The fourth of ten children, I guess that makes me fourth in line.
There are many stories to tell, lots of pictures to show, and much love to be shared.
It is semestral break for the children. GI opted to spend it at Cebu Avenue with Father, Mother and Z (and cable TV, DSL internet connection, softdrinks in the ref, ice cream in the freezer and junk food in the cupboard ... you get the picture).
He brought along his guitar when I asked him to pack the stuff he needed for his stay there. Hope he remembers to play his guitar instead of spending majority of his time playing computer games.
I spent all of yesterday at the office. It was the longest time ever that I have worn my ID. Something like fifteen hours! (Horrible, let's not do that again.) When I finally got home, it was almost 2am. Needless to say the children were all asleep. I missed all of Saturday with them. (Horrible! Horrible!)
My saving grace for that early morning homecoming was MyGirl. She was sleeping peacefully on her side of the bed. She had been coughing for over a week and had been diagnosed with bronchitis earlier Saturday morning when MacGyver brought her to the pediatrician (without me!). Anyway, I couldn't resist but give her a kiss because I missed her. Normally, when I come home late and they are already asleep, if I give MyGirl a kiss, she wouldn't stir. But when I kissed her early this morning, she opened her eyes and when she saw it was me, she gave me the sweetest smile that made me forget I was away from her for the whole of Saturday.
Red and yellow and pink and green Purple and orange and blue I can sing a rainbow, sing a rainbow, sing a rainbow too.
Of course the colors of the rainbow are Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Indigo, Violet. (ROY-G-BIV)
I posted the lyrics of the song for Mother. I expect she will be thinking of logging in to Skype to check if Mindy is connected. If Mindy is around, Mother will call and ask for Noelle to come sing the Rainbow Song for her. That would make her day.
SisterDeer taught me how to french braid. She was 17, I was 16. She was finishing her 4th year of High School as an exchange student in scenic Minocqua, Wisconsin; I had gone there to visit during summer vacation. We both had long hair back then.
Ever since SisterDeer taught me this skill, I have always considered it the more elegant way to braid hair.
Since my hair is cropped now, I only have MyGirl's hair to work with. Our morning routine includes fixing MyGirl's hair for school. After she dresses up and while she eats her breakfast, I would fix her hair.
One of her favorite hair-do's is getting her hair in french braids.
I'm glad it makes MyGirl happy when I french braid her hair.
(I got this from an officemate. There are days when these forwarded messages provide us with insight, inspiration, reminders or even just something to help cheer us up. This message is one of those reminders.) _______________________________________________________________________ Jenny was a bright-eyed, pretty five-year-old girl. One day when she and her mother were checking out at the grocery store, Jenny saw a plastic pearl necklace priced at $2.50. How she wanted that necklace and when she asked her mother if she would buy it for her, her mother said, "Well, it is a pretty necklace, but it costs an awful lot of money.
I'll tell you what. I'll buy you the necklace, and when we get home we can make up a list of chores that you can do to pay for the necklace. And don't forget that for your birthday Grandma just might give you a whole dollar bill, too.
”Okay?" Jenny agreed, and her mother bought the pearl necklace for her.
Jenny worked on her chores very hard every day, and sure enough, her Grandma gave her a brand new dollar bill for her birthday. Soon Jenny had paid off the pearls.
How Jenny loved those pearls. She wore them everywhere - to kindergarten, to bed, and when she went out with her mother to run errands. The only time she didn't wear them was in the shower - her mother had told her that they would turn her neck green.
Now Jenny had a very loving daddy. When Jenny went to bed, he would get up from his favorite chair every night and read Jenny her favorite story. One night when he finished the story, he said, "Jenny, do you love me?"
"Oh yes, Daddy, you know I love you," the little girl said. "Well, then, give me your pearls."
"Oh! Daddy, not my pearls!" Jenny said.
"But you can have Rosie, my favorite doll. Remember her? You gave her to me last year for my birthday. And you can have her tea party outfit, too. Okay?"
"Oh no, darling, that's okay." Her father brushed her cheek with a kiss.
"Good night, little one."
A week later, her father once again asked Jenny after her story, "Do you love me?" "Oh yes, Daddy, you know I love you."
"Well, then, give me your pearls."
"Oh, Daddy, not my pearls! But you can have Ribbons, my toy horse. Do you remember her? She's my favorite. Her hair is so soft, and you can play with it and braid it and everything. You can have Ribbons if you want her, Daddy," the little girl said to her father.
"No, that's okay," her father said and brushed her cheek again with a kiss.
"God bless you, little one. Sweet dreams."
Several days later, when Jenny's father came in to read her a story, Jenny was sitting on her bed and her lip was trembling.
"Here, Daddy," she said, and held out her hand. She opened it and her beloved pearl necklace was inside. She let it slip into her father's hand. With one hand her father held the plastic pearls and with the other he pulled out of his pocket a blue velvet box. Inside of the box were real, genuine, beautiful pearls. He had them all along. He was waiting for Jenny to give up the cheap stuff so he could give her the real thing.
So it is with our Heavenly Father. He is waiting for us to give up the cheap things in our lives so that he can give us beautiful treasure. Isn't God good?
Are you holding onto things which God wants you to let go of? Are you holding onto harmful or unnecessary partners, relationships, habits and activities which you have become so attached to that it seems impossible to let go?
Sometimes it is so hard to see what is in the other hand but do believe this one thing... God will never take away something without giving you something better in its place.
Does anyone remember the Twilight Zone episode where they implied that in between the seconds and milliseconds as we know it, there still exists more time? In this time in between time, there are little blue men that work (in the background) without our knowledge.
If, for instance, you put something down but the next moment you can't seem to find it. You then look around for a while only to find it a couple of seconds later exactly where you remember placing the thing down. You scratch your head and say to yourself that you were sure you checked there a while ago when you were searching for the lost object yet missed seeing it.
The answer? Little blue men.
Or if you put something down here, then find it somewhere else later!
The answer? Little blue men.
Yes, in that Twilight Zone episode, it is said that these little blue men do mini-cleaning and clearing activities during that time in between time. Sometimes, they fail to put the things back in exactly the same place or they are unable to return objects within the given time-in-between-time available for them to clean things, so they simply replace these objects the next chance they get. These lapses were the explanation for those times when we find things in different places or find things at a later time in the same place.
Well, I experienced the little blue men phenomenon recently.
A couple of months back, MyGirl and I were watching television in Father's room at Cebu Avenue. We were at the foot of the bed and I pulled MyGirl closer to me, away from the TV. As I set her down, I heard my left earring get caught in her hair. I felt the back of the earring drop from behind my ear, having lost the post that went along with it. I wasn't worried because the floor was fairly clear, I figured the earring would just be nearby. (Or so I thought!)
I got down on all fours to search for the two pieces I had lost. I quickly found the back of the earring. It was beside one of the feet of the bed. The main earring shouldn't be too far away, I told myself. I looked around for the other piece. I checked under the bed, used a flashlight, even moved the cushion in front of the bed. Nothing!
I ran my hands through MyGirl's hair to make sure that the earring was not tangled in her hair. It wasn't.
I checked near the TV. Not there. I checked near the cabinets of Father. No, it wasn't there. I moved the electric fan out, and checked there even if that was already quite far away. No luck.
I got MyGirl and other members of the household to search as well. All to no avail.
After a whole lot of minutes looking for the earring, we gave up.
I had worked hard to buy that pair of earrings. Several years ago, I had canvassed several shops, gone back and forth contemplating whether to make the investment on a decent pair of earrings, saved up for them, and everything.
I was quite disappointed that I had lost that particular earring.
But what was one to do? Nothing.
Mother promised she'd have the help look for it.
Unfortunately, the weekend after that, Mother reported that the earring was nowhere to be found. She said that they had checked under the bed and the rest of the bedroom but they could not locate the earring.
That was about three or four months ago. I gave up the earring for lost. I considered having a ring or a pendant made out of the other earring.
Last week, out of the blue, my cellphone rang while I was at the office. It was Mother. She was so excited. She told me that the household help had found my earring ... in the kitchen!
I was astounded. I was happily surprised. (And I was also a bit skeptical over whether the found article was actually the earring I was missing.) The kitchen and Father's bedroom are on opposite corners of the house. These two rooms are so far from each other it was inconceivable for me to lose my earring in the kitchen and drop off the back of the earring in Father's bedroom.
Incredulous! But I'm certainly not complaining.
I thanked my mom and the household help.
(Special thanks too to the little blue men. Perhaps they are secret agents of St. Anthony.)
I recently bought a CD set with classical music entitled "Masterpieces." There are 2 CDs in the set, one is labeled Mars, the other Venus. Seeing that there were more males in the car, I decided to put Mars in the car's CD player as we were headed out of Makati.
When track 3 played, we heard the familiar introduction from Beethoven's Fifth Symphony.
MacGyver mentioned that the four-note combination was similar to the Morse code letter "V" (· · · —) and he mentioned something about Napoleon Bonaparte and the world war. He said they used that music since V is for Victory.
Interesting ... these are general information tidbits I didn't pick up as a kid. (Mother was not a Music Major. She taught us other things as we were growing up.)
[Thanks, Z, for this youtube link showing Sid Caesar and Nanette Fabray playing a married couple in a classic sketch entitled "Argument to Beethoven's Fifth." ]
A little research in the internet yielded the following :
(1) Ludwig van Beethoven was a great admirer of Napoleon Bonaparte. He had initially intended to dedicate his Third Symphony and call it the "Bonaparte Symphony." However in 1804, Bonaparte crowned himself Emperor of France which enraged Beethoven. He tore the title page from the score and refused to dedicate his work to his former hero, turned tyrant as far as Beethoven was concerned. When his work was published in 1806, it was not dedicated to Bonaparte, but to Prince Franz Joseph von Lobkowitz, one of Beethoven's most loyal patrons.
(2) During the Second World War, the BBC would use the distinct four notes of the Fifth Symphony to introduce its radio news broadcasts because of the Morse Code equivalent of dit-dit-dit-dah!. Yes, V for Victory!
For MyGirl's first birthday party, her godmother prepared blown up photocopies of MyGirl's pictures covering the first 12 months of her life. We temporarily set up a 4 x 3 gallery on the sliding doors at Cebu Avenue.
When this picture was taken, GI was 8 while RD was 4.
So far, this is my favorite beading project with MyGirl. I share it with some passages from one of my favorite books.
My star will just be one of the stars, for you. And you will love to watch all the stars in the heavens ... They will all be your friends.
All men have the stars, but they are not the same things for different people. For some, who are travelers, the stars are guides. For others they are no more than little lights in the sky. For others, who are scholars, they are problems. For my businessman they were wealth. But all these stars are silent. You --- you alone --- will have the stars as no one else has them ---
In one of those stars I shall be living. In one of them I shall be laughing. And so it will be as if all the stars were laughing, when you look at the sky at night ... You -- only you -- will have stars that can laugh!
Big kiss for RD and MyGirl if they can guess what book the passages come from.
Here's a clue, in Chapter 21 of this book, the fox shared a very simple secret:
It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye.
I got a beading loom way back in 2006. (Yes, there are some recessive artistic genes running in my veins. They remind me of their existence once in a while.) I got some pink and white beads and made MyGirl a very small bracelet. After that, the loom went into storage. And it has been in storage for a long, long time.
During one of my recent impromptu trips to National Bookstore, I chanced upon a book on beading. I contemplated the acquisition of the book, considered the idle loom, but concluded I wouldn't make anything if MyGirl wasn't interested.
Next time I went to National, I brought MyGirl with me. I showed her the book and asked whether she would be interested in doing some beading projects with me. Her face lit up and I had my answer.
We made a couple of small projects using the pink and white beads. Then we moved on to more challenging ones like the Scottie Dog (below). The Scottie Dog was a fairly "big" project. It needed more beads than we had ever used. MyGirl was quite excited when we started.
Here you can see the illustration on the book along with the finished work still on the loom.
The Scottie Dog close up.
After we finished that one, MyGirl wanted to do one with a crocodile design. Can you see the crocodile along with our other projects? MyGirl made this crocodile all by herself except for the parts when I had to untangle the knots she found herself in. Pretty good work for a seven-year old!
I figure that we can actually use cross-stitch designs with the loom. Given this, one day, I will embark on an ambitious project that will require me to connect several mini-projects together. In the meantime, the loom is back in storage but MyGirl knows she can use it any time she wants.
I had one of the most awful days at the office yesterday. Do you ever have those days when you feel like you don't quite know whether what you're doing is right or wrong; when you know you're trying your best but somehow nothing seems to be falling into place? Well, I guess yesterday was one of those days for me.
It made me miss my old office where they knew me well enough such that if things weren't going right, they knew I wasn't messing up on purpose and that I was trying my best. Here at my new office, I get the feeling that they just see the 'things are not going right' part.
Well, when I got home, even MyGirl could tell something was wrong. After she gave me kiss and a hug, she said, "Why aren't you talking?" (Children notice these subtle things.)
MacGyver tried to distract me with a couple of episodes of House, but as luck would have it, one of the episode we caught had Foreman telling Cameron something to the effect that, "You're just my colleague, Cameron, you're not my friend." (Ouch!)
Anyway, after a good night's sleep, I decided to catch an early mass this morning. Right after the mass ended, the congregation clapped their hands joyfully. Somehow, the clapping triggered a 'be happy' button inside me and I went out of the church smiling. It was quite strange. I've never really gotten that sort of reaction to clapping before. (No, I'm not complaining, I'm just saying it was a welcome surprise.)
After that, the day ahead didn't seem too bad.
So far, so good. I'm not quite as 'down in the dumps' as I was yesterday.
Is it because it is a non-working holiday in observance of Eid'l Fitr (or the end of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan)? No, not really, although it is a special day for the Muslims and I do respect that. Yes, it did mean that I didn't have to go to work today and therefore was able to spend some extra time with the kids, so it does count for something.
Is it because today is the Feast Day of St. Therese of Lisieux? Not quite, even though I do have a special place for St. Therese in my heart. I mean think about it, for someone who spent so little time here on earth, she managed to do such great things. What an inspiration! Yes, that does make today quite special.
Is it because I got to spend the late afternoon and the evening with my girlfriends? Now that was special. Get togethers such as these are special occasions. There are hardly any dull moments. There is so much of joy and laughter in the air. There is always something interesting to talk about when you are with your girlfriends. But, no, that is not exactly what made this day extra special.
So what is it? What made this day extra special?
Well, check out these pictures. They tell a story about a special seven-year old ...
... who measured, mixed, formed and baked oatmeal cookies all by herself today!
The mother of three wonderful angels. The other half of God's chosen one for me. The child of two extraordinary people. The sister of my closest allies. The friend to many in this journey we call life.
