The Easy and Calm Sleep

I have been having hit and miss solutions with Little Man's sleeping schedule, and so I engaged myself into some trial and error procedures to arrive on ways on how to make him sleep faster and easier.  The experiment meant changing old activities and patterns prior his bedtime so the first week was admittedly not easy.  It was hard to change patterns especially since Migo was already faithful to the old one, which by the way I miss so much (yep, I miss the old pattern because that old one had a touch of cuteness on it).  But later on, it became smooth and fine until we found ourselves having no problems at all. 

Did I mention that the last bedtime pattern we had was cute?  Let me tell you why. One of the last things he would do before he hits the bed is to dance to this Toy Story 2 song.  Even if I find the dance so adorable, this too was ejected from the new list of activities before bedtime since dancing is not a good choice to end my toddler's day.  And yes, I miss watching him do his thing.



Now, these are my new successful ways on how to calmly put my Little Man to sleep:

Play Hard

Migo is certified galawgaw. He keeps moving, dancing, playing, and all that. He always moves around and really plays hard. He pretty much has a lot of activities during the day and that works on my advantage since moving a lot is his form of exercise that keeps his mind and body healthy. Also, it makes him sleep better at night. I just make sure that he stops playing or being active before dinner time so to relax his body. That is also the reason why dancing to that Toy Story song before sleeping is not qualified to be on our new bedtime activities.

Shortened Naps
My Little Man needs to recharge himself so a nap for one hour (three hours the most) is necessary to keep him going.  He should not take a nap longer than that because that means struggle to sleep later in the evening. Also, I do not allow him to take naps late in the afternoon for obvious reasons.

Dinner
His dinner is at around 6pm because I do not want him to sleep on a stuffed tummy. He will ask for milk in the middle of the night anyways so I feel it's okay to give him early dinner. And besides, it makes sense that since I am establishing an early bedtime here, dinner must also be served earlier.


Shower Time
The one who takes care of my son gives him a warm bath, or swimming as Migo would call it, at around 7pm and they do that the same time everyday. This also serves as a sign that his playtime is up.

Night Routine
Our activities several minutes after dinner time all lead to the bedroom. Brushing his teeth, washing his bum, a new diaper and set of bedtime wear all tell that he is going to bed any minute from then.

No TV
TV is not allowed at night time since whatever he watches stimulates his  mind and makes it harder for him to go to sleep.  I am also not allowing him to watch scary and violent scenes for it cause nightmares and sleep interruptions.

The Bed
I make sure that his bed is conducive to sleeping. Even us adults do not want to sleep on a cluttered bed, right? His sleeping buddy, Mickey Mouse, must be there already waiting for him. I also make it a point to have his covers changed every so often.

Dark Room
He loves to sleep in a dark room and with the electric fan running so that is granted to him.  No problem with me since I also cannot sleep on a bright room.

The Goodnight Prayer
And the very last thing that we do is say our good night prayer.  We both pray "Angel of God", and he ends it up with "Goodnight Jesus, goodnight Sto. Nino, goodnight Mama Mary...I love you!"  Then he says his I love yous to us, closes his eyes and goes to sleep.



I hope this new list of activities before bedtime helps mommies out there who are having some difficulties putting their sweethearts to sleep early.  Good luck, and hope it goes well!

Rain and Crayons

What's up with the weather today?  I woke up at 9am today, a bit late if you ask me, and I thought it was just like 5 or 6 so I believed I still had a long snooze to go.  Heck, the gray sky fooled me! Due to the gray sky, I thought madaling araw pa lang!! It did not occur to me at once that the sky would be gray the entire day due to the rain.  The sun was having some moods because it just did not want to show her rays. Gloomy days meant Little Man's confinement to the four corners of our tiny pad... how sad could that be?  Poor Little man, no running in the garden for him today.

So to not give him a boring day despite the rain, I thought of an activity that we both could enjoy together-- indoors.  I thought of watching educational videos from YouTube, but refused at once since I am afraid he would demand for more videos and we might end up watching until the afternoon, in which I am trying to avoid.  No-TV policy also means no watching of videos from the laptop, so bye YouTube.  I grabbed a book instead and we did some story telling.  He got excited with it, but the fun ended after four to five stories.  So the last thing I had in mind was crayons. I am a huge fan of everything colorful and so crayons would be something the two of us would happily share together for an activity.  And I was right!! Little Man loved his crayons and we both had fun scribbling, drawing, and making fun of our weird creations!  The crayon activity was a nice way to fight a boring, gloomy, and wet day!








 The best partner with crayons are the papers that we do not have use for anymore, aka scratch papers.  I have tons of it in the bodega,  thus it became useful again.

For awhile, my Little Man did not want to share his crayons.  He held it so tightly that I had no choice but to just watch him do his thing.  I begged and begged until his heart softened.

My Little Man doing his thing.  His face read: Please, do not disturb!

Here's the story behind this picture:

Little Man: Mommy, write write Mickey please? (translation: mommy, please draw Mickey.)

Me: *I drew Mickey* Here's your Mickey!!

Little Man: Mickey 'to mommy?

Me: Yes, that's Mickey!

Little Man: *checked my drawing again* ANG PANGIT!!

And so now I believe that a child really does not tell a lie :)

Bench on Mars

Bench on Mars.  Who does not get the drift?  It's definitely a give away, that this Fil-Puerto Rican named Peter Gene Hernandez is the newest endorser of the biggest local retail of RTW (and more) in the Philippines.  Bench has been making a wise and lucrative move in carefully selecting their endorsers.  Their latest bold move is to get Bruno Mars, who is not just popular in the music scene today, he is also a Filipino!  Billboards in the metro do not show entirely of who the endorser is, but using common sense and some hints (hat, piano, sunglasses), one cannot fail to see that this is Bruno Mars!

Don't throw that used coffee ground!

Coffee, how can I ever live without you?  My mom knows this, and so is my husband:  I can last a day without talking to them, but I cannot make it without having at least two cups of coffee in a day.  I just cannot.  I tried my very best to avoid it but my mind and body always crave for it.  Either I cannot concentrate on my work, I get cranky, or I get a headache.  Coffee just works wonders on me.  Just the smell of it brewing in the coffee maker makes me up and about.  There is something about coffee that makes my day. And in the wee hours while I finish some online work and husband's snore in the background makes me feel so "alone", I just grab a cup of hot coffee and I instantly feel otherwise.  It's like coffee is there to assure me that she is my companion until I finish my project or until my eyes pop out, whichever comes first.  Coffee never fails to make me feel better.  If coffee is a person, then she would be one of my bestie.

My coffee is always brewed.  I guess majority of you will concur with me if I say brewed coffee tastes and satisfies better than the instant coffee found in the grocery.  I only have the instant if I run out of coffee grounds, which I sourced from as far as the highlands of Benguet.  The only downside of brewed coffee is its contribution to my garbage.  I had a use for it, actually.  They say it helps in reducing cellulites by rubbing it on the thigh, so I did that twice a day in the shower for like two weeks.  But since I have been really busy lately, I do not have the luxury of time to do it anymore.  But they say it works, so I might go back to that rubbing routine.

It is only recently that I learned of other uses of used coffee grounds.  And I must say that they are actually effective because I tried some of them already.  So, are you brewing your coffee?  You might want to not throw away that used coffee ground yet.  Keep them in a jar for a while and find a use for them.

In the garden:

-Add coffee grounds to your garden soil.  It is proven effective in repelling snails and some stubborn insects. Also, it has nutrients good for plants so it is also effective as a fertilizer.
-Put some coffee grounds in your part of the garden where ants thrive.  Used grounds is also effective as an ant repellent.


In the house:
-Who wants stinky fridge? Good news! Coffee grounds can be used as a fridge deodorizer.  Coffee has a component that absorbs odor from the refrigerator, thus bye-bye to that unwanted fridge smell!
-Rainy days invite ants inside the house.  Again, you may use coffee grounds to repel ants.  Place them on spots where ants are likely to enter.
-Wet coffee grounds may banish furniture scratches.
-Add it in your dishwashing liquid soap. The grounds help in removing stubborn dirt off your plates and glasses, as well as the ones under your pans.
-Dry your used coffee grounds, place them in a small thin cloth sachet, and hang inside the closet, shoe cabinet, or drawers so to get rid of unwanted odors. You might want to add few drops of vanilla extract to add some scent.  

For health, beauty, and vanity:
-You are done with peeling that garlic and now your hands smell like eeew.  Rub some coffee grounds and the pungent odor will instantly fade away.  You wash it with soap afterwards.
-Who does not want shiny hair? Rub coffee grounds through wet hair and rinse.  The oil found in coffee helps in making the hair shine. 
-It helps in making the cellulite less visible, so you might also want to try this one. In the shower, wet your problem areas and massage used coffee grounds unto it for around five minutes.  Rinse after and proceed to your usual bath routine.
-Cellulite tip no.2 - put a few drops of olive oil in your used coffee grounds (just enought to make it slide to your thighs).  Rub this mixture unto your thighs and after some good five minutes of rubbing, get a cling wrap (be sure you have a a big one) and wrap your thighs with it. This will do for like ten to fifteen minutes.  The heat it generates, plus the caffeine content and the olive oil help reduce that bothersome cellulite.
-Add some in your facial cream and have an instant coffee facial scrub.
-Add some in your unscented massage oil.  The much deserved back massage after work and the coffee aroma relieves stress, relaxes the mind, and uplifts the senses.
-For those with smelly feet (and shoes), you might want to put dry coffee grounds in between your toes first before you wear your shoes.  Since coffee grounds is known to be an effective deodorizer, this might work on stinky feet as well.  If it does not work, wash your feet instead. Wash your feet with water and rub some coffee grounds after you have removed your shoes. This will somewhat help you in eliminating feet odor.

Remember, one of the ways to keep the environment green and healthy is to reuse and recyle.  This is reusing and recycling, my friends!! So let's do our share.  And let us start with our used coffee grounds.