Weekly Wrap-Up Archives - Truly Rich and Blessed

“Being” vs Blogging: What I’ve Been Up To Lately {And a “Goodbye” of Sorts}

April 7, 2014 by Tina 14 Comments

It’s been 9 days since my last post here! And exactly 20 days (!) since I last wrote about what we do every day, mostly in our homeschool. *gasp* So many things have happened and I don’t even know how to begin sharing them with you all!

So I won’t.

Yup… you read that right!

As much as I’d love to tell you about everything that has happened these past few weeks, I’m not going to… well, at least not in detail.

That’s because I realized something lately… I’d rather spend my time “being” than blogging.

“Being” a fulltime work-at-home homeschooling mom that is. Plus a supportive and caring wife of course.

Don’t get me wrong here. I love blogging too. I like sharing things with you, my dear readers (even if most of the time I wonder if I even have loyal readers out there!). As I’ve written before, this blog and everywhere else my writing appears is, in a way, my ‘mission field.’ I blog, I write because I hope to inspire at least one person out there to be rich in what matters most.

However, I also realize that blogging, writing and balancing everything else on my plate is not helping me so much in the “being” part of my life.

When Lent began this year, I encouraged all of us, myself included, to do all we can to keep the love alive — the love for God and for others. Sadly, I don’t think I’ve been doing a good job at it.

Palm Sunday is this Sunday already, and Holy Week is fast approaching. Our Jesus Tree is still empty, and the recycled prayer chains that were supposed to be part of our Lenten countdown still remain in their basket. We’ve been neglecting our daily decade of the Rosary and I’ve been short-tempered again, even if I vowed not to be so after my last Confession 2 weeks ago.

It seems that I’ve ‘failed’ at making Lent more meaningful — for myself and for my family.

Thankfully though, it’s NEVER too late to try to make amends.

I thank God for second chances. I also thank Him for the chance to just “be” with my family these past 20 days. I also look forward to more days of “being” — and promise to be more intentional, more purposeful, more present in the coming days — especially with our kids.

Before I go (and possibly ‘hibernate’ again for a while), let me share with you a few snapshots of what I/we have been up to (see, I told you I like sharing things with you!):

The week of March 17 to 23

Tim started “working” so he could save money to “buy Legos” and “give to the Church.”

We went on a “field trip” to St. Joseph Shrine, in honor of St. Joseph’s Feast Day on March 19 — and were able to attend Mass and see the procession!

I attended Catholic Filipino Academy’s Moving Up/Graduation Day, to document it for their newsletter. So blessed to serve with these people! :)

We joined The Mind Museum’s Media Family Day — this deserves a different post altogether! Needless to say, we really enjoyed this fun ‘family field trip’! :)

The week of March 24 to 30

My first article in Mothers Magazine came out!

I gave a seminar on “The 5 P’s of Powerful Parenting” in Batangas — and the whole family came along too! So it was kind of like a field trip for the kids! It was also my first time to speak again by myself after giving birth to Anne!

It was really nice to see this altar at the PhilHealth office in Batangas!

The enthusiastic audience at the Parenting Seminar :)

Another “field trip” that week was to the Phil Post branch in Ali Mall — Tim was finally able to send his letter to his pen pal in the U.S.!

Of course, there’s always time for playing with blocks and other open-ended toys!

The week of March 31 to April 6

We continued our ‘lessons’ in preparation for our trip to Boracay — a HUGE blessing given to not just our family, but to the families of 234(!!!) other employees of Bo Sanchez’s ministries and organizations.

Of course, we thoroughly enjoyed every bit of our days in Boracay! 🙂 Our homeschoolers also had lots of opportunities to socialize with other people and lots of ‘sensory play’ in the sand and water! Thank you, Kuya/Bro. Bo, for your generosity!

Photo from Bro. Bo Sanchez’s Official Facebook page

Of course, when we got back, the ‘realities’ of my life as a work-at-home mom ‘hit’ me right away — I have a mountain of laundry downstairs waiting for me as I type this! Thank God the clothes are already clean though, thanks to my husband. Now I just need to ‘recruit’ the kids into helping me fold and keep them!

Besides our Boracay trip, the highlight of last week was yesterday’s tea party and photo shoot with my fellow Make It Blissful contributors. It was a milestone for me because it was the first time EVER for me to go somewhere without a baby “attached” to me! I had fun chatting with the other #blissmakers there, and the crepes at were delish!!! (Special thanks, by the way, to my sister-in-law for my hair and makeup! Teehee!)

Photo c/o Martine of MakeItBlissful.com and MartineDeLuna.com (Standing, L to R: Denise of Bebengisms.com, Martine, Maricel of ASweetCottage.com, Ginger of MommyGinger.com, Mariel of TheLearningBasket.com. Seated, L to R: Moi, Marilen of Marilen.ph, Van of ShedMom.com, Toni of WifelySteps.com, Louise of MommyPracticality.com and Rhiza of ChasingDreams.net

Photo c/o Louise of MommyPracticality.com (Clockwise from L to R: Denise of Bebengisms.com, Mariel of TheLearningBasket.com, Van of ShedMom.com, Martine of MakeItBlissful.com, Me, Louise)

I split this SUPER yummy “The Spoiled Mummy” crepe with Ginger — and almost regret that I did, because I would have loved to have had it all to myself! Ha, ha! :)

Now that I’ve given you a peek at what my life’s been like lately, it’s time to say “goodbye” — but not forever, of course! With Holy Week coming up very soon, I want to try to make the most of what’s left of the Lenten season — to give more time to God and my family, especially the kids. Even if I’m home with them almost all the time, I know I am not ‘all there’ every time we’re together. Work is also taking up a lot of time, but hopefully things will ease up by May.

And so, dear friends, allow me to bid you farewell for now. I’ll still be around elsewhere — specifically here, here, here and here, so feel free to ‘drop by’ in case you miss my writing. 😉 Of course, you can still connect with me on , and if you want to! I shall miss you all and will be lifting you all up in prayer. Please pray for me too as I want to focus on “being”!

So what have YOU been up to lately? I’d really, really love to know. If you’re a regular reader here, THANK YOU for staying around — and please, do leave a comment. If you’re new to my blog, WELCOME and don’t worry — I’ll be back! 😉

*Linking up to Weird Unsocialized Homeschoolers and Conversion Diary (even if this wasn’t written in the 7 Quick Takes format!).

The Weeks and Days That Were: Of Blessings, Grieving and Everything in Between

March 18, 2014 by Tina 1 Comment

You know the feeling when you wish you keep a journal where you actually write (not type) things down, or even just jot down notes and snippets about your daily life, so that when it’s time to publish a long-overdue blog post you can just whip your journal out and type away, without straining your brain to recall the weeks and days that were? No? Oh ok, so it’s just me then! 😉

Yes, it’s actually been TWO weeks since my last (sorry) attempt to write a Weekly Wrap-Up/7 Quick Takes post. So that means I have THREE weeks “undocumented” over here! Needless to say, this is going to be a rather lengthy post! (Prepare yourselves, people! ;)) I’ll try not to be too detailed though, since I still have other stuff to do! (Can you say “backlog”?!)

— 1 —

Well, you all probably know that we lost my grandfather, our beloved Ama, on March 2. We found out that he had passed away on the night we got back from our trip to Taal Vista Hotel in Tagaytay (which I was able to write about here — what a wonderful blessing for our family!).

Ama would have been 89 on his birthday, March 5, which coincidentally was Ash Wednesday this year. I thank God that my youngest brother and I were able to visit him two nights before he died, the night before we left for Tagaytay. We weren’t allowed to talk to him much because he was already having difficulty breathing that time so nagmano lang kami (“mano” is a Filipino tradition where we ‘seek the blessing’ of our elders by getting them to place their hands on our heads/foreheads). *sigh*

I wish I could have told him all that I wanted to tell him then! I wrote a post on Philstar.com in his (and my grandmother’s) honor though — in loving tribute to them and their legacy of love. Ama at Ina, mahal na mahal po namin kayo!

— 2 —

The day before our Tagaytay trip (and before going to Malolos in the evening, to visit Ama), we attended the Parents’ Orientation of The Master’s Academy. This is part of our current “discernment process” — about whether or not we should enroll the kids in a local homeschool provider or continue being independent homeschoolers. It was SO nice to see fellow homeschooling-work-at-home momma Blessie there! 🙂

If you’re wondering whose hand that is, holding Blessie’s ear, it’s her son’s! :)

So… are we going to enroll in TMA Homeschool? We’re still praying about it! 😉 Of course, we’re also praying about our other choices for DepEd-accredited providers, namely Catholic Filipino Academy (CFA) and . CFA has new tracks this coming school year, so we’ll see how it goes (Lord, lead the way)!

Since we were already in the area, we treated the kids to a few hours at . They had SUCH a blast feeding the animals!

My main concern (and my husband’s and the kids’ too!) about the zoo is that the animals seemed SO hungry whenever we would feed them. I was pretty shocked when the fish seemed to be in such a frenzy when we put in the fish food! Calling on the Ark Avilon Zoo management — is this a ‘normal’ thing? Do your animals get fed regularly? Please do something about this!

Needless to say, for that particular week, our homeschool highlights were the two ‘field trips’ we took — to the zoo and to Tagaytay! Both were blessings I/we did not expect to receive this month! Thank You, Jesus! 🙂

— 3 —

The next week — March 2 to 9 — went by in a blur. Since my grandfather passed away on a Sunday, we went to his wake on Monday with my brothers. (Anthony was in Baguio for a teambuilding session.) It was bittersweet to have an instant ‘family reunion’ with my mother’s side of the family, to mourn Ama’s death.

Tuesday was spent catching up on chores (read: A LOT of laundry! ;)) and trying to squeeze in homeschooling and work.

This is what happens when you leave for the weekend (and have a busy week prior to your trip)! ;)

The kids and I also prepared our Jesus Tree ornaments and other Lenten ‘materials,’ i.e. their sacrifice beans jars and our ‘repurposed’ Lenten countdown prayer chain (we took the chains from last year and just placed them individually in a basket).

To be brutally honest with you all though, it’s already almost two weeks since Lent began and we still haven’t hung a SINGLE ornament on our Jesus Tree! And used any of the prayers in our basket! We’ve just been following along the Holy Heroes Lenten Adventure and praying one decade of the Sorrowful Mysteries every evening. Hopefully, we’ll be able to catch up on the other stuff this week!

On Ash Wednesday, I left the kids with my mother-in-law and met up with my new ‘colleagues’ from TheAsianParent.com. I’ve started working for them part-time as the copy editor for the Singaporean site (the main website) — it’s been such a blessing so far! 🙂

Here I am with Roshni, the founder and CEO of Tickled Media, and Lacar, the new EIC of the Philippine edition of theAsianparent.com (http://ph.theasianparent.com).

I went to Mass afterwards then met up with Anthony (I so love him!) and the kids — he came home from his Baguio trip early so we could be present on the last night of Ama’s wake. We returned on Thursday for the burial of his remains. In the midst of our grieving, we rejoice still, knowing that Ama is no longer in pain.

At the last Mass for Ama

Friday to Sunday was all about chores (again!), work, the kids’ activities, plus Holy Mass of course. We also got to attend the surprise baby shower of a dear friend and fellow homeschooler. It was good to connect with other families — and the kids made new friends! And got to take home small tubs of slime, which they totally enjoy playing with! 🙂 Time to try making our own slime again, I think!

A special blessing for that weekend was also the opportunity to watch our first ballet show together — for free! Thanks again to fellow homeschool mom Liza Castaneda of Ridgepointe Ballet for inviting us! 🙂 Our little aspiring ballerina especially enjoyed the show!

— 4 —

The week after that — March 10 to 17, last week — also passed by so quickly! We didn’t do much ‘formal’ work in terms of lessons but I did try to have more read-aloud time and outdoor time again with the kids. I also had Tim take some of his third and fourth quarter exams (they come in the ‘packet’ sent by Kolbe when you enroll, along with the curriculum and daily lesson plans).

We’re done with Phonics (yey!) and are more or less three-fourths done with the other subjects in Kolbe’s First Grade curriculum (except Geography, which we opted not to cover). We are also not formally doing Spelling, and Reading is also done informally lately — more of having Tim read aloud to me and answering questions orally. Sometimes he chooses what to read, sometimes I do.

The Science lessons in Science and Living in God’s World seem a bit ‘fluffy’ to me, so we need to ‘beef’ it up with more hands-on experiments and supplemental reading material. We need more Art and P.E. activities too! For starters, I think t’s high time we used the box that we were blessed with a while back!

For Filipino and Sibika (Civics), I hope to enroll Tim in The Learning Library’s Summer Program for Filipino, and finally continue using the Civics book I got on sale (One Country, One People). We started using this on the anniversary of People Power but haven’t been consistently doing so.

— 5 —

Last week was also the time we commemorated the first anniversary of my father-in-law’s death. Babang luksa, as we say it in Filipino. It was a time of prayer and reconnecting with family and friends too. Grieving but also rejoicing. Life’s like that, isn’t it? There are times when we are sad and times when we are happy.

We also had a fabulously fun playdate with our friends from The Learning Basket and their kiddos later in the week. The kids absolutely loved it, and we’re already planning for the next one! 🙂 The kids and I spent the weekend at my parents’ place because they were set to leave for another mission trip — more fun playtime for them, this time with their cousins!

— 6 —

Yesterday, Monday, was my attempt at returning to a more ‘normal’ schedule. It was Saint Patrick’s feast day, too, so we did some activities to celebrate before our formal ‘Learning Time’ in the afternoon.

Read-alouds for the day! 🙂 Books from TheLearningBasket.com and TheBookDepository.com

Instant ‘art’ and ‘social studies’ activity: Make flags of Ireland and shamrock ‘art’

Our youngest ‘student’ joins in the fun!

— 7 —

We are so blessed in so many ways and although I feel like I’ve been failing A LOT lately, especially with it being Lent and the time for repentance and change and all, I am greatly encouraged by the knowledge that my God (and YOUR God too) is more than enough for me. He will fill in where I lack. I will not allow satan to steal my motherhood and I will do my very best to keep love in Lent and beyond.

Whew! And that’s it! How have YOU been lately, dear friends? Come share! I’ve missed you so!

The Week and Day That Was: Of Life, Death and Surrender

March 4, 2014 by Tina 3 Comments

This post is under construction but I want to be able to link up to Conversion Diary and Weird, Unsocialized Homeschoolers so I’m publishing it now anyway! Please ~~come back again in a few hours~~ read this post instead to see how last week (and the weeks after it) went for us (Yup, I never got back to writing this post! Yikes!)! 🙂

The Week and Day That Was: Of ‘Rekindling’ Love, Heart-Breaking Protests and Raising Independent, Money Smart Learners

February 25, 2014 by Tina 10 Comments

This post is the second of 7 posts that I’ll be writing this week, as my response to Jen @ Conversion Diary’s 2nd Epic Blogging Challenge. To God be all the glory!

{Note: This post contains affiliate links. Any purchases you make through these links will bless my family and go to our ‘homeschool fund.’ Thank you!}

I always like looking back at the days that have gone by — they help give me a better perspective and realize just how blessed we are. This helps me especially on not-so-good days, when life seems hard and problems seem to weigh me down. I believe that all of us — especially homeschoolers — need to take a look at every week that has passed, count our blessings and little ‘homeschool victories,’ learn from our failures (both homeschool-related and otherwise), and then move on.

So for those of you who are new to my blog — welcome! 🙂 My ‘The Week and Day That Was’ posts, which are linked up to Weird, Unsocialized Homeschoolers and Conversion Diary, are my way of documenting (sort of) our homeschool days — come take a peek at what goes on at the Kingdom-Seekers’ Academy!

— 1 —

So you all probably know from last week’s post that I have decided to let the kids play outside more often in the afternoons, after ‘Learning Time’ is done. We were able to do so last week and I can tell that the kids are so happy about it! 🙂 Reminder to self: This is one way to ‘rekindle‘ the kids’ (and my) love for the outdoors, free play and God’s creation — even if we live in an apartment smack-dab in the middle of Quezon City, we are still blessed that our landlady is fond of trees and plants, and so there are small patches of greenery inside our small compound. Even Anne breaks out in a big smile whenever we go outside — she loves it when I place small flowers and leaves in her hands! 🙂 [Read more…]

The Week and Day That Was: What Matters Most

February 17, 2014 by Tina 3 Comments

It was another full week and day for us! Please allow me to share a bit about it with you — I’m linking up to Weird Unsocialized Homeschoolers and Conversion Diary again, too! 🙂

— 1 —

If you read last week’s “The Week and Day That Was” post, you’d know that I was kind of down two weeks ago. Praise God for working in my heart though, I’m feeling a lot better now! Though I must admit I still have my “lapses” (and take it out on the kids, poor things! :() I’m trying oh so very hard to be the mom my kids deserve but I fail miserably many times. Have you ever felt that way — like you keep messing up? I do! I just pray that our kids will remember Mama pouring out her love for them and seeking forgiveness more than Mama being angry and all “monster-like”! This post on Simple Homeschool actually brought me to tears earlier, because I needed to remember that it’s all about love. This lifestyle that we have chosen, that I am learning to embrace? All I need is love. What matters most is LOVE.

— 2 —

Moving on… (I do tend to get all sentimental here, don’t I?)… As usual, Monday was about our daily routine. On Tuesday, to help prepare the kids for The Lego Movie, which they were set to watch with their Papa in the evening, we read about The Tower of Babel from one of our children’s Bibles, watched the trailer, and talked about how God uses us people to “build” too. (We usually let the kids watch movies only after we have read Christian/Catholic reviews about them. Here are a .)

We also did our usual formal academics lessons (Religion, Math, Grammar, Reading, Phonics {a little bit of it because Tim seems to have learned to read certain words on his own!}, Science and a bit of Geography) and wrapped up early so that we could head to the mall. The kids enjoyed their advanced Valentine’s “date” with their Papa, and I (with Anne, of course) was able to shop for our weekly groceries while they were at the cinema.

— 3 —

On Wednesday, well, it was another typical day for us. Except for this:

Anne started cruising! 🙂 I was SO shocked to see her! *sniffs* Our baby is growing up so quickly — thank YOU all again for your prayers, love and support for her and our family! She is a healthy and oh-so-happy baby, and brings so much joy to those around her! 🙂

— 4 —

On Thursday… well… I wrote a whole post about what happened on that day here, and linked up to Simple Homeschool (I’m number 3 on the list, yey!) Like I said in that post though, not every day in our homeschool life looks like that… 😉 I was actually supposed to attend a blog workshop by my dear friend and “sister” Martine on that day but ended up not going. It was a blessing in disguise I guess, because if I had gone then I wouldn’t have been a witness to this, among other things:

What matters most is LOVE.

— 5 —

Friday was Valentine’s Day, as we all know. In our family, occasions like Valentine’s are special, in a way, but I’m not really into all the (commercialized) fanfare that comes with it. The kids decided to make their own cards for their Papa in the morning, so I let them do so while I cooked lunch. I read out loud to them during lunch.

We didn’t go out or anything because, for me, every day is Valentine’s Day anyway. As with everything else, what matters most is LOVE. And I am blessed to have my husband and kids to love and who love me! 🙂

— 6 —

Saturday was another full day for us — we dropped by House, where my friends at The Learning Basket were giving a workshop for yayas; had lunch at our favorite chicken rice place; had fun at ; went to anticipated Mass; then joined Anthony’s family for dinner. After dinner, we went to visit my father-in-law’s grave — I can’t believe it’s almost been a year since he passed away. We still miss him dearly and pray for him every day and night! After going to the cemetery, we went to my parents’ place to spend the night. Papa and Mama wanted to have time with us before they left for their mission trip to India. It was an impromptu trip and we weren’t prepared, but what matters most is LOVE, right?

— 7 —

So Sunday ended up being a “lazy” day at my parents’ house. We left in the afternoon (after some tears from the kids — they just didn’t want to go!) and ended up spending some time playing (well, the kids anyway) and having dinner at my mother-in-law’s house. I will always cherish the times we have with our extended family members! I love family time and I’m so happy that the kids had a blast last weekend. Making good memories — isn’t that part of what the “truly rich” life is about? What matters most is LOVE.

Speaking of memories, among last week’s highlights was this:

Rysse coming up to me and saying, “Look, Mama! I know how to write 2!”

I praise God for reminding me to slow down when it comes to homeschooling and life in general. And to not force my children to learn when they are reluctant to do so. These, for me, are among the many blessings of choosing to teach our kids at home.

I was more affirmed about this yesterday as we went about our “Learning Time” in the afternoon (the morning, as usual, was full of work, chores, etc.) — I asked Rysse if she wanted to “learn with Mama,” and she said No again. But she ended up taking out her Math workbook by herself and working on a few pages. 😉

We also played outside yesterday, after a long break from playing outdoors, for various reasons which I shall not bore you with. It was fun to “change things up” and I pray we’ll be able to play outside more every day!

Needless to say, I ended up being a bit more exhausted than usual yesterday! Thank God for loving, supportive Anthony, who “took over” in the evening!

Well, that’s it for now! May the rest of your week be blessed, friends! 😉 And just in case you didn’t get the hint, remember: What matters most is LOVE. 😉

How did last week go for you? How’s your week going so far? Let’s chat in the comments!

P.S. I am elsewhere on the Web again this week, so feel free to “visit” me on CatholicMom.com, where I share about the best penance I ever got, and Philstar.com, where I share tips from my fellow work-at-home moms! 🙂 God bless you!