First playdate

Monday was  a mix of difficult and fun day.  Little Spanish Pinay woke up 2 hours too early than her usual and I got wounded up between my work and her for about an hour and a half. Nanny was kind of lazy yesterday too which got me ticked the whole time she was here taking care of LSP.  She kept on doing "nothing" while LSP tried to cling on me, wanting my attention while I beggingly say "not now, I have work to do".  I had to tell explicitly to my dear nanny to please get LSP and go to the other room and play with her.  Couldn't she just realize that on her own? I am obviously still ticked so I'll let that go.  Besides, it's not nice to talk badly about a person on a blog.  Next topic please.

Since LSP woke up too early than her usual, she also slept 2 hours earlier than her usual naptime.  Result is we had plenty of time in the afternoon to play.  We went to the park and LSP had a blast.  She recently learned "mami, no me pillas!" (mami, you can't catch me!) from a the cartoon show Peppa Pig.  So she's been doing that while running so fast and her head turned back.  She can easily bump into something anytime and it always gets me screaming for her to watch out and look where she's going.  Toddlers are really heart-attack provokers!

She says "tigidig, tigidig!" Read as: tee-gee-deeg, tee-gee-deeg :-D

That's the Filipino way of making the sound of riding a horse ;-)

Later on, I got a nice phone call from a friend to check on us if we are available to meet her and her little one.  Playdate for LSP, finally!  Hubby joined us right after he came home from work and I was really glad he was able to meet V. 

I've met this friend of mine, V, in one of the parks nearby last summer.  We are both first time moms.  We exchanged timid smiles at the beginning, a couple of nice comments about our daugthers who are just 4 months apart.  We are both "from the outside" married to someone "from the inside".  See, a lot of things in common.   We coincide again in one of the streets downtown, exchanged few his and hellos then another coincidence in the supermarket.  The third time says we are meant to be.  Friends, you know? We exchanged numbers.  We've been wanting to schedule a playdate but alas, cold weather and Christmas vacation in our native lands, and then cough and colds prevented us from having one.  BUT when the time is right, the time is right... even if things are not planned.  So the impromptu playdate happened yesterday! Finally, LSP got to really meet D and this time since they are older, they got to play with each other.  The first time they saw each other was just like exchanging curious looks and then just moving along with their own things.

The playdate was great! D is a real darling.  She only didn't bring LSP some gifts from their vacation to their native land but she let LSP play with her toys without any fuss while LSP wants ALL of D's toys. LSP is obviously on the mine-all-mine stage!  We went to have some coffee and then proceeded to go to another park after.  D and LSP walked holding each other's hand the whole time.  I died of their cuteness. 

This is the best I could do to improve a photo as a product of dusk and phone battery dying.

But look at them holding each other's hands while walking!

Hubby's phone wasn't doing much better than mine either.  But on the other hand, since I am not sure if my friend V is comfortable about posting her daughter's picture on the web, then this is perfect.  It's just like masking the faces in the picture of a daughter of a celebrity on magazines, yes?

Sadly, the fun has to end.  It was already dark and getting colder and dinner time is about to start and the little ones need to rest.  We said our goodbyes which was not really welcomed by LSP.  She hates goodbyes. Most specially, she hated saying goodbye to D's baby doll. She wanted to bring it home with her! My little sweet rascal.  The best part is that this is not the first and last playdate for LSP and D together.  Spring is just around the corner as well, so that means nicer weather for playdates!

How's your week going so far?

Are you earning from your blog?

Who doesn't like to be recognized and appreciated? 

Yesterday, I had a short chat (we regularly chat) with a high school friend about blogging.  She asked me if my blog is earning big now. 

I've started blogigng way back 2007 and was ust writing things from time to time for personal journaling and a bit of a past time.  It was never opened to public. Then I created a new blog that chronicles my pregnancy and later on, experience about motherhood and life in general.  Few friends and family read my blog and started to encourage me about putting it for public viewing and advertisers and eventually, probably earn from it.  I was told that there are people who are earning enough just by blogging or writing articles... and it kind of gotten my curiosity.  I've been telling people though that my blog only talks about personal things and personal views and that I do not write articles good enough to get readers and regular traffic.  Plus I wasn't sure if I was ready to put my thoughts out there for public scrutiny. 

Then again, later on, I was encouraged by the idea that I'm not gonna lose anything anyways.  People may not like what I write but what harm would that make?  It may not earn anything at all because no advertisers will be interested in my blog due to not having any decent traffic or becasue I may not have really time for writing regularly or do all the works to get traffic, but then it won't change anything if I am just blogging for personal purposes only.  I would still write whenever I can and whenever I want and with whatever topic goes on top of my head. 

So off I went and jumped on the pool of bloggers out there aspiring to get some extra ka-ching ka-ching for their pocket - without that big hope, though.  I started joining memes and visiting other bloggers and writing in a more frequentl manner.  I've started knowing more bloggers from different part of the world with different niches.  I've enjoyed reading their articles, their thoughts about motherhood or fashion or friendship or writing or God or anything under the sun, their own experiences of the same roller coaster ride I am going through, their rants and raves about life, their humor, their children's annecdotes, etc.  I also enjoy (tons) reading their comments on my articles and from time to time, exchanging emails with them. 

Then it hit me.  What I never expected about putting my blog into public view for initially hoping to get some extra hand on our expenses, is that I will be gaining cyber friends.  Yes, ma'am.  cyber friends.  Call it pathetic but it's nothing pathetic at all to me.  It's nothing like people having a thousand facebook friends but not even exchaging any his and hellos and asking about how's your dog on their facebook wall. This is different.  My cyber bloggy friends dig me.  There's concern and there's friendship and there's acceptance and there's support and there's connection.

In reality, I haven't been doing much on finding advertisers to sponsor my blog or articles or anything like that.  I honestly don't have any idea how to do this.  What I have only done so far is visit other blogs and join memes.  I've earned a significant number of google friend connects and I got a google page rank now and was chosen to be a momcenter partner but I don't know how to move forward after this.  Let's just say I really have no clue on this kind of business - as stupid as it may sound.

Not having a clear vision of the possibility of really earning from blogging, I still look forward to writing more articles and read more blogs.  Ideas kept on pouring for new articles but the extra time a mommy can get keeps on narrowing with the life's demands.  I get giddy everytime I see the small icon on my phone that I have a new comment waiting to be published.  I've forgotten about my real motive for opening my blog to public.

And so going back to my friend's question whether my blog is already earning big?  My answer is a big YES.  I've earned friends!  I'm even looking forward to meet ups on December! How was this thing called back when I was in high school?  Eyeball, was it? LOL.  And this was friendship waiting to bloom was even confirmed by what happened the other day on my blog.  I talked about it here.  And the support and comments  I got just bloated my heart :)

So you guys, thank you once again! Here's to more blogging and more friendship!