Hi, guys!
Leo and I love this song! It’s true that no matter how sinful we are, our Heavenly Father is just there tirelessly watching over us, catching us every time we fall. His love is overflowing! Please take time to listen to this song. From The Inside Out by Hillsong. Have a blessed day ahead!

P.S: My parenting blog has a new title — Raising My Two Little Angels. Feel free to drop by!

Baby Ayesha woke up very early today (5am) so we decided to get up and join her. By 6am, we were all playing outside while waiting for breakfast to be served (tocino, daing and fried rice — yumminess!). Then Leo cooked yummy macaroni spaghetti for lunch coz our helper had her much-awaited day off after breakfast. Yum-yum!

There’s really no place like home…Here are some of our photos.

Good morning, Philippines!

Ayesha’s chasing Greggy…hehe.

This is the overweight version of me after giving birth. LOL

Ayesha can’t get her eyes off the toys

Baby Ayesha @ 3 months and 2 weeks
More photos here.

If my husband and I didn’t drop by at House of Praise last Saturday, I wouldn’t have found out about Darlene Zschech’s upcoming concert with the Hillsong Worship Team here in Manila. Whoa! For sure, this is gonna be one amazing concert! Can’t wait!

All proceeds will go to ADOPT a Family Program. Hope to see you there! Mark your calendar — April 20th at Araneta Coliseum. Good morning!

UPDATE: April 21, 2010
Last night’s concert was awesome. People were jumping, dancing, raising their hands up in the air and singing their hearts out to God. Pastor Darlene Zschech and the entire Hillsong Worship Team did a fantastic job! Sana maulit muli. Hehe.

GOOD NEWS: Pastor Darlene Zschech, together with her husband, will be coming back in Manila this July to join the EN2010 World Conference. She’ll be one of our guest speakers, so I’ll be seeing her again. Can’t wait!

I’ve just finished reading Raising Godly Kids by Harold J. Sala. I learned a lot from this book. As I flipped through its every page, it made me realize what I am doing wrong and what I am doing right when it comes to raising my children. So I guess the million dollar question that needs an answer is: How do we raise godly kids in this ungodly world? Read what this book has to say and don’t forget to jot down notes! I know as a parent I have made countless mistakes, but I won’t allow those mistakes to hinder me from raising godly kids.

With that being said, allow me to share the things I learned that I’d rather not forget for as long as I live. Things that will mold me into becoming the mother that God wants me to be…

1. Love in the family must be kept alive through little acts of kindness and thoughtfulness.
2. Every child has gifts and abilities. Find out where your child excels and encourage him or her without ignoring the fundamentals of education.
3. Give your child your undivided attention.
4. If you want to be the father or mother that God wants you to be, learn to listen to your child.
5. A reward for doing the right thing teaches the wrong thing.
6. There are no second chances with parenting. If you fail, you can’t go back and start over.
7. The wise parent has to balance protecting a child from hard knocks and letting him experience the consequence of his own actions.
8. Parenting is bringing out the best in our children without condemning them for what they cannot do or making them feel inadequate when they fail to meet our expectations.
9. Teach your child to evaluate what he hears and sees and to think of himself.
10. Strive to be the best message you want your child to see and hear.
11. You can’t pass on the baton of faith to your child unless you have it firmly in your grasp.
12. Be there when your child needs your help.
13. Model the value system that you believe is important.
14. Build your child’s character through moral feeding.
15. Teach your child to be his own person.
16. You have to guard the moral and spiritual nature of your child.
17. Knowing the difference between discipline and punishment gives parenting a different perspective.

I highly recommend this book to every parent who wants to make a difference in the life of his/her offspring. Dr. Sala is right when he said that there are no second chances with parenting. That if we fail, we can’t go back and start over…Years from now, I’m pretty sure none of us would want to look back and ask ourselves “What have I done wrong?”.

P.S: I’m getting more parenting books at National Bookstore this weekend. Feel free to recommend good ones. Thank you!

Last Sunday was a special day.

Special because it was baby Ayesha’s first time to go to church with us. We bought a new stroller for her so we can take her anywhere we go from now on. She’s turning three months next week! Yey!

Here are some of our photos.

We love Sundays!

Before going to their respective classrooms (Kids Church)

Then we went to Market Market after the service…Our little princess didn’t make a fuss at all. She seemed to have enjoyed every bit of her first stroll around the mall!

Daddy’s little girl

Feeding time!

More pictures here.

Oh by the way, So-Cuddly.Net is now up and running. I was able to transfer it to my new host. The images on my posts are missing though. Because when O2g’s server (my former host) unexpectedly crashed two weeks ago, I didn’t have a back up of my wp-content folder. So I lost all my plugins, themes and images. It’s a good thing I was using the WP-DB Backup plugin on that blog which automatically sends a back up of my WordPress database to my email. Otherwise, I would’ve lost all the posts I wrote for the last two years. This plugin really saved my day! I highly recommend this to those who have WordPress hosted blogs and are too busy to backup their database regularly. Thanks, Filosofo!

He who spares the rod hates his son, but he who loves him is careful to discipline him. — Proverbs 13:24.

Have you ever felt frustrated over disciplining your child? That sometimes it makes you think you’re not doing a good job in the Parenting Department? That if it were some course in college, you’d flunk miserably? Well, you’re not alone. I sometimes feel it too.

They say if you want to be a good parent, you can’t be too strict nor too permissive. You need to learn how to balance discipline and love. But since you can’t practice being a parent unless you become one, how would you know when you’re pulling the rope too tight or too loose? Children, as they grow, tend to do things on their own without knowing the consequences of their actions. And as parents, we try to protect them from going through unnecessary hurts and frustrations. Hence, the spoiling part comes in (ahhh, I’m so guilty!). Between me and my husband, he is the disciplinarian and I (believe) am the spoiler. Although he can be a spoiler too, he seems to know perfectly where to draw the line and is often good at imposing corrective actions on our four-year-old son. (Yeah, I guess he’s the better parent).

There are many ways to discipline a child. One of them is spanking. While I strongly agree that this may be an effective method, I don’t think it works for every child (especially if it’s done the wrong way). If spanking is too much and is done out of anger and frustration of the parent, the child becomes more violent and hard to control.

When we were just a couple, my husband once told me that spanking is okay as long as it is clearly explained to the child the reason for such kind of discipline and as long as it doesn’t go beyond a mere slap on the butt. If you hit your child on the head or strangle his neck, then it becomes wrong. As parents, we need to know the difference between child abuse and discipline.

I always try to discipline my son by patiently (errr – sometimes I’m not even that patient. LOL) explaining to him why he can’t always get what he wants, but more often than not, my begging just falls on deaf ears. It’s just amazing how kids can be controlling sometimes. *sigh* And because we love them, we often lose our parental authority by giving in to their wishes. (Guilty again! LOL)

I don’t believe in violence, but if you’re gonna ask me if spanking is sometimes necessary to discipline our children, then my answer is yes. But if you can make them follow your rules and control their wrongdoings without spanking, then much better. Remember, strict parenting doesn’t always get positive results.

How about you? How do you discipline your child? What do you do to make him listen to you without spanking? Do you believe in the saying Spare the rod and spoil the child?

Share your thoughts, please! Thank you.