Our experience at the 37th Manila International Book Fair

Thanks to Homeschoolers of the Phililpines, a homeschooling Facebook group I belong to, I found out that the 37th Manila International Book Fair (MIBF) was scheduled this September at SMX and got free passes too! :)

I love books (and now even children's books) so I practically "begged" Daddy A to clear up our very tight schedule just so we can go and bring along Z. I knew that as a little bookworm, it'd be such a treat for her to experience her first book fair :)

So we went a little bit early and took a stroll along SM Mall of Asia's bay walk. 

Exercising by the bay

We had a quick bite at Starbucks too while waiting for the book fair to open its doors at 10 AM.

When we arrived at quarter to 10, we were a bit surprised with the already zigzagging line of people going inside SMX. Had we known about this queue, we would have wrapped up our breakfast much sooner. 

Grabbed a quick bite

We only had a couple of hours to spare to "get lost inside" so it was really a good thing that I chanced upon the recommendations of Ms. Donna Simpao Pangilinan in her HomesCool blog. I just went through her list and visited the booths that would best suit the season we are in. We were a group of 6 and we went in 4 different directions 😜 Myself looking at preschool/kindy products, hubby over at the Architecture books, FIL I guess looked at Agri books and my MIL went to the Grolier booth with the kids :)

Hubby's books - Diksiyonaryong Biswal ng Arkitekturang Filipino & Three Centuries of Binondo Architecture

First stop for me was Pauline's..

At this point I was still mindful of the budget. Well, more like keeping in mind that most booths I visited only accepted cash payment. 

I was able to score 5 books at a discount of course and the booth-keepers were really nice. I even overheard one sister comment something along the line of "hindi sayang ang pag-join nila sa fair". Whether it was due to monetary gains for their products or the fact that they are able to evangelize thru joining the fair or both..I was actually touched (and really happy that the Lord provided for them) when I heard her utter those words.

At Pauline's, I'm a Paulinian after all :)

Second I went to Bookmark and purchased 4 packs of "Original Artwork created by a boy with autism" each pack has 8 Notecards and 8 Envelopes. I was reserving these for Christmas or even just a "how are you" letter to friends. I ended up using 2 right away for reasons I will share in my next post.

Original artwork by a very talented child

Third stop for me was the Sing, Spell, Read and Write set of books although they ran out of packages already. I hope I can see them once more during the Homeschooling Conference this October! :)

Fourth stop, now with hubby in tow was the Jolly Phonics booth. First time I've heard about them from Ms. Donna's blog but when they explained each book and package to us, we decided this is a must-try for our toddler. Although it is really on the expensive side (even with a discount hehe), to us it is worth it for our homeschooling plans. 2 weeks from having the book with songs CD, Z already knows most of them and more importantly, is able to recognize the sounds each letter / phoneme makes. We're not rushing her to read at this point but we also want to expose her to different modes and mediums for learning. And I say we need to give our Leapfrog DVD's a rest too! :)

Some packages are PHP 30-70+k, these are for schools, I believe.

We got The Phonics Handbook & Jolly Songs with CD from them, luckily we were given a discount. Otherwise these 2 books alone would've cost us about PHP 5,000.00 already (what?!?) Hehehe. Daddy A gave me "the look" as if to say, you better make this worth if for the children 😂 The nice thing about this handbook is that I can make copies (legally allowed) for our home so that means I can really use this for more than 1 child :)

The snake is in the grass, the snake is in the grass...

The fifth and final stop - actually my MIL's stop - was the Grolier booth. I thought they were just looking at the products until I realized they actually bought a whole cart-full of children's educational books like the following series - Talking English (with talking pen), How Do You Know (with talking pen) & Fun-Thinkers with Match Frame. Wow!!! It was an advanced and truly merry Christmas gift for the kids because we had to make sure the pens were working :) Thank you so much Amah M & Angkong D!

Now I know what (and how much! hahaha) I have to prepare for next year's book fair! :) Just kidding Daddy A....but not really! :p

Knocked out baby in the Lille

Grolier books and talking pens from Amah M & Angkong D..thank you!!! :D

Our 4th Wedding Anniversary

Latepost :)

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It's our 4th Wedding Anniversary!!!! :D

Funny how I still seem to remember things that happened on that day, how I felt, how others probably felt and many others in between. And yet here I am trying to remember everything that happened in the past four years...some are remarkable, some regrettable, and some just feel like a big blur!

What do we have to show for the past 4 years? That's something that I always think about. Material wealth, well not so much for now. That's something we have to steadily work for. But I'm forever grateful for being blessed with my family - hubby, dear Z and a little one on the way! Yes, we have a new bub coming soon! :D 

Honestly, this is probably the season in my life I'm least prepared for. I mean being a wife, being a mother and being at home most of the time. I've always thought I'd be slaving away in the corporate world even with kids but what do I know...priorities change. Here I am, a full-time homeschooling stay at home mom (SAHM). There are of course things I miss but I know that right now we're making the best choice for our family :) 

Photo by Reality Box

Remember how I told you last year that we'd make sure to always celebrate our anniversary and of course, get our yearly dose of Alex Franco's yummy cake? Well this year, this clearly did not happen. Instead of a nice night out, we headed to the hospital to get the little one checked. Instead of steak for dinner, well we still had dinner of course but I had to relegate the cooking (supposedly my gift or treat for A) to our helper. Instead of a nice cake, well, the chicken macaroni salad is still in the fridge hehe.

In the past (boyfriend-girlfriend stage), anniversaries are more or less grand gestures with flowers, dinners and gifts. I definitely would've been frustrated if we did not have anything special planned out. But again, life I mean married life with kids changes one's perspective drastically. Today it's okay we don't go out for dinner. Today it's okay to book a Grab taxi going to the hospital and "book" a tricycle going home. Welcome to real married life! :)

P.S. Okay, not being totally KJ here...little Z and I (despite our stuffed noses) were trying our best to surprise Daddy A with our recorded song. I guess I underestimated the time needed to record and edit haha...will probably release that when we have the time. Next year, perhaps? Haha :)

Happy Anniversary to us, Daddy A! I love you forever! :)

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P.P.S.

We did have a nice meal in a resto after all! :) Here we are in Mary Grace Cafe at Lucky Chinatown Mall, still under the weather but enjoying the good food nonetheless :)

What worries me everytime we eat out is whether Z will like to food. Good she enjoyed the mushroom soup and pasta arrabiata *thumbs up!*

Ordered Perfect Plate #3 with Apple Cinnamon Honey Iced Tea. Loved the chorizo pasta here :)

Pasta Arrabiata. I would've gone crazy with chili peppers here if only I wasn't sharing with Z hehe..

With our Lillebaby Carryon (toddler-size) Airflow. Basically this is how we roll. Strollers are just a back-up for us but we find this more convenient :)

Homeschool: Learning even if teacher mommy is sick

Still learning even if mommy is sick 🤒. I actually worried that since her favorite is our read-aloud time, and I physically can't do too many read-alouds today, our homeschool today would be blah or "cancelled". I even thought of just leading her to do arts like coloring, doing dot art or even just cutting paper. 

Yet here she was, very excited to pounce on her Jumbo Bananagrams and make up words..the very long ones like only toddlers can :) 

Today I'm really amazed at hearing her sound out all letters from this very long "word" she is still forming. On a side note, I tried sounding out CVC words with her a few weeks back a la Talking Words Factory. She wasn't so receptive with the activity so I planned to just delay it for next year since she's barely 3 anyway..so seeing her do this or at least attempting to sound out words is really such a treat for me! 

Overheard her saying this:

"Pag B, "buh"..Pag T, "tah"..essentially sounding out the letters as well as identifying them. 

When she manages to pick same letters from her Bananagrams, she matches them or if not she finds out the match from the alphabet chart..talk about self-directed learning. All credit to her for this activity since I'm merely an observer today..not even a facilitator aack! Although how I wish I was :)

This makes me so much excited to start out the Jolly Phonics we got from the Manila International Book Fair! :)

PS. She also requested we read another Ballet book (PHP 99 @ NBS), she's just so fascinated with the different forms 👯

Kanto Freestyle Breakfast at Midnight

Just got home from dinner with A's college friends. I'm supposed to feel full with all the yummy Apartment 1B dishes..but there's something about eating and at the same time feeding and entertaining a toddler that has left me all sorts of famished. 😬

Luckily we were able to drop by Kanto Freestyle in Boni, Mandaluyong for a quick take-out trip 👍🏻👍🏻

New Zealand Beef Tapsilog

Goya Chocnut Ganache Pancake

Since it's already midnight, I "just" (hahaha) ate half of each 😋 Now I feel everything's' right in the world..or at least in my tummy!

Sweetest dreams! :)

Happy Grandparents' Day

"What children need most are the essentials that grandparents provide in abundance. They give unconditional love, kindness, patience, humor, comfort, lessons in life. And most importantly, cookies." -Rudy Giuliani 

To all our dear grandparents, thank you so much for everything and we love you very much! :)