life is hard: how do you cope?

jude and i had an extra time last night to map out our plans/projects in the pipeline, to do's and to have's, and the corresponding expenses for the rest of the year. i ended up with a heavy heart because of the latter as it will eat a chunk of our savings. unforeseen expenses also came along and adding it up with the gamut will really force us to withdraw part of our savings as our incomes and extra cash are not enough. this lead me to think: what if we didn't oblige ourselves before to save part of our earnings? it's gratifying to know that inspite of the increasing demands of our family (with the coming of iñigo) and increasing prices of the goods nowadays, jude and i managed to save.

life can be really hard these days and for a lot of people, us included, living is all about surviving. hence, we already taught ourselves to live within our means and forego things we cannot really afford or dispense at the moment. wittingly or unwittingly, we learned to be stringent in terms of spending.

- shopping means raiding the malls during mallwide sale/inventory sale only. this is the only time i splurge a little and buy the things and items my family and i would like to have. if the things we need or want can wait until there's an off-the-price promo, then we wait. the same practice goes for our travels. we schedule them as early as possible so we have more time to avail those discounted tickets being offered by some airline companies.

- we buy from divisoria or second-hand shops if possible. when i need new pots or towels for the house i schedule a visit to divisoria as i know i can have them at almost half the price compared to those at the mall. i also intend to buy the things i'll be needing for my store from mk kitchen equipment in reliance, mandaluyong. the stainless trays and bins there are way cheaper than the brand-new.

- we de-list activities that bring no value for us. i hate going to some places or on gimmicks, which are usually unplanned, where we went home as if nothing happened and it was actually better if we just stayed home. i would be more willing to spend 2k for a night of fun and bonding than having spent 500 but thrown in humdrum.

- we cut our subscription expenses at the minimum. we do not have cable for our tv and unlimited internet connection for our computer yet. there's no need as of now. all i think about these two is they will just add up to our monthly bills. we still enjoy life anyway without them.

- we don't buy or spend on credit. we are virtually debt-free since we only have less than 10k in our credit card bill and we can easily pay it off. what we do when we want something badly is we save up for it, and that should be over and above the savings we keep for the rainy days. of course, there's an itch sometimes to buy impulsively and you know very well that nagging voice that tells you "buy now or regret later". jude and i experienced this when we went malling in megamall last december and there's a yearend promo for a plasma tv/dvd/component set, all selling for only 60k! we were already planning to get it on an installment basis since our cash then was alloted to something else but thank goodness we dropped off the plan.

- we delineate the wants from the needs. the truth is there's a thousand and one ways for us to afford upgrading our computer and digital camera, getting a brand new car, or constructing a bigger and nicer house. but we opted to keep our life simple and our financial status in balance by being contented with what we have right now. fyi, jude's is using an old model of motorola for a celfone and even if he has the moolah to buy a newer one, he chose to put his money somewhere else.

we know some people who bask in luxuries and bought luxury cars, grand house, laptops, ipods, condo units, which are beyond their means actually, and now found themselves in deep shit. honestly, we were wowed by their extravagances and their capacity to afford it but still, we'd rather not be like them. these same people are working like dogs now just to keep up with the lifestyle they made.

jude said that if there's one thing we can do with our extra money is to invest in assets, assets as defined by the book of robert kiyosaki... and i must agree with him.

how about you... how do you cope? share it with us please as we may learn something from you.

breastfed babies are smarter babies

iñigo amazed me yesterday when i was putting together the rubber mats which he loves to disassemble. i was fitting in the "number 9" piece into the square mat when he saw me and hurriedly crawled to his bike's basket where he put the other piece i needed. he went back and gave the other piece to me... so smart of him! =D

...and when i give him something he wants and ask him "what will you say, iñigo?", he would instantly say "tezzz". that's "thanks!" hehe. see... my little boy is already that polite. =D

...and his sign of the cross already improved. he can start now with the "in the name of the father" by touching his forehead and wait for us to say amen for him to do the amen sign. we have a pious child in the house! =D

he also got the hang of some of mommy's instructions such as "close the door", "come back to mommy", "do not touch, it would hurt you", and my favorites: "hug mommy" and "kiss mommy". =D

according to research, breastfed babies are ahead by 5 points in IQ level compared to formula-fed babies. that's enough motivation for me to keep breastfeeding my son until he's two.

 

jude's birthday celebration

jude had a grand time in his last birthday. the celebration actually began on its eve as his boss bernie in p&g threw a birthday bash for himself and jude in his house in cabuyao central subdivision, just one block away from our future house.

i prepared tacos as our contribution while the other foods and the booze were shouldered by boss bernie, aside from the videoke rental. the p&g boys had a great time singing and partying all night. the other boys even took off their shirt and waved it in the air when a rock song was being played. oh well... as always said, work hard and play hard... and they did.

we went home past 10.00 as the little boy is already sleepy. oh yes, iñigo went us with us and showed his dancing prowess when someone sang "itaktak mo". hahaha.

we woke up early the next day as i was itching to join the mommy milkshake fun run at the fort--not for the run itself but for the freebies. hehe. the fun run was organized and sponsored by a lingerie manufacturer to help promote breastfeeding in the country. i didn't go home empty-handed as i received a brassiere and panty set from them. babaw ba? lol. jude, on the other hand, was aghast when he saw that the free shirts that we will be using in the run is in pink. pakipot pa... hehehe.

in the end, the three of us (you read it right... we were three and iñigo was again with us in the run and jude carried him using a carrier) ran and enjoyed the morning of jude's birthday. jude was even inspired to join another run with iñigo and was thinking of buying a jersey set for his son. sino ngayon ang oc? hahaha.

after that event we head on to vito cruz to fetch jude's family to have lunch in max's restaurant. afterwards, jude and i left iñigo and his yaya matet with mommy and off we went to mall of asia to watch transformers, which we were aching to see in a big screen even weeks before.

all these happened in jude's birthday and i was glad that he's more than happy as he did everything he wanted to do on his birthday, including wearing a pink shirt. =P

jude here was wearing sunglasses that i gave to him as gift for his recent birthday. i just let him blew a candle on a cupcake because all of us in the house were on low-sugar diet mode; hence, no cake as for now. palusot! hehe.

 

 

 

 

 

counting little accidents as blessings

i write this as a praise to GOD and to remind me that everything that happens to us has a reason so we just have to follow HIM.

here's my story...

jude decided last sunday to spray insecticide around the house as we are under ants attack for almost a month now. of course he couldn't do this while our little boy is around so he told me that we go to a nearby mall while waiting for the odor to diffuse. so while jude was doing the job of spraying insecticides in all corners of the house, iñigo and i jumped into the backseat of the pick-up and waited until he finished off the job.

it was a big mistake for me to let iñigo just sit beside me unstrapped while i was reading a magazine. i forgot that my son is already a toddler and is curious of all the things he could lay his eyes on. one of the things he took fancy of that time was the car door's knob (the pick-up has no child lock feature), he pulled it, and lo and behold, i saw my son diving from his seat! horrors! was glad that i was sitting only a few inches away from him so i caught his body on time. was literally in a state of shock after that scene and even my little boy sensed the fear in my face. looking at him, he didn't know if he would cry because of the accident or because i was too terrified for him. but there's one thing that i was thankful for that afternoon: that little accident happened when the vehicle is not moving. because if it did happen when we were already on the road... oh no, don't want even to think about it... erase, erase.

a similar event happened when we just moved in last april into our new house. we were fixing our things then and positioned the baby cabinet against the window for privacy's sake. little did we know that the wind in cabuyao can be strong sometimes and can move a sturdy object. so there the glass vase was, above iñigo's cabinet, when the wind swept the curtain, which shoved the vase down from where it once stood. thank GOD fo we were all inside the room and iñigo was lying on the bed and not on the rubbermats where the pieces of the glass vase were scattered.

we were really grateful that it happened with a perfect timing. i threw questions like "what if it happened when we were out and the glasses hit iñigo while he's playing on the rubbermats?". i refused to think of any answer but "GOD is really good, HE didn't let it happen to our son."

samu't sari

the building permit application have already been filed with the munisipyo and am hoping that the permit will be released this month. we are targeting september for the start of the house construction and if everything else will fall into place, we will move to our new and OWN house by end of this year. wish us luck, please?

***

i already reserved one space in southpoint square for my food stall. fyi, southpoint square is located beside malayan colleges, mapua's branch in the south and which i was eyeing before to put up my food stall. unluckily (or a blessing in disguise?) my ex-plan didn't materialize. and after so much pondering (and observing), i decided to have a tacos and nachos bar in my stall alongside the fruit juices bar. am targeting the students and yuppies who will drop by the mall to look for alternatives to ordinary snacks.

btw, i asked jude to let me handle and manage this biz alone. i don't want us to end up arguing over petty matters like what's the better nacho dip: cheezy or salsa. hahaha. seriously, putting up a business is complicated enough and i don't want to complicate it further because i have to deal with him always upon making a decision. and knowing how jude can come up with out-of-this-world ideas... que horror!

***

the toyota vios was already bought and on the same day we bought a 2nd-hand isuzu pick-up. there's money left from the transactions and jude and i are on guard (ala jawo) on where it should go. we bought shares of gma-7 when it held an IPO recently. jude also invested on mutual funds and on p&g's cooperative, peca, as their interest rates are doing well right now. he alloted an amount for my biz but i told him that i will raise the capital by myself--saving part of my salaries from my part-time job.