Practice

It's another busy and stressful day. I was really looking forward to going to Mass.

 

I feel that with all that's on my plate right now, I need to ask for extra graces.

 

So we had dinner at 6 PM. I was hoping that the kids would finish their food fast and get dressed in time for the Mass.

 

Ok, I realized I had high expectations... We were a few minutes late again for daily Mass... considering that the church is just behind our house and I could hear the bell from the kids' bedroom.

 

My consolation is that I was still able to go to Mass with my kids. That is a dream come true and an answered prayer.

 

As we hurriedly walked to the church, I reminded my eldest son of the proper behavior during the Mass. He said he knows what to do.

 

But in church, the usual challenge happened again. The kids are being kids and are making some noise. My toddler was moving around instead of sitting down quietly. I gave him our house keys to distract him. I gave the umbrella to my eldest so he wouldn't get the house keys from his younger brother. That would keep them quiet and I would have some peace.

 

It did not keep my boys quiet and my eldest sat quietly and beside me only for some time. His butt "got itchy" after some time and he began to be restless.

 

I kept whispering reminders to him but my reminders didn't seem to get through.

 

I kept reminding myself that Jesus once said, "Let the little children come to me."

 

And so I brought my children to the church with me. Actually, I also do not want to leave them home with the maid only. With all the bad things I heard from the news and read in the internet, I don't want to take that risk.

 

Anyway, I thank God for those moments when I'm not hushing my child or running after them or trying to keep my eldest seated beside me. I'm grateful for those moments when I had heart-to-heart exchanges with God. I was in truth amazed that I still felt refreshed and comforted even as I worried about my kids disturbing other churchgoers because of their noise and movements.

 

When I saw the smile of the man seated behind us when we said "Peace be with you" to each other, I felt that I saw a glimpse of the Father's smile. I felt comforted and assured that bringing my kids with me to go to Mass is part of His Will for our family.

 

So although I felt embarrassed (and proud at the same time because he was singing his heart out to God and he knew how to sing the songs in tune) of my eldest son when he belted out the "Amen" and "Ama Namin" and he read the responses a bit later than the rest of the congregation, I made a decision not to leave the kids at home when I go to Mass in the coming days.

 

I thought, "He's just four years old anyway but somehow he tries to participate in the Mass. But since he is only four years old and a hyperactive boy, it's natural that he can't sit still for an entire hour without making some noise or movements in between. Even the Occupational Therapists/Teachers of my eldest son tell me that one hour is too long to expect for a four year old to sit still. However, they encourage constant reminders and practice. There! Constant practice! That's exactly what I plan to do. That's one of my reasons for bringing them with me. I want them to learn by practicing. And since they are still practicing, they are bound to make mistakes.

 

Then, I thought about my life and my walk with God. I'm also practicing in this life. I'm practicing to be Christlike. I'm practicing to live my life according to God's Will. I'm still practicing and so I'm making a lot of mistakes in the process. I thank God that He is an evergracious Father to me. That He has not given up on me and that my countless mistakes during practice does not make Him think or decide to leave me.

 

Hmmmm... I thought this would just be a short post. Now, it has developed into a meaty reflection which is quite surprising because I was already sleepy minutes before I started composing this post. I guess that's the Spirit working in me and through me. Another proof from God that even in my weakness, He can bring out something beautiful.

 

Let me conclude by sharing how our evening at home looked after the Mass.

 

My very intense child (who belted out the "Amen" and "Ama Namin" during the Mass for everyone to hear even without a microphone) requested for his guitar, got the mic from our electric keyboard and went up our stairs. He started singing some worship songs at the landing.

 

I asked him to go down and sing in the middle of our sala where there's plenty of space but he wouldn't obey. He said that the stairs is his stage. I explained to him why I want him to go down. I told him that he might fall and his younger brother might go up the stairs as well. His mind was set however. So I told my youngest that we will just pretend to be the audience and we will stay at the bottom of the stairs while we watch his big brother perform. I'm glad my youngest didn't insist anymore to go up.

 

Then, to savor the moment and let go of my stress, I stood at the bottom of the stairs holding a camera. I enjoyed his songs and became my son's number 2 fan. His younger brother is his number 1 fan now!

 

 

 

My lessons for today: we are all works in progress and practice makes us more like Christ!

 

Our New Home: A Promise Fulfilled

We've finally moved to our new home! Yehey! Praise God!

That's one of the reasons that I have not updated by blog for quite some time. First, we moved out of our remaining condominium unit which we rented out to a student. Then, we moved temporarily to a house near our real house so we can monitor the construction and finishing closely. Then, we moved into the house that God promised to give to our family around a year ago. God is so good! He has fulfilled His promise! He has been true to His Word as usual. :)

Most of our things are still in boxes and are waiting to be unpacked. But let me share about the things that I'm grateful for today on our third day in our new home.

1. I'm thankful that we were able to go to Mass last Sunday as a family in the church near our house.

Our first daily Mass as a family in the church nearby.

2. I'm thankful that we were able to go to daily Mass yesterday as a family for the first time.

3. I'm thankful that we have a much bigger house to clean and fix.

4. I'm grateful that the basic things we ordered to furnish our new house (like the new mattress we ordered from Mandaue Foam) arrived on the same day that we moved in. We're actually not yet done finding the right furnishings for our house. But we love it just the same. We're so happy to sleep in it already.

5. I'm thankful that we have a small garden at the back of our house. This is now part of my eldest son's daily duties. He takes care of watering the plants. He loves doing it! And I'm excited to buy and take care of more flowering plants especailly orchids.

6. I'm grateful that we now have our own garage where we can park our SUV (Innova). We used to rent a parking slot when we were staying in our condominium.

7.  I'm thankful that we now have a new maid. I hope she stays with us for a long time. She arrived yesterday afternoon. At least now we have someone to help us fix the house and do some chores.

8. I'm grateful that we found an affordable dining set at a mall in Alabang a few days before we moved in and that it was delivered for free. I'm also grateful that its design matched the design of our light fixtures in the dining area and in the sala.

9. I'm grateful that we have a service/laundry area on the ground floor of our house now and it can serve as drying area for our clothes. In our condominium before, the drying cages for our clothes are on the 5th floor of our building.

10. I'm grateful that in spite of our busyness in moving and fixing our new house, I am still able to work from home and homeschool our kids.

The vehicles and shapes Yanthy drew
on a Manila paper on top of one of our boxes.
Homeschooling while preparing for our move.



Yanthy's 10 spiders

11. I'm grateful that God sustained and continues to sustain me and my husband physically as we do chores at home (especially while we did not have a maid yet) and at work.

12. I'm grateful that God forced us out of our comfort zone to bring us to where we are right now. Because of this new adventure with God, we have grown much in faith.

Our family in front of our townhouse.

I have more to be thankful for but I will stop here for now. I just want to give back the glory to God for all these wonderful blessings and answered prayers. If not for His grace and provision, we wouldn't be living in our new house now and enjoying God's favors.

Let me share this song that has always been one of my favorites. This song helps me be reminded of the truth that miracles do happen when we believe in God's promises.

For Work-at-Home Moms: How to Get Work Done with Kids Around

To say that the past five weeks had been busy weeks for me is an understatement. I had been facilitating a series of workshops for my clients in the past weekends and most of them were done out-of-town. I also had an out-of-town speaking engagement a few days before one of the teambuilding workshops I facilitated in Tagaytay. Moreover, I write articles and books in between these workshops and speaking engagements. I had been doing all these and more in the past weeks that we do not have a household help.

 

You might ask: How do you get to do all the (business-related) work given your circumstances?

 

Aside from grace from God and help and support from my spouse, I give credit to strategies I learned in the past years as our helpers come and go. These strategies are very useful whether you work from home or run a home-based business. I work from home to do writing jobs and HR projects. But I run my consulting and training business as well. Let me share my time-tested and kid-tested strategies with you.

 

Teach your kids to play on their own.– When you’re a new and first-time parent, you have a tendency to think that you need to be with your kid ALL the time. But the truth is, you need to give your child some time alone to teach him to be independent and to teach him to entertain himself. I know this to be true because I was like that when I was just starting out as a new mom. Good thing I love to read and I learned from the books and articles I have read that teaching and allowing kids to have some time alone is also good for them and to us parents as well. You can teach this to your child gradually. Start by giving him five minutes of independent playtime. Then, slowly extend over time or with practice. This helps develop not only your child’s independence but also his creativity and imagination because he does not need to be dependent on you all the time in taking the lead on what he will play with and how.

 

Farmer Mateo and his produce.

 

If you have more than one kid, teach and encourage them to play with each other.– In the beginning, I thought and felt that it would be very difficult to have more than one kid. But as my boys grew older, I learned to appreciate having more than one child. One of my joys now as a mother is to watch my boys play with each other. I am amazed actually at how much they enjoy being and playing together. My youngest who is one year and a half loves to play with his older brother. He laughs so hard at his antics. He wants to follow him everywhere. So lately, I ask my eldest child to keep his brother busy by playing with him when both of them are awake and I have some work that really needs to be done. This strategy promotes camaraderie between my boys and teaches my eldest all about responsibility. The great thing about working from home is that I can easily step in when they suddenly fight over a toy or someone cries.

 

Doctor Yanthy and his patient.

 

Schedule to do some work while the kids are asleep.– I had been employing this strategy since I had my first child. It’s easier to work when the house is quiet and the things around the house are not a mess. You can do this early in the morning like what I’m doing now as I write this piece. Or you can work during their nap times after lunch (that is if your kids still nap.) I used to get a lot of work done in the afternoon when my eldest was still a baby and a toddler. Now that he is four years old and a preschooler, most of the time, he doesn’t want to take a nap anymore. You can also work at night after the kids go to bed. It’s quite challenging though to work at night if your kids go to bed late. Thus, it would be very helpful if you train your kids to sleep by 8 or 9 o’clock.

 

 

Mateo sleeps in the carrier.

Instill in your kids a love for learning and reading.– One of the things I’m very grateful for is that my kids love to learn whether with me or on their own. My kids are bookworms, especially my eldest. He would read on his own even with no one asking him. It’s one of his favorite past times. And because my eldest loves to read, his younger brother imitates him. My youngest pretends that he’s reading, too! I love it when I see him make up words while holding a book in his hands. So my kids learn by reading while I do some work on my laptop or while I do my own reading. Since my eldest already knows how to write, practices his writing skills, and loves to draw, his younger brother follows his lead. I therefore make sure that I have a lot of paper, crayons and pencils available to keep their hands busy. I also feed their curiosity by answering their questions and encouraging them to be observant. This practice has further developed them to be always curious to learn and to be keen observers. By answering their questions most of the time, they are encouraged to ask more and develop the attitude to seek understanding of something.



Our little genius.

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