I was so touched....

Last night, Faye and I were reading her What's for Breakfast book. It has devotions with bible verses. The devotion for yesterday was about the embarrassing situation that the writer had, so i asked Faye if she had experienced this before. She said she couldn't remember any instance. What she remembered was her 7th birthday party, in which she was really shy of all the people watching her.

Then, she suddenly said that during the portion of the program in which her Ate Emy, Ninang Eunice, Lolo Caloy, Tita Dedeng (for Kyla), Tita Esphie (for Ate Kaye & Ate Lingling), were reading the letters that they made for her when she was only 1 year old, she almost cried because she was so touched. I was surprised, because she didn't tell me this after her party. I asked her which letter touched her, she said, it was on the 3rd or 4th letter, because at first, she said, she still didn't "feel" it.

When she turned 1 year old, I included in the invitation a request for the guests to write her a letter, which I intended to open on her 7th birthday. I kept this in a small paper bag, and once, when she was around 5 years old, she saw these letters and was intrigued when she read her name outside the envelopes. She asked me what were those, I just ignored her and didn't let her open the letters. And to avoid the same incident, i then carefully hid it inside the cabinet.

After her 7th birthday party, I put the letters in her memory book, and she read it one by one, although she couldn't understand some of the cursive handwriting. She didn't mention to me anything about her feelings when the letters were being read to her, it was only last night that she told me that she was so touched and almost cried.

During her party, when i distributed the letters to the people who wrote them, all of them couldn't remember that each of them wrote Faye a letter 6 years ago. It was only when they saw their own handwriting that they believed.

It was Tito Rico who read the letter of Lolo Caloy.

Tita Esphie was reading the letter of Ate Kaye and Ate Lingling
who were not able to attend Faye's party.

Tita Dedeng was reading Kyla's letter
who was also one year old when the letter was written by her Dad.


It was Ninang Eunice's turn to read her letter.


and Ate Emy

Pain

How do parents cope when they see their child in pain?

Accidents really happen when you least expect it...

We were scheduled to attend a meeting last night, and we brought Faye with us. On our way there, Faye slept in the van, so her dad had to carry her when we reached the venue. Unfortunately, her dad closed the sliding door while Faye was in his arms, so he didn't see that her right hand was still inside the door. Her middle finger was hit causing the fingernail to be forcibly removed from the nail bed. At first, Faye wasn't aware, she was wakened by the voice of her dad who was repeatedly saying sorry. She woke up wondering why her dad was saying sorry. It was only after a few seconds when she felt the pain that she cried.

We rushed her to the hospital which fortunately was just across the street. We didn't know how to console her, so, we just embraced her and assured her that everything will be alright. At this point, i still couldn't bear to look at her finger. Her hand was x-rayed to check for fractures, and thank God, the results were negative.

Then, the doctor explained that he had to remove the fingernail. He will put anesthesia directly on her hand which could be painful and uncomfortable. Through all this, she was with her dad, and she kept on telling him stories, or whatever she could think of, probably, to remove her focus on the pain.

Before the procedure was started, we prayed over her, we asked God to give her strength and to make her well.

When finally, she was asked to lie down on the bed, the doctor covered her with blanket to keep her from moving and her Tito Norman (our brother in the community) held her feet, her dad held her hands. I kept on talking to her, trying to divert her attention. When the doctor injected the anesthesia, he had to rotate the needle so that the medicine will surely cover her finger. We couldn't bear to see her crying. She was inconsolable, even as I kept on telling her stories while the procedure was being done. Then, I suddenly remembered that I bought her two new shirts, so, i told her that i had a surprise for her, she suddenly became interested. I saw it as a chance to divert her attention away from the pain. I kept on telling her to just ignore the pain, but she also kept on saying, "Eh mommy, nararamdaman ko pa din."

When finally, the fingernail was removed and her hand was bandaged, she again remembered my surprise for her. I told her, i will give it to her once we get back in the car.

It just breaks our hearts to see her like that, her dad kept on saying sorry, and all she said was, "OK lang yun, daddy".

Now, after almost two weeks, her finger is healed, although we have to wait for at least 3 more months for the new nail to come out.

Happy 15th Wedding Anniversary!

We wanted to celebrate our special day just like in the past years. Unfortunately, we didn't have much budget. So, up to the last minute, like, the night before, we still couldn't decide where we were going. We had plans of going to Puerto Galera, even for just 1 night and 2 days, and I had made the calculations already of how much we were going to spend for transportation, accommodation and food, and we felt that was the best place that we could go to with very limited budget.

So, there, off we went to Puerto Galera! We left the house very early in the morning of May 1. He surprised me with a bouquet of flowers which he bought while I was waiting for him to come back from buying medicines. We then took the bus going to Batangas pier. It was a good 2 hours travel, we arrived in Batangas pier at around 9:20am. We checked the available ferries going to Puerto Galera -- i didn't want to ride the big banca because I had a terrible (well, for me it was terrible!) experience the last time that we went to Galera and we rode that big banca (100 seating capacity). But, we found out that there was only one aircon boat, all the rest were the open banca -- and we had to wait for at least an hour and 15 minutes. We decided to just wait, instead of getting scared all throughout the trip.

Behind me was the aircon boat.


And this was the boat that I didn't want to take.

There were only 8 of us in the boat --- all the rest of the people find it more exciting to ride the open boat --- but it was fast, i think, it only took us 45 minutes to reach Galera. Though it was a bumpy ride -- and scary also -- i still preferred it over the open boat because i couldn't see the waves coming.

Next adventure as soon as we reached Galera was finding a place where we can stay. We settled for the White Beach Resort. It was a nice place, near the beach, and at the same time --- cheap! The last time that we went here - in 2005 - we stayed in Talipanan, a nice place for people who love quiet nights, it reminded us of our stay in Pagudpud in 2004.

Our lunch was good,


but not as delicious as our dinner.



A view from the restaurant where we had our lunch.

Our stay was great, we soaked in the sun, had nice food, and enjoyed each other's company. We even had a massage right on the beach! What an experience!

Under the heat of the sun, we enjoyed watching the people, made private remarks about the group of girls that we saw in the company of one Japanese guy, two Pakistani guys who made pass on the girls wearing skimpy swimsuits, they even sat beside the girls when these girls made the wrong move of acknowledging the guys' "hello".

For our kids' pasalubong, i asked the Manang who did our massage to make personalized bracelets for my kids.

When it was time to go home, our next adventure was finding an aircon/closed boat to bring us to Batangas Pier, but since it was a weekday, there were no schedules. So, after convincing myself that everything will be alright, i finally decided that we had no other choice but to ride that open boat. We prayed that no big waves will come our way. We just talked and talked during the ride, i listened to music on my cellphone, and enjoyed the sight of the couple (i think the girl was a Thailander and the guy was Italian) in front of us who can't get their hands off each other.

We arrived safely in Batangas port, and we reached home at around 9pm. The kids were all over us, they missed us dearly and we missed them also.