10/31/12

on credit cards


One of our financial goals for this year was to keep debts at the minimum. In fact, as early as November of last year, my husband already suggested that we no longer renew our credit card after paying all our dues. I was actually hesitant about his suggestion because I thought it would be convenient to have at least one credit card so we can have something to use when there's an emergency expense or any expense that cannot wait until payday. Nevertheless, I gave in to his suggestion and cancelled our account. For almost a year now, we've done all our purchases in cash and in debit transactions through our ATM. It cannot be denied how convenient credit cards are, though, when it comes to online transactions, especially when booking for a flight or hotel accommodation. This is why I asked him again today if we can apply for a new one. Besides, I have already proven to him how careful I am with my purchases. :-) He seems to agree with me this time. News about identity theft cases is the only thing that's keeping him to say yes this time to credit cards and I have yet to convince him how contactless cards can effectively address this huge concern on security. Anyhow, this is not really something that we need to debate about. I would rather that we be without a credit card and live in harmony as couples should. :-)

loving my family

I realized it's been a while since I posted pictures of us here in my blog.

with my husband and my little girl

I think this was taken some months ago when my brother arrived from Abu Dhabi and he treated us for lunch at SM. Obviously, brother is not in the picture as he was probably the one taking it. Every time we go out as a family, I will always look for an opportunity to have pictures of us taken even though there are many times that I feel like I don't look my best. After all, it's a reality I have to face, right? It's definitely a good idea to have our life as parents captured in photos. I love my family!

10/30/12

husband's birthday dinner postponed

Today is husband's birthday. We were supposed to have a simple birthday dinner at our favorite restaurant today but decided at the last minute to postpone it so that we can go home immediately after office work is done. However, we realized that the water pipe at home needs to be fixed tomorrow. So, after remembering that the plumber is supposed to come back tomorrow morning after having inspected the cause of the problem, we had to stop at the hardware store to get one of those threaded inserts that he requested. Good thing we brought the worn-out sample, so it didn't take us longer than 5 minutes to get what we need. We are glad that we still made it home early because little daughter has long been waiting for the birthday celebrant to arrive.

10/28/12

scary or not

Lately, the theme of the stores at the mall is anything Halloween - from pumpkin toys to costumes and outfits. I already expected this somehow but what I didn't expect when I was paying at the counter was the look of the cashier. She has totally scared me but, after coming to my senses, I asked if I can take a picture of her. She happily obliged and even made some minor fix to her hair. She even volunteered her other co-employees to pose for me but they haven't returned from their break yet.


Oh well, I guess she's not really scary after all. It was only her makeup that scared me.


10/26/12

a musician in the making



My little girl is definitely a music lover. She loves to sing and to listen to many of today's popular songs. However, I remembered she was about a year old then when she didn't have good experience with music. This was the time when her regular naps would often get interrupted by one of our neighbors practicing with an electric guitar. I did not choose to complain over the loudness of the guitar attached to an amplifier, though. After all, the culprit is a kid rehearsing for an amateur band. Since this went on for nearly a month, I must admit that there were times that I wished the kid had rehearsed in a soundproof area of their house; or if not, his parents could have taught him to use the headphone jack when rehearsing especially if he is still trying to familiarize/master the part he is going to play. Thankfully, Dipdip already got used to it that she can now practically tolerate the sound of loud guitars and live bands. In fact, she'd happily dance or sing along. And whenever there's a 'karaoke' or singing session in the house, she'd like to have the chance to hold the microphone and to sing. Well, we've got a musician in the making!

10/12/12

little girl wants to play

Just this month, my husband accidentally broke the toilet seat at his parent's house. So, naturally, we needed to replace it.  We've been to several hardware stores already but, unfortunately, it seems like these stores ran out of beige toilet seats. Last weekend was our final attempt of buying the toilet seat replacement from another hardware store. We tagged our 3-year old along that day, by the way. Still, we weren't lucky to find any beige color. Thus, we were thinking of just getting the white one since the old seat needed to be replaced ASAP. To make up for the color mismatch, the salesperson in-charge was more than pleased to assist us that she went out of her way to demonstrate the best feature of the toilet seat they are selling - the rubberized feature. She took one from the shelf, put it on the floor and jumped right down at it several times with all her force and weight just to show us that it's hard to break the rubberized type of toilet seat. To make the long story short, we  were impressed and went on with our purchase regardless of the fact that it didn't match the color of the toilet bowl. When we arrived home, my little girl who had witnessed what the salesgirl did with the toilet seat at the hardware store happily asked with excitement if she can already play with it because she wants to jump on it! :-) Suddenly, I thought we shouldn't bring her along the next time we're going to the hardware store.