Pedring

Afternoon classes were suspended yesterday, Monday, due to heavy rains care of Typhoon Pedring.  Today, classes were also cancelled from Nursery all the way to College since Metro Manila is apparently under Signal No. 2 (down to #1 this afternoon).

This may call for extra time to work on school-related stuff, but, no.  I took it as time to bond with one of my countless half-read books.  Today it was One Day by David Nicholls.  I'm more than halfway through the book and I'm having a difficult time putting it down (well, save for this time when I decided to blog about it, hehe)!

And, oh! Say hello to our new baby! This is probably the last "baby" before the real baby ;) Guilt-free because we know this will help us welcome Baby Guce well ;)

Olympus EPL-2 

I'm no photographer, but I'm loving this camera already! I remember the last camera I bought was care of my dad and he bought it for my college graduation in 2007! Whoa, 4 years ago! It still serves us well but I must admit, nothing like that white beauty up there! My younger brother, Charles, now uses the old camera:

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Okay, that's it.  Will wait for the 7:00 PM news to see if there are advisories on tomorrow's resumption of classes.  If classes will resume, will probably bury myself in school work tonight.  Otherwise, looks like I'll be able to finish a before the day ends! ;) 

Alvin 101

It's been almost 3 months and I still find myself surprised at the things I discover about my husband each day.  Despite being together as boyfriend/girlfriend for about 5 and a half years before we married, I realize it IS true that you can never really know a person until you really live under 1 roof. 

These are the things I've learned so far:

1) We have different morning routines.  He wakes up, eats, then takes a shower.  I wake up, take a shower, then eat.  Which works to our advantage because our shower can only comfortably accomodate just one ;)

2) Alvin does not eat vegetables AT ALL.  I am grateful to have our cook Michelle whip up dishes for us but did not really know this fact about him prior to married life.

3) He must watch TV before hitting the sack.  It's almost like his lullabye already.

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So far, that's it.  I am looking forward to more discoveries as the months (and years) progress.  Everyday is a learning experience - we learn about ourselves and each other, hopefully preparing us to be the best parents we can be - in 6 and a half months ;)

1, 2, 3, 4, 5!

Today marks my 5th teacher's day in ICA, or, ever.  I'd have to say, that this year was probably the "driest" I've experienced.  For the first time, I was fuming mad on teacher's day because of students' behavior.  For the first time, instead of saying thanks (well I did, naman.) to the kids for their song number, I spent more time talking about how much more they had to improve on, yada yada.  There goes Mrs. Guce again, I'm sure a lot of girls thought that.  Who cares.  

Out of all the jobs there are out there, I think being a teacher is the most difficult to separate from personal life.  I've said this before and I still feel the same way - teaching is a 24-hour job.  I'm in school from 7:30 AM to 4:00 PM but when I'm not, I must conduct myself properly and wear decent clothes (which is not really a problem, FYI).  When I'm at home, I check papers, plan lessons and create my Keynote presentations (painstakingly fixing font sizes, colors, layouts and animations).  When it happens to be a year wherein my advisory class is a tough one (it's becoming more often, thank You Lord), I think of them before I sleep, when I wake up and even when I'm in the shower - I think of what I can do to help them be their best.

With all that being said, I think I'll go now and write my resignation letter.  As a matter of fact, I attempted to resign twice already (SY 2009-2010 and SY 2010-2011) but something JUST. KEEPS. ME. COMING. BACK.  Sometimes I think, bakit ko ba pinapahirapan sarili ko dito? My husband makes enough (I didn't say a lot but enough) for us to survive simply anyway.

...

Uh-oh.  Bakit nga ba.  HAHA.  *thinking*

...

I guess for me, it's not enough to live my life for family and friends.  I'd like to say that I was able to live for someone else that I'm not related to, that on normal circumstances, I couldn't care less about.  I want to live my life knowing that I've used it well and that I did all that I could to 'make a difference'.

I don't know if I actually do, but I think it counts to at least try.

This year, I think God was trying to teach me this: To serve the Lord even (more) when it's difficult and even when I don't think it counts.  In His own sweet time, He will show me that my efforts were not in vain.  After all, serving others is serving God...and there is no "getting tired" in serving God. :)

Happy teacher's day to my fellow ICA teachers! Tomorrow is another day to "try" ;)