Weekend Love: Another Rainbow Sighting

I don't know if my memory is right but I think this weekend was the first weekend this month where we finally got to experience bits of sun. It was also the first weekend of this month that we stayed home, or close to home (discounting the quick trip to the nearest mall yesterday to run a few errands).

So this afternoon, we let the little girl drag us down to the pool. We didn't join her to swim but it gave me and the hubby an hour to bond (i.e. talk nonsense and laugh our hearts out) while watching the kid have her own moment of fun.

What a nice bonus as well. Just when we were about to head home, this twin rainbows as the little miss called it earlier appeared.

Ah, just the perfect ending to a weekend well spent.

despite how crazy the past week was, it seemed to be telling
me - Joy is everywhere. You just gotta open your heart more and let it in.

QOTD: Why Is There Night and Day?

Original post started in mid-July 

Yesterday, (probably due to sheer exhaustion) I swallowed a tiny pill of optimism and believed that I can forcefully put a hyperactive kid to bed at 6pm. The sun is still up and shining so brightly that even a thick curtain in our bedroom cannot hide.

The kid was trained that long sleeps are for nighttime and from where she was lying it just wasn't night time yet. So she just had to ask:

"do i really have to nap, Mommy? it's already late afternoon."

For which, I had to slyly reply:

"no, this isn't naptime. it's early bedtime little girl. now, close your eyes"

But Mr. Sun is still up. And I can't go to sleep yet. I'm not sleepy.

Here we go again. I thought I'm now a proud graduate of this phase. Apparently, that was all wishful thinking now.

But we can just talk here in bed, Mommy? Why is there day and night anyway? (bakit may araw at gabi? kelan ba nagiging gabi?)

Photo grabbed from here

Ahhh, an opportunity I can seize finally. So I briefly explained to her why there is night and day. I tried my hardest to provide the simplest explanation. And while I am far from calling my attempt on early bedtime a success, I seem to have hit the jackpot on this one.

I made a fist, placed an invisible pole in between my palms and told her that pole is what holds the earth. And everyday, the earth revolves around that pole while the star that is the Sun is in a fixed position. So to simplify, some places are lighted (DAY) and some places are not (NIGHT). She understood my simple explanation but I know complicated questions are going to start pouring soon. (Note to self: start investing time to do more science research.) I hope when that day comes, I'll be armed and ready.

For now, I can only wish it doesn't come real soon. I just do not want to be caught unprepared.

Found a useful link from Ehow by the way listing a few experiments you can do with your preschoolers in relation to this topic. Bookmarking it here as well for future use. :)

34th Manila International Book Fair

Going to the Manila International Book Fair has been in my (invisible to the eye, visible in my head) yearly must-go-to-with-the-kiddo list. The kid is turning 5 next month and yet I still couldn't find the time to bring her. I thought last Saturday that we could squeeze in a few hours to spend at the fair after Sam's birthday party but the weather wasn't very cooperative it forced us to choose to go home instead of heading straight to the book fair. I slept with a broken heart that night.

I think the husband must have felt my sadness because one of the first thing he told me when we woke up the next morning was "go, I think you will really enjoy it there. It's your happy place".

A bubble thought went "awwww" in my head when I heard that but I wasn't in the mood to really take it seriously because the weather remained gloomy. I really want to take the little girl with me. So better for me to stay home if we can't go together. "Better luck next year", I thought.

But after breakfast, Mr. Sun peeked and the hubs decided he'll go with us so I finally gave a little squeal, grabbed a few things for the kid and readied her for our trip to a 'BIG' bookstore. The mention of that made her excited as well. In the beginning she thought we're just going for a bookstore date at the nearly National Bookstore.

Luck seemed to be on our side because it rained hard while we were on the road but when we were nearing our stop, it was only drizzling and we didn't have a hard time commuting to MOA at all. It just took us a little over an hour to commute from our place to MOA despite the heavy downpour and slight traffic in Baclaran. 

When we got to SMX, the kid was just too eager to get inside I didn't get the chance to scan the floor map to check which side was Lampara and Adarna books are located. Well, the kid was really only after finding NBS because when we entered Hall 1, she made a beeline towards the NBS arch totally dismissing the colorful kiddie book stall that was just right beside the entrance. I guess she figured, she will find every kind of book anyways inside NBS. She immediately raided the kiddie bookshelves, I think we spend more than an hour just going through each of the books on display. Some of the books, she took out and pretended to read on the floor. Good thing we got there early so the crowd was still manageable and she still was able to get a space on the floors.

I would've gone through each of the stalls if the hubs was with us but he wasn't in the mood to go inside the fair so I had to just pick the stalls that we'll check. After spending a good deal of our time in NBS and burning almost half of our budget on workbooks, we also went to Anvil Publishing's area. We bought 2 books there but I seriously wanted to splurge on the textbooks most of which were being sold at 80% off but I had a tight budget and I really wanted to see the Lampara and Adarna stalls first.

Found these trivia books at the Anvil display. I was tempted to get the entire set.
My siblings and I were trivia addicts and we really enjoyed Brain Blitz when we were younger.

It was past 1pm when we got to the Precious Pages area (where Lampara books is located). Sadly, they were only selling at 20% off. I had to pass else I end up buying just two books each from them and Adarna. The kid didn't push, she contented herself with leafing through the books she liked and making me read the pages that interest her.

This was one of the books that caught her attention.
IT HAS YOUR NAME MOMMY!

After leaving Precious Pages, we headed straight to the information booth because I was already dizzy from looking around searching for the Adarna stall. Turns out it was just near the Precious Pages booth. The kid found it first actually. While my eyes got transfixed on the Cultural Center of the Philippines booth, kid grabbed my hand and shouted "THERE, Mommy! ADARNA!" That sounded amusing. I didn't know if she read the sign right or if she just remembered what the Adarna logo by memory.

Adarna was our last stop so I let her pick books she wanted to check and didn't press her to hurry anymore. Sadly, there wasn't much left on those books that were previously being sold for 50% off. I was aiming to spend half of my budget on those. Still, I was quite happy with what we came home with from Adarna. 

When we were about to pay for our picks, I caught a glimpse of Russell Molina (one of the Adarna authors that I really like, no bias, he tells stories that are very reflective of the realities in the Philippine society). I excited told the kid she can have one of her books sign by the author himself. She gave me a wide grin and proceeded to bring her books to the counter. She handed the book to Russell to sign. (Happy me, she isn't shy anymore!) I also asked Russell for a souvenir photo and he happily obliged. 

Ahhh someday Maia I hope we can publish a children's story for Adarna. A mom and daughter colab perhaps? Just the thought of it makes me giddy. But really no pressure there. That's just one of my silly wishful thoughts.

Anyways, back to this super sulit trip. I had a thousand bucks to burn here's a breakdown of my spending for the:

NBS (8 workbooks, 1 storybook)           -       523.75
Anvil (1 book and 1 box of Dora stickers)-      123.50
Adarna (7 books)                                   -      430.00
Total                                                        P1,077.25

snapshot of our MIBF loot

I overspent a little but brought home a total of 15 books. I think had I gone earlier, I would have bought more with the budget  I had but still the daughter and me were happy campers on this trip. And yes you bet I'm going to save for more pesoses to burn next year!

Till Next Year!!!! (we're going to bring bigger bags and somebody else to keep this little girl company while I scour the floor for more bargains)

Timed Out

August 6th, around dinnertime

I really wish I remembered now or even just wrote a few words in this draft post to give me a clue of why I had this photo of you sitting in that corner serving your much deserved time out. But I do vividly remember though that when I told you I had to do it, you just nodded your head and proceeded to grab your chair. You gently positioned it in that corner and went on to sit till the time you need to serve was up. Your puppy eyes were pleading for me to forgive and yet you kept quite in that corner. You waited till I signaled it was okay to leave that corner.

"You sit there for 5 minutes." I had to say that firmly making sure I didn't choke or show any sign of amusement.

On times like these, you never argue with me now. You perfectly understand the rules in our house. You know that when you did something wrong, you need to be "punished". You hardly even cry anymore. Like in this photo. You didn't cry anymore. But I know you were really sorry. 

I often here you say you are now my big baby. Our big baby. I'm happy you still like to be called our baby. I hope you will never feel embarrassed if in case you're all grown up and we still call you Baby. Don't worry sweetie, it's not going to be that often but I hope when the moment hits us you would allow us to baby you that way we do right now. Because really, you will forever remain our baby. (forgive Mommy, I'm just extra sentimental today)

p.s. You might eventually be curious if time outs ever worked for you and might be surprised to know that they did work. Time outs gave us both the time to regroup and rethink our actions. On your part maybe it wasn't that way yet but almost always when we talk after your time outs, you seem to realize what your mistakes were and would acknowledge them by readily offering your heartfelt apologies. That is enough for me and your dad. I hope you will never outgrow that gift of genuine humility and courage to accept your mistakes because when you are older they would probably become one of the most difficult virtues to nurture and live by.

Weekend Love: Litte N@Wies Tea Party At Stacy's Capitol Hills

I was fortunately to be online when the idea of dressing up our little girls as princesses and bringing them together in a tea party was brought up in a private Facebook group that I belong to. I immediately expressed my interest to join knowing that if I ask the little miss herself she wouldn't think twice of saying YES! to the invitation right that minute anyways. Especially since she's so into everything princess-y these days.

The response to that invite was overwhelming and within a few hours, it was closed because the original plan was to really arrange a small, intimate formal party for the little girls and the organizers wanted to keep attendance to about 30 kids max. It took weeks for the organizers to iron out everything, even find a dainty place that could fit that much number of kids and their parents (so about 60-ish all in all). Several cupcake shops were considered and eventually the choice was zeroed in on Stacy's. It had a branch in BGC but it was smaller and it didn't have the space for the adults to hang out in while the kids are partying so the bigger branch in Capitol Hills became the obvious choice.

Quezon City is FAR from where we live but that didn't stop us from pushing through. I know that commuting was going to be a challenge but I normally don't let myself get intimidated by that. So come Saturday, I donned my supermommy cape and readied myself for the challenge ahead. It was just me and the kid so I really had to toughen up. I briefed the kid too that it wasn't going to be an easy commute this time so she needs to be very cooperative with me. We left home around 1:30pm and arrived at Stacy's around 3:30pm. Not bad at all. And the party was just starting then.

I immediately took the kid to the nearest restroom so we can change into her 'princess' attire (which is a borrowed flower girl gown from her second cousin). We came back to Stacy's and found an empty seat for her. It only took her a few minutes to warm up with the other kids (considering it was her first time to meet any them).

Preschool Corner: Reviewing For Reading And Spelling

We've recently just finish with first quarter exams and let me just share with you another review tool that proved to be useful to us.

A few years back, I bought a box of tongue depressors for Maia. About 99% of that wasn't put to use at all and I don't have the confidence to use it anymore as Maia already played with the box several times before.

I've used them in several crafts projects in the past but I still have a lot of it left. I've recently been exploring other creative ways of reviewing the kid with her sight words and spelling. Last year, listing them on a piece of paper and posting that paper on the wall worked but this year, it just doesn't seem to do the trick anymore.

Then I thought these Popsicle sticks could be useful too. I wrote the words on the popsicle tips and wrapped a decorative tape on it to categorize the lesson it falls on - short a, e, i, o, u and to tell which week the spelling word was taught.

We created a guessing game out of it and the kid liked it! We were able to review smoothly.

I have yet to see the results of her mastery tests on Reading and Spelling but she already assured us it was super easy for her. Oh well, whatever the result is, I'm already proud to know that she's gain so much confidence already especially when it comes to reading and spelling.