Day (14 May), we celebrated our incredible kiddo. There was an MC, DJ, face painting, a water slide inflatable, a catered buffet, a kiddo craft and painting station, lots of prizes, a magic show, and a puppet show. Most importantly, as they were Merrick’s only requests, the party was super colorfully decorated and there was a colorful birthday cake. He sure loves all things colorful. Again in true Filipino fashion, everyone and their sister were invited… our staff and their families, all our friends and their kiddos, extended friends and their kids from Merrick’s school, and it overlapped Ali and Matt’s visit too. We had four families cancel due to COVID and other sicknesses but it was still a pretty large group. We all had a wonderful time even with the oppressive heat and a little rain. A big shout out to Ina at Events by Ina, who event planned the heck out of the party. Thank you to Jeanna at Jeanna Arnaiz Sugar Arts for making the perfect birthday cake for our colorful-loving kiddo and to Angelito of AMC Photography for capturing the day.

Just after Ali and Matt left on the following Wednesday, we headed to El Nido, Palawan to celebrate Merrick’s actual birthday (19 May) as a family. We stayed at Seda Lio from Thursday, 18 May to Monday, 22 May and Marg and Charity graciously joined us for the celebratory weekend. We ate like kings and queens, beached it up nonstop, swam in the pool, did some stand-up paddle boarding, and went to bed early (haha), which was glorious.

Mom and Dad were able to get out for a morning of diving. Our first dive was at Nat-Nat, Cadlao Island. Although the visibility was mediocre, we swam with a hawksbill turtle, saw some barracuda, triggerfish, and highlighter parrotfish. Another notable for this dive was our first time seeing a spotted barramundi cod and observing the rain from the below the water’s surface. Our second dive took place at the most popular El Nido diving location, South Miniloc Island. Here the visibility was great and we did a mostly shallow dive with a little current. We saw endless notables here… our first time seeing not one but TWO lionfish and one was fighting with an eel! There were tons of clownfish, Christmas tree worms, absolutely beautiful corals, fields of massive cabbage coral, a large school of yellowtail barracuda, various nudibranchs, a spotted reef crab, a titan triggerfish (territorial and aggressive), and a giant pufferfish which was at least 3 feet in length. Overall, some great diving in El Nido.

On another day, the whole crew took an island-hopping tour, which included seeing the most famous sites of El Nido. We explored the cavernous Secret Lagoon (first and only tourists there at the time!), kayaked the gorgeous Big Lagoon (Merrick fell asleep), beached it up and snorkeled at Shimizu Island, then we ate an incredible seafood spread at Entalula Beach for lunch. We headed back to Seda after that because a storm rolled in and the kiddos were spent. On our last night in El Nido, we had an incredible fire sky sunset.

Some not so fun parts of the trip were the sand flies, which left us all covered in red bites. What really took the cake was Merrick had sand fleas (we think) imbed into his left foot. This left his food incredibly itchy for two full weeks and the bites became slightly infected because of the scratching. He was a one sock kid while we covered his foot in a cream three times a day for two weeks. You can still see some scarring but thankfully it’s not bothering him anymore. Despite these not-so-fun things, there were many more positives and the trip was a success overall.

In the meantime, you’ll find us snuggled up at home listening to the rain or hanging out with friends. Sending you all lots of love and a Happy Father’s Day to all the people out there rocking the Daddy role.

All our love,

xo Team Jansen

Samantha’s memorables. Merrick’s surprised excitement when the layers of his birthday cake were also colorful. Ali and Matt’s ability to be at Merrick’s birthday party. Splashing in the pool with Arden in El Nido. Collecting shells on the beach with Merrick. Snuggling Arden while we boated around gorgeous El Nido. Merrick eating 5 desserts for his birthday (haha). Experiencing Secret Lagoon without another tourist in sight. Seeing two lionfish for the first time with my dive partner. Swimming with the hawksbill turtle. Celebrating another birthday in this incredibly beautiful country with my family.

Travis’s memorables. Watching Merrick during the bird reveals of the birthday magic show. Getting back on the sail board in El Nido. Seeing a massive turtle while stand up paddle boarding. Diving with Samantha. Bulalo soup. A lot of beach reading with Samantha. Getting called Tyler by the party MC 🙂 A custom, hand made, palm hat by the sports activities kuya.

Merrick’s memorables. COLORFUL birthday and COLORFUL cake! Presents! Sliding down the [inflatable] slide. Seeing the tractor on the beach. Eating yummy cake [in El Nido]. Riding the boat [in El Nido].