How I wish we have boxing week sales in my part of the world. I saw my friends posting pictures of their Boxing Day sale loots and I can’t help but feel envious, as it is a total steal. I am sure we won’t be able to buy those products like Bath and Body works lotions, 50-inch LG Plasma TV, iDock speaker, BalckBerry playbook and more at a price that my friends paid for their loots.

Our last buy from Boxing Day sale was our TCL TV in our living room, which we asked our friend to buy for us. It was a very good buy as we got the 32” TV for only $200 where it is double the price if we will buy it here.

We want a bigger TV to for our living room, as our 32” TV looks small now that we have a bigger living room space. We can ask our friend again to buy 40” TV for us but the problem is on how to ship it here.

Oh well, I guess we just have to wait for the small time sales that most stores are offering here (and besides we still don’t have the budget yet for a new TV. LOL. It is just still in our wish list.)

You know that it is time to go on a diet when people still think that you are pregnant even if you have given birth a year ago. LOL.

Well this is the situation where I am at now as I still hear questions like “When are you due?” from acquaintances every time they see me. So I will just smile back in response to their questions as I know that they do not intend to hurt my feeling because I don’t need to look in the mirror to figure out that I still look pregnant.

And now that Christmas season is almost hear and it is time to shop for my Christmas outfit, I can’t help but check those trendy maternity dresses from Babies N’ Bellies as I know that they are the perfect fit for me (with my still bulging tummy that makes me look I am 5 months or more pregnant. LOL). At least if I shop from them, I will not feel depress as I am sure that I will find a sophisticated and fashionable dress that will perfectly fit me.

I am so excited as we will finally be heading to Cebu for a much needed rest and recreation this coming Friday. I was all smiles when I went home from work today and I can’t stop thinking about our upcoming trip. I only have to wait for a few more days and we are off to paradise.

I have been through a lot of stress and adjustments these past weeks and hubby can attest at how stressed out I am as I have been talking to him about it. My Twitter friends are also a witness of my rants these past weeks and the things that make me feel problematic and stressed out and I know a little time spent away from the place that is giving me stress would really be a perfect breather for me.

Hubby is excited too as I know how he has been working hard lately to make both ends meet so we can pay for our monthly amortization for the housing loan that we got for the purchase of our new house. God knows it is ONLY him and I who will make things work for us as we can’t rely on anybody else for help except the two us so I know how tired he is also so this vacation will be a perfect time for him also to relax.

Just a few more days to go and I can finally be free from all my problems even just for three days.

I still haven’t recovered yet (physically and financially0 from our 3-weeks vacation in the US. Imagine, I only was able to rest for one day and then I have to go back to work right away. One reason is that I have no more vacation leaves left and second I have to start working hard again to earn money to pay for the expenses that we incurred during our trip.

Aside from our US expenses, now I can feel the stress as I have to pay for tons of house hold bills like electricity, our day to day meal allowance, house rent, yaya salaries and more and it is just me and hubby who is working to meet all this expenses. Our electricity bill actually started to shoot up last month (and I am expecting that it will double this month) since we are now using two air-conditioning unit since my parents and my sister moved in with us. I am happy that my parents are actually staying with us but my greatest fear is if we can cope up with the expenses as it is just me and my husband who will shoulder all our expenses plus the added budget that we have to allocate now that my parents are staying with us.

I guess I will just leave it all up to Him, that hopefully I will find extra work to shoulder all the expenses (which is up to the roof now) and that my body can handle the stress and the sleepless nights that I have to endure so I can work at night after working the whole day for my day job. Oh well, this is my life now….I just hope and pray that I will not get sick so I can continue to work to provide for my kids and my parents (and my sister too.)

Most of you know that my sister ran as Kagawad in the recent barangay election. Unfortunately, she did not make it.

We were actually surprised with the result of the election as we all know that she has a big chance to win since she is carrying the name of my mom who is a three-term barangay chairman. Almost everybody in our barangay, if not all, loves my mom and they are even convincing my mom to make anyone from our family run as chairman to replace her. But neither I nor my brother is interested in politics. My sister expressed interest in running but she is still young to run as Chairman, so my mom and my dad thought that it will be better that she run as Kagawad so she will get training first before taking on the big responsibility of being a Chairman.

My parents did not let her be under a party and she run as an Independent candidate but one of the parties running is supporting her. They even had a meeting with my dad to get my father’s support so my father will help them get the support of my mom’s supporters and they will do the same to help my sister get the vote of their supporters.

And that is what my father and my mother did, they introduce them to our supporters and my parents really worked hard to convince my mom’s supporters to vote for them. My father had a hunch already that they will not be true to their word and that there is a possibility that they will not campaign for my sister and instead will ask their supporters to do a single vote. Single voting is a strategy that a candidate can use so he can guarantee a certain percentage of the votes required to win. But my dad said that he talked to them man-to-man and they promised that they will not do that and my father believed them.

But that is not what happened. Come canvassing time, my father and my brother was at the polling stations and they witnessed the pattern of votes coming from their precinct: they only wrote in their ballot a name for the Chairman and only two names for kagawads and no vote for my sister.

My sister was number 1 in the precincts coming from our supporters but the votes coming from the precincts of the candidates whom my dad had a meeting with has a big population and so when my brother tallied all the votes, my sister got booted out from the Top 7 candidates after the votes coming from their precinct was added.

It was a sad realization for us and we really learned the hard way. My sister could have been a better public servant as she will continue what my mom has done for our barangay and my mom’s constituents can real attest to my mom’s achievements. But sad to say they did not thought of what benefits our barangay will get if true leaders will be elected all because of their selfish dreams.

My sister is the youngest candidate but they thought of her as a big treat, thus this is what they did,. But all is good. As what I have been telling my parents who got really sad and frustrated at first, it is their lost not ours.

Christmas used to be my favorite holiday. As soon as the “BER” months enter I am excited already and I will already start my Christmas shopping list and will do my Christmas shopping as early as September. Then I will make sure that I will also shop for clothes for my family so that they have something new to wear on Christmas and New Year.

It is not just the shopping that I love about this holiday season but the festive feeling where everybody feels so happy and blessed and they love to spread the love to everybody.

But honestly for this year, I am really not looking forward for Christmas. I have reasons which I would rather keep to myself. My wish is that I will find in my heart to accept the situation because no matter how much I resist and no matter how much I hate it, this will be our setup from now on and I should just learn to accept it.

One of the things that I don’t like when I was pregnant, aside from the morning sickness, was my acne breakouts which I experienced from my first to my last trimester. Thankfully, my acne problems are gone after I give birth and all I need now is an acne scar cream to erase those ugly acne marks.

But you know, no matter how many acne breakouts and morning sickness and dizzy spells I experienced, I will gladly do it again if after all of that, I will be blessed with a very precious child.

As what a friend had said, when you have two kids, the love and attention that you give to them will not be divided but will be multiplied. I know sometimes it is crazy taking care of two kids especially during the first few months when we have to deal with Bela too as she is still adjusting from having a brother. But the joy that my husband and I are experiencing every time we hug and kiss our two kids is just priceless and is something that we will trade for anything.

Bela and Cobi, the two most important people in my life. Sometimes they drive me crazy. You know kids, they can be unruly sometimes. But I will surely miss Bela and Cobi as I go back to work next week. I don’t want to be sentimental and emotional about it but the more I think of my dreaded September 7 (which is my first day back to work), the more I feel sad and depressed. I think I will have a terrible separation anxiety this time.

I have been so used to being around the two of them since I was on maternity leave that I don’t know how I can adjust being away from them even just for a few hours. Bela is even handling it even better than me because every time we talked about it and every time I tell her that I am really sad now that I am going back to work, she will just say “It’s okay mom, don’t be sad. I will just fetch you from work everyday so you will not be sad.”

Hay, if only it will be that simple. But I know I can’t afford to quit my job so I guess I have to find away to cure my depression soon as I have to be ready to go back to work in just five days.

In just a few weeks I will be going back to the office to work. This means I won’t be able to see Cobi and Bela 24x7. As early as now I am feeling sad already and I am already having separation anxiety. I am not sure if I can stand it to be away from Cobi and Bela even just for a couple of hours five days a week.

I have 78 days of maternity leave so I have been used to just staying at home and be with my kids. I love it every time Bela opens her eyes in the morning and I am the first person that she sees. I love it every time Cobi feeds directly from me. I love it that I don’t have to take a leave if I need to attend to important events in Bela’s school. I love it that I can take Bela to school and fetch her almost everyday.

These are just some of the things that I will really miss once I go back to work. So if I choose to stay at home, what would be my options:

• I can look for online schools and study at home so at least I will not be stagnant and will still continue to learn. I checked out a list of online schools here and I have a lot of options to choose from.
• I can get a work-at-home job. I know a number of mommies like me who have work-at-home jobs in the IT field.
• I can set up an online store where I can sell US products. I found a number of multiply sites who sells stuff from the US and I am pretty sure that I can give a much lower price than them.

But I guess I will still not find the courage to resign and leave work. I have been working for more than a decade now and imagining myself not having a regular pay check scares me, especially I have two kids to feed. Oh well, I hope in time I will be able to adjust and will be able to go back to my old self as a working mom.

On this day of your life, Abie, we believe God wants you to know ... that today you can help a thousand people see God's light.

Feel God's light shining within you and take a step to inspire someone else to shine. As you share this vision today with just one soul, that reaches ten lives that touch a thousand.

Of course I always want to help other people to see God’s creativeness in my own simple ways. I can start in my own home by inspiring my children to do good things to others by becoming a model to them.

As we all know, helping is a very great way to make people happy. Just by showing them that you care will always be a lot meaningful. So I hope that many people will do this and share the blessings that they receive by paying it forward.

This picture was taken when I was already 8th moth pregnant. Gosh I really look big already. I was 149 pounds on my full term and when I had my check up last week, I am down to 129 pounds which means I still have to work hard to loose my extra baggage so I can go back to my pre-pregnancy weight.

I read that moyoberry is the ultimate way to lose weight and since it is made of fruit, I might be able to take it even if I am breastfeeding.

When I had Bela, it took me seven months before I was able to loose my pregnancy weight but I am hoping that it will not take that long this time. We will be having the baptism of our baby boy in a month’s time and I am wondering if it is possible for me to loose weight that fast or is it just wishful thinking. LOL.

Hubby left last Friday night as they will be bringing their mom to her hometown in Sorsogon, Bicol where she will be buried as per her request. We were not able to go with him as I was not allowed by my doctor to travel as it has just been a week since my Caesarian delivery so it will be dangerous for me to take long distance travel.

I don’t know if it is post partum or I just miss hubby or I just feel really bad because I am not beside him during this difficult phase in his life that I really feel sad and guilty for staying here at home. I know he understands my situation and he never really made me feel guilty about it but still I feel bad.

The burial will be this Tuesday and I am sure they will choose not to travel back to Manila on the same day as they are still tired and I also want hubby to take a good rest first before he drives for another 13 hours or more going back to Manila so the earliest that he will arrive in Manila is late Wednesday evening.

I so miss hubby already....

I just received a text message from my brother and he told me that we have a second hand laptop in our store. I asked him before to let me know if we have a laptop in our store as I am planning to replace my old laptop as it is acting up already and won’t keep up with the demands of my busy online life. LOL. Now I am thinking if I should get it or not.

The technical specification of the laptop is ok – the capacity of the hard disk, the speed of the CPU, the capacity of the RAM is above what my current laptop has and is more than enough for the simple desktop processing that I require. It even comes with a laptop warranty so even if it is a pre-owned gadget, I will still feel secure in buying it as it is still under warranty.

What do you think guys? Should I upgrade or not? I have to negotiate first with my brother and see if he will agree that I will pay when able. LOL.

It has really been a busy month for me both at work and at home. There is an on going project in the office which keeps me very busy that is why I am so stressed out. Then there has been a number of changes at home that is also causing me so much stress. Add to that my anxiety since I am about to give birth any time soon. (I guess I would really need clearpores cleansing products so I will not have acne breakouts again because of all the stress that I am going through).

I have been asking hubby for the longest time now to fix our second room so that it will be ready when our baby boy arrives. But he has been really busy too and he always have rackets or meetings even during weekend that he hasn’t find the time yet to start with the room renovation project.

Oh well, I just really hope that things will get better by the time I give birth. Being the OC person that I am, I can’t help but really think that we are still not ready for the coming of our baby boy. We still have a lot to do but because my tummy is big already, there is really nothing much that I can really do so I just really have to rely on hubby and trust him that he will get the job done before baby boy arrives.

One of the things that I was not able to get from my mom was her passion and love for make up. My mom can’t even go out of the house without her make up on. But you know, it is actually my frustration.

If only I can bring back time, back in those days when I was still single and I have all the time in the world, I would have enrolled at Regency Beauty Institute, a Cosmetology school in South Carolina.

The advantage of enrolling at Regency Beauty Institute is that you will be guaranteed to get the best training as they have very experienced educators. Students can also get hands on experience as their campuses are all modern and salon-like so their students can get nothing but the best training. Another advantage of enrolling at Regency Beauty Institute is that they have a program whereby they help their students after the course to get a job in the beauty, fashion and health industry as they have connections to salon and spa owners.

Imagining me as a makeup guru really puts a smile on my face. If only I can really turn back time.

We were out the whole day yesterday and when I reached home, we have no Internet connection. I have tons and tone of work to finish online but I guess luck is not on my side so I just tuck myself to bed and went to sleep. I set my alarm at 4:30 AM so I can wake up early and finish work. I still can’t access the Internet from my laptop so I called SMART and they reported that we have good connection in our area. I have to wake up hubby too (bad me) to fix check our connection and thank goodness he was able to make it work.

Now I am typing away and rushing to finish work before its deadline at 8 AM. I hate rushing….Next time I know better and I should finish work first before prioritizing other things.

We took Howell to the airport last Tuesday night for his three weeks Temporary Duty to Kolonia, Micronesia. I hate it every time Howell has to leave. I know it is work and I can’t do anything about it and I know he has done this many times already, but still I don’t think I will ever get used to it. In fact, I haven’t had any decent sleep at all since he left because I can’t stop thinking about him (call me corny and cheesy or over acting but I guess that's how attached we are to each other). If only I am not pregnant, I would have use acne home remedies already because I am having acne breakouts again because of these sleepless nights. (I actually checked the site of BestAcneRemedies.net and what I like about them is that they actually evaluate each of the acne remedy products and they gather thousands of customer reviews before listing on their site the top 5 acne remedies which means that the products that they are recommending are reliable).

I received an email from him Wednesday afternoon and I was really glad and thankful that he arrived there safely. I actually checked his flight status from Manila to Guam and the plane arrived seven minutes early than the schedule but I did not get a confirmation for his Guam – Kolonia flight so I feel relieved after reading his email, because at least I know he arrived there safely.

Hubby kept on telling me that three weeks is just fast and before I know it, he is already on his way back home to Manila. I keep counting the days and wishing that hubby is already home as we are missing him terribly already…

I have posted on Bela’s blog my dilemma on if we should send her to big school already or not this coming school year. She already took entrance exams at St. Theresa’s College and St. Scholastica’s College and luckily she was accepted at both schools. Now all we have to do is decide which school we should choose or if we will just let her stay for another year at her current school.

I was reading one blog of a mom like me who is a pre-school teacher in a progressive school. She mentioned that before, parents don’t have other options but to send their kids to traditional schools because there are no progressive schools that time so it is really something that parents nowadays should think about.

I was telling my mom why it is so complicated to make decisions like this for parents like us. I told her that I feel that we really have a big responsibility to make since it is the future of Bela that is at stake here. My mom just laughed at me and told me that Bela still has a long way to go. She will have her first communion where I have to look for communion invitations, she will have her first crush, her first heart brake, go to college, get married hopefully and have her own family.

My mom told me that in time I will know what to do if I will just listen to my mother’s instinct. It is natural to feel this way especially Bela is our first child but my mom is confident that whatever decisions we arrived at, she knows that we will only choose what will be best for Bela so I should stop worrying.