This is it.

In a few hours’ time, we go through a new phase in the changes that are about to happen to my children. While the youngest is happily vacationing with my MIL down South, the eldest child and the boy are going in different directions, to two different schools this coming June.

I don’t know how I will juggle having three children in three different schools and I know the schedules are going to be a bit crazy. I don’t know if I can still bring over projects, assignments, printed materials that have been left on a table somewhere and remembered when they are within the confines of the school.

The eldest child will be enrolling for her first semester in college.

The son will have an interview to a school because he passed the school’s entrance exams.

I hope and pray that we are doing the right thing in guiding the children through the steps for the realization of their dreams.

I am also sure that my husband and I would be there for them all throughout their learning process and even beyond that, maybe even if there are employment screening at easy back ground tasks to be accomplished for them.

Am excited for both of them. I better get some sleep because we have a long day ahead of us tomorrow.

Summer Vacation is officially here.

The children have their own destinations this summer and all of them, including their cousins from the husband’s side of the family are going down South to spend summer with the MIL.

Looking at the vacation photos of some of my friends make me melancholic at times because we do not have the luxury to do these things together.

For one, since the kids are away, how can we? Sure, it would be nice to dream about having a luxury apartment in paris, even if only for a few days. Sure it would be nice to walk down the streets of Paris savoring the rich aroma of food wafting from cafes and feeling the cool weather, a good enough excuse to use clothes fit for cooler climates. I can dream for this vacation with the family, can I? Perhaps in the future, when all responsibilities have been settled.

Anyway…

Another thing would be setting aside extra budget which we don’t seem to have a plenty of, especially since we have a college-bound child for the coming school year.

Someone once said that parents need not burden their children about expenses to be incurred with their schooling because as parents, we should have known better and have planned well for these things, whether or not these are still several years from happening.

But how can one do so when there is just enough to cover for immediate needs and not have extra to save for the years to come?

Let us not “judge” and tell other parents what we think is best for their children or what we think they should have done in the first place. Maybe it would help if we try to encourage other parents than try to have them see their shortcomings which I know they are very well aware of.

Ahhh… am straying away from the topic. Even if we could not check in at a luxury hotel in the metro during long weekends, enroll in fun summer activities nor head off to a dream beach destination, we know that having each other and spending time together are enough to make summer vacation fun and enjoyable.

I posted this question in FB the other day:

How do we tell our kids that everything is ok if they are disappointed, their expectations not met and their hearts and spirits broken?

How?

This school-year has started out smoothly with the kids but we experienced a few bumps along the way. One has set us back big time and the other was tolerable. Looking back to my daily “Grateful today…” posts in Facebook (I think I should do this in this blog), I realize that we have more blessings than non-blessings or challenges. And for that alone, I am truly grateful.

We all make mistakes. Our children make mistakes and we, as parents should be there to guide them and not castigate and wait for the explanation why these mistakes happened. We may know the reasons or we may not know at all but the important thing would be to help them learn from these mistakes.

Our children will encounter hurts, pains, broken hearts and wounded spirits but what counts most is that we are there to help them grow stronger, learn from these things and guide them look for their own place under the sun and become better persons. Disappointments and mistakes will set us back and in doing so, we see the bigger picture from another angle and know that we still could do better.

We may know what should be and what is right for them but in the end, they themselves have to deal with these things and learn from these experiences. We step back and be the “wind beneath their wings” and not the puppeteer who will flap their wings for them or just have them stay in the nest, safe and sound.

Khalil Gibran wrote:

You may give them your love but not your thoughts.
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow,
which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.
You may strive to be like them, but seek not to make them like you.
For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.

Here are more Life Lessons posts I wrote in the past.

Parents, do you monitor the things your kids read, see and watch online?

We can’t monitor everything, yes, but we can tweak settings to avoid having them see, watch and read things that they are supposed to.

How?

• You can use the SafeSearch filter in the setting. This can be done with tablets and mobile gadgets too.
• The router can be also used to block out certain sites as well as to shut down the internet connection on certain hours, especially during sleep time
• Use Chrome Nanny (this is a useful tool for you to stop peeking in your favorite social media and entertainment sites when you should be working, right?)
• Clear your search history or surf the web incognito (this though is what the children do to avoid detection so it is better to use Safe Search filter)

Whether you are on the lookout for the latest stats of your favorite sports, looking at cigar magazine ipad for your fave uncle, or simply just looking online for a surprise gift for your child’s birthday next week, it is better to be cautious when using these gadgets especially if your children use the same one.

The Kontra Sakit, Kontra Liit Campaign with Ceelin Plus kicked off last year.

This campaign aims to curb growth stunting among Filipino children. The Food and Nutrition Research Institute (DOST-FNRI) conducted a study on the nutritional status of Filipino children in 2011. The results they got are the following:

• 3 in every 10 children ages 0-5 years old are stunted for their age
• among children who are 6-11 months, 16.2 percentage have stunted growth
• stunted growth reaches as high as 33.6% when these children turn a year old

The Philippines has the second highest incidence of stunting in Southeast Asia, with Indonesia at the top spot, according to a United Nations Development Programme study. The high prevalence of growth stunting in the Philippines, placed at 30-39% for chidren under age five has already been a concern with the UN Development Report, back in 2008.

There are two factors main factors to be considered in the incidence of growth stunting among Filipino children:

• malnutrition
• recurrence of illnesses and infections

Underprivileged children in developing countries such as the Philippines have a high prevalence in the incidence of growth stunting than their counterpart at a higher socioeconomic level.

These height deficits in children are related to poverty and other environmental influences (dirty environment, unsafe water, dirty air, too many people in a small space) than to genetic influences in body size, even if there are differences in ethnicity across socioeconomic strata.

It is in this regard that Unilab’s Ceelin Plus launched Kontra Sakit, Kontra Liit campaign. The campaign aims to increase awareness about growth stunting and highlight the importance of strong immunity against illnesses and infections that further contribute to the condition of growth stunting.

Why Ceelin Plus? Ceelin Plus has

• vitamin C that forms part of the body’s natural immune system and stimulates the activities of the antibodies and immune cells.
• ZINC  is needed for the normal delveopmental and maintenance of the immune system.

The preventive supplementation of 10mg/day of zinc increases the immunity against repeated illnesses which has a significant effect on the growth of children less than five years old.

Last year, our youngest daughter got sick for several days. She didn’t go to school for a week. Her fever, though not high, was on and off. She didn’t have much appetite. She was lethargic most of the time.

When we had a check-up, the pediatrician said that she has tonsillitis.

Here are the symptoms of tonsillitis:

• Fever
• Bad breath
• Nasal congestion and runny nose
• Swollen lymph nodes
• Red, swollen tonsils covered completely or in patches by pus
• Difficulty swallowing
• Headache
• Abdominal (belly) pain
• Raw, bleeding patches on the tonsils

These were what we did after she was seen by the doctor:

• we had an appointment with an ENT doctor who used a video otoscope on her. He cleaned her ears too.
• we were prescribed antibiotics for the tonsilitis
• we had blood tests done to rule out dengue fever

If your child (or you) suffer fever for a few days, go see your medical doctor immediately to rule out infections, dengue fever and other complications.