Anthony Bourdain tries Jollibee. And he enjoyed the food!

Run, Mommy, run!

I'm a working Mom, work-at-home, yes, but I still need to go to our office once in a while.  This means that although I work from home, I still have emails to send, clients to attend to, boss to report to, calls to make and well, real work to do.

I'm also a Mommy.  And now that's it's summer, I still make worksheets for my son to do coz I don't want him glued to the TV the whole day.  I also find activities for him to do - bring him to his basketball clinic, soccer clinic too, birthday parties, play dates and yes, I've also enrolled him in the McDonald's Kiddie Crew.  It's his second time and he liked the first time, so I enrolled him again.

Champions at the basketball clinic

So, I work, right?  When I have to drive him around, I usually get ready an hour before.  But then I sometimes get delayed when an email comes in or there's a call.  So maybe half the time, we're a little bit late.  For soccer, we've been late twice already.  For basketball, we're usually just in time.  For birthday parties, we've been late many times LOL.  For play dates, the mommy friends already know that I'm always in a hurry, so they understand :D My son has raised this with me several times already.

And after an event, I'm always in a hurry to go home because I have more emails to write and send.  I am a working Mom.  I'm luckier than other working Moms because I can work from home.  I know I'm blessed with what I have.  My own Mama was working full time outside of the home when I was growing up.  No one would bring me to summer activities, I remember I just stayed home summers of my childhood and books were my escape.  I did go visit my Lola and cousins a lot back then, so I was never bored.

At his school's soccer pre-training

Anyway, yesterday was a particularly busy day.  My boss was in town, which meant I had to go to the office.  But before I left, I had to cook my son's lunch and the yaya's too.  The new yaya (who's also leaving by the weekend) doesn't know how to cook.  Then off I went to the office.  At lunch, my officemates and boss decided to surprise a friend who just celebrated her birthday that weekend.  And since we had a meeting at our other office after lunch, I volunteered to drive everyone.  On the way to McKinley, a traffic officer stopped us and told me I was "coding".  All the while, I thought our plate number ends in 4 but that was the old car, since we got a new car in July which ends in 2!  Horror!  So yes, my driver's license was confiscated.  The MAPSA guy was actually hinting na mag-bigay na lang.  But I didn't want to do it, I'll do the legal way.

Because of that traffic violation, the meeting was delayed.  I planned on going home by 2pm since it was my little boy's first day at Kiddie Crew which starts at 3pm.  I was only able to leave at 2:45.  I got 8 missed calls from the little one, I can almost hear his disappointment.  I wanted to cry from guilt!  I got home at 3:45 and dropped him at McDo 10 mins after.  After I parked, I followed him in and saw that he was happily getting drinks from the vendo and helping at the counter.  Major heartbreak was averted, thankfully.

Yestarday at McDo's Kiddie Crew

You see, my daily life is like that.  I struggle to give him my time and also have time to do my job.  He'd go to me for something and I would often times have to tell him to wait a bit.  I speak to my friends at the office who are Moms like me and we go through the same thing.  We'll just have to manage this better, and accept that we're always in a race :D

My advertising little man

Since it's summer, the little boy has been watching TV.  I do try to limit him watching cartoons - he can only watch it for 2 hours in the morning and an hour in the afternoon.  After his cartoon time, it's Mom or Dad's turn or he can watch other stuff like basketball or any age appropriate show.

The other day, while after his cartoon time was up, and I was working upstairs, he suddenly called me urgently.  He said I needed to watch TV, I went to him and he showed me home tv shopping where they featured ceramic pans.  And then he proceeded to say that it's so easy to use, it's non-stick and you just wipe it and you can use again.  He sounded so convincing too! :D  He knew that I didn't like our old pans, and saw I bought a new set.  He thinks we should get the ceramic pan too since it's nice! haha

photo source here

Then yesterday, I was sitting beside him while he was watching tv and then he showed me a garden hose that expands.  He tells me that it's perfect because it's easy to use and then it's easy to keep.  Meron pang, "Oh!  Look at that Mommy, nice right?!".  Haha  And he said, it's cheap too!  "Only P1,400++ if you call now!" haha  I was just laughing!  He does know how much I love my plants and I water them everyday, so he knows the hose is going to be useful :)

photo source here

He's actually been bugging me to buy him VitaPops.  He sees it on TV all the time.  The thing is, I keep forgetting and I buy him Ceelin chewables.  So when we went to see his pedia the other week, he remembered VitaPops and told me he's going to ask his doc.  When it was our turn, and ask he did.  He asked his doc if he can take VitaPops instead of Ceelin.  His doc is not aware of VitaPops so she asked what it was, he said, "It's Vitamin C and it's from the makers of Ceelin" - his exact words! :D  The doc was so amused and therefore gave her approval.  Good job little man!

photo source here

TBH, I didn't want to buy VitaPops coz I just bought a bottle of his vitamin C.  So imagine my surprise when I was given sachets of VitaPops after buying him a toy at Toy Kingdom.  It's a perfect example of a kid's prayer is granted :D  Pati kay God, his advertising worked :)

Yourself vs yourself

So the school year has ended.  Just like that.  Sometimes I still can't believe that we survived it - tutorial was pure hard work.  I had to do lots of worksheets and haggle on study time versus TV time, Ipad time, PSP time, basketball time and Xbox time.  It was always a messy morning, always short on patience (me!) and running after time, every time.  Every school day leaves me winded and just wiped out.

I am particularly happy with my son's grades in school - 4 Es and 3 VGs (Ex being the top, then E, VG, G, S, NI and F).  I worked hard for those grades too, so I should get an award, a bag perhaps haha!  In their school, they don't have top 10s during the quarter and at the end of the year.  I was on the fence about not getting or knowing how my little one was doing in school, in comparison to his classmates.  But then it made me think too - the school follows the principle of doing your the best, of not competing against others, but only against yourself.  You see your grades, you just do your best, not withstanding how the others are doing.

But to be perfectly honest though, I still wanna know in Grade 7 (or is still 6?) if he's done well enough, overall. LOL  Yes, I grew up in a competitive world, competition is ingrained :D