What characterizes a healthy family? This is what moms and dads seriously think about when problems or tests are encountered at home. They try to evaluate their own family and hope that there comes a time for their family to get past the tests.
So, how does a family become healthy? What must a family have for them to be called healthy? But before I try to answer that question from observing many different families and my own, let me first say that when I talk about family it may refer to two kinds of relationship – the parent-child relationship and the husband-wife relationship.
A good acronym to use for the characteristics of healthy families is no other than the word FAMILY. I will be using those letters to show elements of a health family.
Now that the holidays are over, people are altogether bustling back to their regular routine and that includes us. I know I have failed to do our anniversary post during the holidays and I also know I have a handful of other backlogs waiting to be sat and worked on.
Here are my son’s office and mine, side by side. Both were hand made by the hubby. It was imperative that both tables were placed like such. It would be the most convenient, even as we do our home school classes everyday. I couldn’t have imagine we will be able to pull it off. I remember at around the same time last year, we were trying to figure out how we will be able to fit in our son’s study nook in our tiny house. Just look at what we were able to squeeze in. Not just our son’s office but mine as well.
In relation to our previous posts on drug use and abuse among the youth, the following is reprinted from the colum of Mr. Jesus Bigornia of Bulletin Today, issue of July 3, 1977. It is published in its entirety, unexpurgated and without comment.
“Dear Mr. Bigornia:
By the time this letter reaches you, my physical body may have been either buried six feet below or lying in a state in a funeral parlor or church recieivng empty and hollow words of a necrological services.
But my death will not be in vain if you will just print this letter as it is in your column.
I was the teenage son of a ranking government official and, like most of high government officials and business executives, I was left alone to manage my young life.
My father was an honest, dedicated and able public servant. There was no question about his integrity. Everybody knows about that. To show his loyalty to the public service, he worked from 6 a.m. everyday, from Monday to Sunday. He was indeed a model.
To emphasize the curent drug situation in tis proper perspective, let us briefly review the baseline data on dangerous drugs in 1972. This was the year when the Dangerous Drugs Board (DDB) and the Constabulary Anti-Narcotics Unit (CANU) started implmenting Republic Act 6425 otherwise known as the Dangerous Drug Act of 1972. At that time, there were only about 20,000 drug users in the country, who were practically concentrated and limited within the confines of Metro Manila are. Most of them were using only marijuana, a locally sourced drug of abuse, which was then grown almost entirely in the cordilleras and to a limited extenet, heroin. The magnitude of the drug problem then was practically negligible and quite manageable by today’s standards.
After 30 years, instead of abating, the drug problem even worsened and has now assumend very alarming roportions. The National Household Survey on the Nature and Extent of Drug Abuse in the Philippines conducted by the Dangerous Drugs Board in 1999 came out with an estimate of 1.8 million regular users and 1.6 million occasional users. The mani drug of abuse is the most dreaded, methamphetamine hydrochloride or “shabu,” whie drug abuse has now affected the whole nation.
My little guy does not cease to amaze me with his ways. Here he is ever ready to tell the story of his more recent favorite movie, UP.
He isn’t just getting savvier and savvier when it comes to his cognitive and fine motor skills, but he is also becoming more imaginative and creative. When dear husband was making me my office table a few weeks ago, Jed was on the side with his own sets of toy tools. Read the rest of this entry »
We counted three years into our marriage before our son came. One thing my husband and I were set on right from the time we learned we were pregnant was to start right as we parent our child. This is why I have tried to be at my best health ever even from gestation. I made sure there were no missed appointments and we completed our preparation for childbirth classes for Lamaze/Bradley. We even enrolled ourselves in child care classes. There was no way we were leaving parenting to chance. Needless to say, we were really thrilled to welcome our son when he arrived in May 2005.
Even before I gave birth, I was keen on exclusively breastfeeding him and then later have him on a brown rice diet, aside from making sure we don’t miss immunization appointments. These were the least that we could do to make sure our son stays healthy.
with our days old son, Jed
When our son was ready for semi-solid foods, I made a mistake of introducing instant baby foods to him at first. The convenience is there, true. But I can only be grateful enough that we were able to shift to brown rice which I dutifully grind first before cooking until he was ready for solids. I bought a grinder especially for this purpose. Our son easily adjusted to the taste of naturally cooked brown rice, vegetables and fruits. No need for instant cereals or what nots.
Why brown rice, you might ask. Polished rice means that a major percentage of B vitamins are destroyed and that includes80% of Vitamin B1, 67% of Vitamin B3, 90% of B6, 50% Manganese, 50% Phosphorus, 60% Iron, aside from the benefits of fiber that can only be found in unpolished rice. Although it was a tad more tedious to prepare than giving the regular instant baby cereal, there was no way I’m withholding my son the benefit of eating brown rice. Brown rice has to be soaked in the water it will be boiled in for at least 30 minutes. Nothing instant, I tell you.
Our little guy is seriously working on his Christmas wishlist. But I have an inkling what’s going to top his list is something that he has had since he learned to say the word “car” when he was 9 months old. Read the rest of this entry »
I cannot emphasize enough how the hubby has been wonderful through and through, especially during and after the storm that was. It meant a great deal that he spared me the sight of the storm’s aftermath. He had me come home a couple of days after. Although stench was still there, what I can only see from how it left the house was from the pictures. And I can only imagine how gruesome it would have been to see it in person. You have to cut me some slack because I did have to go through weeks and weeks of cleaning up too, together with my trusty weekend girl who made herself available every single day since day one after the storm.
Here is our 4 year old Jed reciting Psalm 100. It has been a while since he last recited the chapter and he has kind of forgotten some of the verses, which explains the “and thens” in betweens.
Psalm 100
1Make a joyful noise unto the LORD, all ye lands.
2Serve the LORD with gladness: come before his presence with singing.
3Know ye that the LORD he is God: it is he that hath made us, and not we ourselves; we are his people, and the sheep of his pasture.
4Enter into his gates with thanksgiving, and into his courts with praise: be thankful unto him, and bless his name.
5For the LORD is good; his mercy is everlasting; and his truth endureth to all generations.
It’s now or never — at least when it comes to teaching children the value of time and the discipline of time management.
“Parenting experts have said it time and again—childhood is the best time to ingrain the skill of time management,” points out Kelvin Ngo, Operations Manager of Kids Watch Central. “Studies tell us that 80% of a typical workday is wasted on unimportant tasks and wasted time – a statistic that could have been prevented if only these adults had been disciplined early on.”
To help raise awareness on the importance of time management among children, Kids Watch Central will be holding Kids Watch Central Family Fun Summit 2009 a parenting seminar on time management that takes this issue head-on. “It may sound like a cliché, but now’s the right time to do something about it;
Real Mothers, Real Lessons
“What makes Kids Watch Central Family Fun Summit 2009 different is that the lessons from it are not textbook-based. The insights that will be shared are from real-life mothers who actually had to experience teaching their kids first-hand,” notes Ngo.
Yesterday, my son and I wrapped up our first quarter of homeschooling. I cannot be more proud of him! Right from the time that we started, how he memorized the visualized instructions by heart, which is foundational to every pace that we use for every single subject of every single school day. I never had a hard time getting him through the homeschooling routine, to start with. I cannot be more convinced that this is exactly what I should be doing. My heart is full and I am overjoyed as I see right before my very eyes how his eyes light up as he learns new things and all the developments! How he associates everyday things with the new learnings. How he can locate countries and places around the globe and to think that it has only been less than 3 months!!! I can go on and on about these things, but here’s one thing for sure– in my heart I know that this is exactly the place that I should be and not the sidelines. Read the rest of this entry »
Our son, Jed took his third unit test last Thursday and passed with flying colors– concluding our first quarter of this school year. He is now able to follow through the stories, instructions and all, his fine motor skills have improved significantly, too. We will officially start with the second quarter this coming Tuesday. Monday, being a non-working holiday.
“close your eyes”(this is what we always have him do to get him ready for the surprise)
It has been a while since we got him a real surprise. This time he totally did not see it coming. We got him a more durable RC. All his previous ones are now broken and dysfunctional. He so loves cars and there is nothing that will overwhelm him more than this. So we figured to get him something that he really wants, this time a more durable one. It helped too that it was 50% off from the time we last saw it.
He is now able to follow through the stories, instructions and all, his fine motor skills have improved significantly, too. We will officially start with the second quarter this coming Tuesday. Monday, being a non-working holiday.
