I confess, after hearing Keira Knightley’s remark that James McAvoy is the best kisser among all her leading men, I was flabbergasted. What? Not Orlando Bloom? No! It can’t be. So then I watched the much talked about Atonement. But since my Blockbuster queue messed things up, I started with Becoming Jane with the ethereally beautiful Anne Hathaway. James plays the one that got away. The guy who supposedly inspired Jane Austen to write about love and romance. Now I am not the type who likes period drama and all those costumes makes me thank the heavens for the evolution of fashion. But this particular one, I liked. Love the flowing nightgowns. Love the prim and proper dialogues. All the propriety reminiscent or perhaps what inspired the chipmunks who speaks so politely: “shall we go?” “perhaps we should”. “after you” , “no, after you”. The actors were superb - Maggie Smith as the sinister Aunt, James Cromwell as Jane’s father, Julie Walters as Jane’s Mom.

Anyways, this is such a good movie. The thought that Jane had a love affair was very refreshing indeed. That she was so inlove but still let her mind rule over her heart was so heart wrenching and beautiful. And that was there, in that movie, that I fell inlove with James McAvoy.

Atonement was a highly acclaimed movie. A little dark and disturbing on some levels but it was the love story that mesmerized me. The acting was very good and once again, James stole my heart. The storyline was thought provoking and at the same time very heart wrenching. Keira Knightley is such a great actress and easy on the eyes too.

In the end, after watching both movies, I wholeheartedly agreed with Keira Knightley. Sorry, Orlando Bloom, it’s over between the two of us. It’s not you. It’s me.
 

Insensitive friend strikes again!
IF: Hey, whatchadoin?
Me: Oh, you know, puttering around the house.
IF: I am so bored! I don’t know how you do it!
Me: Well…
IF: I mean, how can you stay at home day in and day out, attending to your children’s and husband’s needs? Don’t you get bored? I am so glad my maternity leave ends in a few weeks. But you! You’re stuck there for the long haul.
Me: You see, (formulating a snappy comeback)
IF: Well, gotta go, the baby needs to be fed.
Me: (reluctantly)Bye.

Grey’s is Back! The long awaited epi after the writer’s strike was aired last night. And I had to remind my family that I am back as well. Meaning back to my old schedule of TV night. It started with Ugly Betty at 8 pm where the pathetic Henry proved even more pathetic and the Baby Mama proved to be more annoying. I loved Hida’s protecting her baby sister, Justin’s sassyness and Christina’s accent. While Alexis is growing on me and Renee and Wilhelmina is proving to be the sisters from hell. Too melodramatic and soap opera-ish, if you ask me. Mark had a lot of airtime in this one, not a lot for Amanda. And Gio, the knight in shining armor needs to better get his groove on and start talking!
The commercials were oh so painstakingly plentiful and entertaining at the same time. New movies to watch out for - Hancock with Will Smith, Speed racer with Emile Hirsch and Christina Ricci, Ironman with Robert Downey Jr. etc.
And GA! Oh where do I start? let’s start with what I didn’t like:
Rose, nuff said
Hahn
Callie
Christina-too worshipy of Hahn
what I did like:
George finally admitting he complains too much and vowed not to anymore
Lexie - looking all puppy eyed and delivering her own “pick me, choose me, love me” not in a romantic way though
The Chief - acting all authoritative and delivering advices at the same time, shows heart, compassion and caring
Meredith - finally admitting she has a problem and is taking steps to move forward
Neutral (but I still love them both)
Izzie
Alex
Next Thursday promises to be a promising week as well. Can’t wait!!!

It has been a whirlwind of activity once again as we welcomed Spring. This is the time where people suddenly come out of hibernation, soak in the sun and do crazy things like jogging, take a sudden interest in gardening, and pretty much whacking every weed, bush and greenery they see in their yard. TheFisherman is no exception. He’s an avid gardener but Spring especially brings out the Outdoorsy type in him. He treks to the Home Depot and takes on projects quicker than you can say I-have-to-do-everything-this-Spring. The sunporch/sunroom roof has been fixed by the contractors, who after tasting our home cooked meal, suddenly didn’t want to leave. The 1 1/2 day project stretched out to 3 days and I scrambled to prepare their coffee, snacks, lunch and dinner. It was tiring but fun at the same time. For someone to appreciate my cooking was the best compliment. They particularly liked the biko -sticky rice cooked in coconut milk and sugar. I made some for them to take home and they said they ate it with ice cream. After they have left, TheFisherman decided we needed to give the ceiling and floor a fresh coat of paint. Which we did one weekend.
It doesn’t stop there.
TheFisherman also plans to make a paved patio, flagstone the stoop, change all the bathroom fixtures and God knows what else. Oh and yes, he also just recently re-seeded the whole front yard. He bought a whole dump truck load of top soil which they dumped in the middle of the driveway and which we shoveled and wheelbarrowed for 3 days. My biceps and shoulder muscles were screaming! The neighbors were all slowing down as they passed by and saw this huge pile of dirt. The perplexing looks on their faces saying “what the?” One neighbor finally came up to me and asked: “what’s going on, Mary?” I managed to respond between shovelling : “we can’t afford a gym membership”. To which she laughed and left me grunting and sweating. I secretly wished this whole thing is going to be worth it. The image of me sipping iced tea in the front yard admiring my green green grass kept me going.
Right now the huge pile has been reduced to a field of dirt scattered with grass seeds and fertilizer which TheFisherman dutifuly waters every day.
Yesterday, he looked at me while watering the lawn and said: “so we’ll get the flagstone this weekend?”

Some snippets of our conversation:

On seeing me take my earrings off

Tween1: Why do girls wear earrings anyway?
Me: To make us look prettier
Tween1 (aghast): Why? That’s not right. That’s self-mutilation!
Me: Well, in tribes they even have those huge plates hanging from their mouth and rings on their necks.
Tween1: But still!

While driving on top of the hill and admiring the view:

Me: Oh look at that beautiful view?
Tween1: What’s beautiful about it? They cut down trees to build houses.
Me: Well the houses’ colors looks really nice.
Tween1: It would have been nicer if the only color is green - for all the trees.
Me: But still!

Avee tagged me for this. Thanks!

~~Begin Copy~~

I am tagging Julie, Cookie, Feng, Anne and Maps

I saw this at Paula Deen’s show. Since I had all ingredients on hand and anticipating the arrival of my hungry sons ready to pounce on whatever after-school snacks there are, I hurried and made these.

Apparently, The King himself, Elvis Presley loves these Peanut Butter and Jelly sandwiches with bananas. Now this is a good way for a Mom to sneak in some fruit in a snack. Covered with the gooey peanut butter and slathered with the jelly, the bananas are unrecognizable. The added effect of the bread toasted and covered in cinnamon sugar made it more appealing to the young eyes. It was a cinch to make but I had a slice myself and approved this recipe. Kid tested, mother approved indeed!

Recipe can be found here.

Thanks to all those who greeted me on my 1st blogversary. It is comments from people all over the globe that makes us feel connected and appreciated. In fact I can open up a lot in my blog and vent to my heart’s content knowing that somewhere someone out there must be going through the same stuff I am. That makes it bearable and that makes blogging worthwhile.

That said, how do y’all like my new look? I thought that after a year, it was time to shed my old skin and don a new one. Of course I haven’t gotten round to tweaking it yet as I’ve been running around like a chicken with my head cut off. Tween2 has been sick for almost a week now and his Pediatrician did some tests, the results of which we are still awaiting. For now he stays here at home with me, watching TV and resting. Poor kid has bags under his eyes like a journalist on a deadline. It is for this reason that we weren’t able to go to the Cherry Blossom Festival. I could have gotten lots and lots of pictures of pretty flowers and picturesque scenes. Instead, we are at home. Oh well, maybe next weekend.

We are also having some work done in the sunroom/sun porch. And what was supposedly a 1 1/2 days work turned out to be 3 days. So 1 sick kid + 1 contractor + 2 workers = Mom’s messed up routine. Note how I did manage to sneak up some blogging time though (wink wink).

And so once again, thanks to all those who greeted me. Here’s to another year.

There’s this new show on TLC entitled “The Secret Life of a Soccer Mom“. The premise of the show is that a Mom goes off for one week. Her family thinks she’s off to a spa getaway but the truth is that she’s on a one week soul searching journey. Reliving what she used to be or trying out what she’s always wanted to do. At the end of the week, she gets to decide whether to pursue a career or stay at home. I watched this episode where a former award- winning chef had to give up her career to care for her 2 toddlers and stay at home with the kids. I can totally relate. Of course I’m no award-winning chef but I did give up my career to stay at home and take care of my kids and husband. And seeing the woman be in her element in the kitchen was really something. She even said: “this is the best right here, just me with my spoon. I’m happy”.

It made me think of me. Of what I could have been and what I could become. There are restrictions now that I have kids. Daycare expenses, the thought of leaving the kids to strangers and letting them raise your kids does not appeal to me. So we make sacrifices. For the sake of the kids. For the sake of our marriage. For the sake of our husbands. And sometimes we get lost in the process. Who am I now? What have I become? And we lose the self-confidence, the self-esteem, the feeling of self-worth. Can I still do it? Will I be able to deliver?

Now I know that the TV producers just might have thought of this show as another way to make money and capitalizing on the reality-based shows’ successes. But it still made an impact and was thought provoking enough for me to write about it here in my blog. It made me pause and ponder.

I have yet to watch another episode. Once was enough to have made an impact.

image credits: www.tvguide.com

my very first attempt at an angel cake to celebrate my first year of blogging

I just saw from my registration here at WordPress that I recently celebrated my one year anniversary. And even though I do have posts from way back, they were basically lifted from my jurassic era (read: paper-and-pen journal). I’ve been writing and been uploading pics and receiving awards and making friends and I am very grateful. But I am still a newbie. I have yet to figure out a lot of things:

1. How do I protect my pictures? Sometimes I don’t upload pics to my posts for fear of being snatched away by pic      thieves. And can you say privacy issues? I don’t want images of my sons in some wireless phone ad just like what happened here.  
2. How do I do the widget thingy on the right side showing the award I got and in the process thanking the people who gave me the awards? I did it with the Rockin’ Blogger things but has since forgotten. Which makes me feel incredibly incompetent.
3. How do I do the RSS feeds? I still manually go to the blogs on my blogroll my clicking on their site.
4. How can I enlarge my fonts? I squint whenever I read my posts.

Can you say techie challenged?

I am very grateful for what blogging has done for me. I have met new blogger friends and have made connections. I have shared my stories as they have theirs and I shared some emotions I haven’t dared share with my relatives and friends. Special mention goes to Pinoy Moms Network where I met awesome Pinoy Moms from all over the world. You all rock!

And so goes a year of blogging. Here’s to another year. And another. And another.