The Baby Blog

I may not get that many readers, but I hope that you take the time to read this:

A couple nights ago, John and I received call from a friend we knew during our college days in PACE at SF State, OJ Leonardo. For me personally OJ is a dear friend as he was my mento and role model, and a big influence in getting me active in the community. Unfortunately his call was not just to catch up, but a call to help save the life of his son, Harrison.

Harrison was diagnosed with Leukemia at a very young age. He had undergone chemotherapy and was in remission. However, just before Thanksgiving he relapsed and is now in need of a bone marrow transplant. Meet Harrison and learn about his story at www.helpharrison.com or www.caringbridge/visit/harrisonleonardo

This story still brings tears to my eyes as I know this could have easily been one of my sons, and no child should have to endure so much with so much more ahead of him. John and I will be emailing all our friends to pull together donor drives to get as many people tested to see if there is a match for Harrison. The Asian American Donor Network will send out a staff person if we can get 20 people signed up to be tested. If you have already been tested you know how easy it was, and I think it's even easier now! So please help spread the word. the AADN has a list of upcoming donor drives on the first website I listed for Harrison.

We will post our donor drives/parties as soon as we can get an interest list going.... our goal is to have one in all parts of the bay area!!! If you are interested to help us organize or would like to be tested please let us know! Thank you...

First Cheryl Burke wins a second time with her partner, Emmitt Smith on Dancing w/ the Stars... then on Saturday, Manny "Pac-Man" Pacquiao wins a second time against Morales in the 3rd Round!! Wow, Pinoy/Pinay Pride!

We had a mini fight night get together at the house... but even the singing (National Anthem's from both PI and Mexico) and introductions took longer than the actual fight! As anti-climatic as it was, it was still a good fight to watch cuz as soon as they would rock the punches they would go at it...and I hate watching fights!

Oh yeah, and USC beat CAL... sorry Drama Queen... but yeah for Rok Star!!! And I did some early shopping with GooseNeps and scored on a pair of Down House Slippers from Restoration Hardware Outlet for $6.00!! And I finally got my dark brown and neutral tone close-toed shoes for work for a total of $80.00 from Naturalizer.

So if anyone is down for Black Friday.. The outlets open at midnite Thanksgiving night!

Well my days of comfort and spoils will soon be coming to an end. In some ways it is good news, but I was getting really comfy with our current situation...

Beginning tomorrow, Damoomoo will be back to world of the EMPLOYED... but during the graveyard shift (hey, UPSer, looks like he beat you to it!) 11pm to 7am! well training will be from 6pm to 2am! I am actually really sad because I enjoyed having him at home or at least having some free time together! Plus, when he has gigs, we will be down to Saturday and Sunday mornings!!

But his job, although not the largest income, could definitely leap to bigger things, and the benefits could really be used to our advantage! And when AJ starts public school, he'll be home to pick him up, and once again he will not be commuting very far *LUCKY*!!

Congratulations, daddy!

I already have a hard enough time trying to figure what to wear to work everyday (especially considering that my house and work have a 10 degree difference in weather!), and the fact that I hate ironing my clothes!

But I really need a full-length mirror in the garage to check to see if my shoes look good with the rest of the "hard to pick" outfit! cuz today, it's just all WRONG!

I admit I choose my shoes based on comfort and predicting how much walking I'll actually have to do (more meetings = more walking). But geez, what I chose today, is cause for the fashion police!

No it's not Mother's Day, or anything like that but I've gotta brag about how lucky I am to have a mom and mother-in-law that I get along with so well. Yes I admit my mom can still manage to drive me nuts, but that's my mom. At least I know that Damoomoo gets along with her too, she isn't "crazy" or completely unreasonable. And my mother-in-law, what is there not to love.

But the best thing about them is that they do everything above and beyond to make our boys happy and fed! Nana is always making cookies and pancit with the boys in mind. And did I mention the bag full of clothes they bought the boys and the new winter jackets! My mom who came over last night with my stepdad to fix and pick-up the blue car (finally), made sinigun *that's what the boys call it, the boys' favorite dish! And guess what... both of them ate 2 servings each! On top of that mama tess gave Mio his bath and massaged a kink out of neck-- all before she left!

And to top it all off, they watch our boys when we have to do "grown-up stuff", and most of the time it includes a sleepover!

So yes, I have to give much love, kisses, and thanks to the moms in my life! MWAH :)

I have looked forward to this 3-day weekend since the last long weekend (the beginning of the school year) and I had so many things planned... take the kids on an train trip to the city, which got changed to a Ferry ride, and go to the Lawrence Hall of Science museum for the Dinosaur exhibit (moved to the downtown area during re-modeling of the GGPark site)

but guess what... the boys were home sick all of last week and because I fought hard at not catching their "bug", at the first sign of REST, my body caved in! But the best thing about the whole thing --- it forced me to stay home, and luckily Damoomoo didn't have any gigs or meetings, so the family just stayed home.

Well, we did make a trip out to the outlets with UPSer. I scored with a $5 blouse from Banana! Probably would have bought more, but decided to wait until Thanksgiving (hint: Outlets open at MIDNITE on Thanksgiving night!), and of course we ended the evening with Carne Asada French Fries & Horchata!

Oh and did I mention that we watched the WHOLE Star Wars adventure beginning with Episode I all the way to Return of the Jedi in HD! MnM spoke about nostalgia walking around SF State... I felt nostalgia watching the original Star Wars to Return of the Jedi! Yes, we stayed up until past midnite to finish them. I admit we didn't just SIT on the couch the whole time watching every single second... but it was on!

Thanks to Damoomoo for just letting me be lazy this weekend... I really LOVED it. Now if I can just get rid of this cough!

Now that Kuya is in Kindergarten, he has homework every week. Each week presents a new letter and number. (Thankfully we get the previous ones back with a few corrections here and there, but mainly with happy faces.) But to let him feel a part of the experience, we give Mio the 'old homework' to complete and trace the letters.

Last week we took a co-worker home who lives about 5 minutes away from us. We went insider to see her new house, (her husband thought the boys looked so much alike, that he thought he was seeing the same boy!) We couldn't stay long as I had to remind AJ of his homework. My co-worker playfully asks Mio, "Do you have homework, too".

Mio responds:
"Yes, the letter A, and the letter 9!"

Sounding it out.
Part of Kindergarten is also learning how to read words by sounding it out. Remember in either Sesame Street or Electric Company they had a "shadowed couple" who would sound out words separately and put them together?
You know what I'm talking about!:
"BLOG"
"GER"
"Blogger"!!!

Mio: I know how to spell 'tail'
Mom: Oh really! How do you spell 'tail'
Mio: tuh (the T sound), tuh, tuh.... "TAIL"!!

wow!