My boy just turned 4 years old. At age 4 he has already has lots of accomplishments . He's turning out to be a real fine boy. Here are some facts about my boy:

1. at 11 months old, he got his first ever trophy for being the most energetic baby when I joined him in "The Cutest Baby Competition" organized by Sunway Lagoon club.
2. he has been to 4 other countries aside from Malaysia - Thailand, Singapore, Philippines and Cambodia.
3. at 2.5 years of age, he told us he wanted to be a doctor because he wanted to check doctor mommy. (after all the exposure he got in taking him with us for my antenatal check ups). it hasn't changed ever since. he still wants to be a doctor now. he hasn't thought of any other profession like Mesothelioma lawyer.
4. he started school at 3 years of age. That's why at age 3, he could read already. He's now reading his Book 9 in class. They're supposed to read until Book 8... but since he finished reading 8 books, he has started reading Book 9 already.
5. he got his 2nd trophy for joining the Sports Day in school at 3 years old.
6. he became the most charming ring bearer at 3.5 years of age, on his uncle ramesh wedding.
   
7. before turning 4 years old, he had his first ever performance (speech and dance) in front of more than 1,000 people. the teacher said he could sweet talk the teachers. he would tell his teacher if the teacher looks nice on that day and if the teacher is wearing nice clothes. That's why he was tasked to do the speech. Hehehe. (It's a pity I only took half of his speech... but I was supposed to take photos only and his daddy the video. But since I thought it would be hard for me to upload videos to youtube from the video cam, i decided to just take video from my digital camera myself.)

Anyways, there are more things about my boy... Just wanna toot the the best ones he has accomplished now.

I have finally started doing some stuff for my son's 4th Birthday Celebration on Monday, 27th October. We did some grocery shopping last Sunday a Cold Storage in Ikano. Yeah, I know it's to far to be groceries shopping there. But we were at Ikea last Sunday to buy some things and since there was a supermarket nearby, we just decided to buy our groceries there. It wouldn't be ideal to come back to Subang Jaya to go to Carrefour just to buy groceries. We found almost everything we needed for his birthday there. Birthday planning is fun... but I get a bit nervy. I don't know why. I always feel like this everytime I organize parties. Is it called party jitters? LOL. Anyways, just want to check off my list from my previous post about my son's 4th birthday planning:

1. work on the guest list with my boy. he already has a list of his own which includes his classmates, his cousins, and his grandparents.- check
   
2. work on my dishes. i'm planning on a mixed dishes. and asking my mother-in-law to cook indian dishes, I cook some western dishes and some finger food for the kids. - check
   
3. work on the decoration. - check. i mean we bought what we want to put up on that day already.
   
4. work on the loot bags. my gosh. i can't believe I haven't done a thing for this one yet. - check. done already.
   
5. search the internet some cup cake recipes and cup cake designs.- check.
6. order birthday cake. check. ordered from grace. she does really awesome cakes. I thought of baking the cake myself since I did his birthday cake for his 2nd birthday. But thought I'll have no time to bake his cake and do decorations because I don't have a helper this time to help me with the preparation. Ordering is the best option for now.
7. book a clown. check. this is probably the highlight of the party.
8. buy his birthday gift. check. did this during the Lego sale last August. Hehehe. I'm getting clever, hey?
   

His theme for his party is Thomas and Friends theme. So I bought some Thomas and Friends stuff for the decorations. I asked him to choose actually (along with Barney and Pooh Bear)... but he chose Thomas and Friends. I keep forgetting he's too old for Barney and Pooh Bear already. Hehehe. Well, there's much more things to do like:

1. do a bit of house spring cleaning
   
2. wash the curtains
3. wash the couch covers
   
4. buy a jug for drinks - i've been wanting to buy this one for a long time now. need to buy really soon so we can use for the party.

Planning a birthday for kids is fun. I am enjoying myself (just a bit nervy - have I told you this before?). Anyways, hope everything works well on that day. I just want this one to be memorable for my son. He's already 4 years old and he's capable of enjoying his party already. So I pray that it will be a blast.

Now that Christmas is just around the corner, it's time to think of Christmas gift ideas. It's better to prepare them early on than to crumble what to buy for Christmas gift for the family. My list would go on and one, but let me start with my parents first. My mom and dad had been wearing prescription eyeglasses for some time now. And from what I saw last year when I visited them in the Philippines, their eyeglasses looked really old but I never gave it a second thought. But now, when I was browsing the net for some cool gifts to buy for Christmas, I stumbled, again, upon Zenni Optical. I said again, because I remember seeing it the last time I was looking for stylish prescription eyeglasses. And besides, Zenni optical prescription glasses was featured in Chicago Tribune.
Zenni Optical eyeglasses have indeed become popular because of its good quality and cheap price. They are cheap because when you order, they will send it to you straight from the factory. There's no middlemen involved so you can get it for its net price. Isn't that cool. Nowadays, there's nowhere you can find eyeglasses that are of good quality and yet cheap. So I'll probably get one of Zenni's prescription eyeglasses for my mom as one of my Christmas gifts for her. What do you think? I'm sure she'd like this design. It is so stylish. My mom is more stylish than I am. So I'm sure she'll appreciate this one.

I can't wait for Christmas. I have so much in mind what to do and I'm glad I'm starting off now with my Christmas gift list. I know it's too early. But I think it's better to be early than be late.

It was truly a success for a first time meeting. Thanks to Steph for organizing it. I've been in Malaysia for almost 6 years now and yet I haven't really mixed around with Filipino expats in Malaysia. One factor is the distance and I don't drive. Not that confident enough to drive on Malaysia road. But since Steph contacted me (thanks to the blogosphere she found few Pinoy bloggers who are now residing in Malaysia), I knew that I have to meet her and meet Josiet again and a few others whom I have not met before. Glad I joined. It's cool to meet new people with the same originality. I had fun... so did my hubby. The food was awesome. It's nice to be eating pinakbet, relyenong bangus, adobong baboy, etc... again. Cannot remember all the food there. Grace's desserts were to die for. Looking forward to meeting them again and hoping they all could come for Schenker's Birthday party.

Proverbs 31:30 says, "Charm is deceitful and beauty is vain but the woman who fears the Lord, she shall be praised." With so many definition of beauty nowadays, it's just so hard to tell which is the real definition of beauty. You watch the television, you read the magazines or books, and they would tell you being beautiful is skin deep. You have to wear this and that to be beautiful. You have to have this and that to be beautiful. A lot of us are misguided on the true meaning of beauty, thus we define beauty in a wrong way. But you know what, the best definition of being beautiful is when we fear the Lord. We see the true beauty in a person when she has a good heart. When she offers help to those in need and considers this as doing it for the Lord; when that person has compassion on fatherless, sick and poor; when she extends her hospitality to strangers; when she doesn't think of herself as above others... then she's a real beauty. A role model to look up. This is my motto in life that beauty is vain but the woman who fears the Lord, she shall be praised.

If you want to find out more about how to be beautiful in the Lord, you might want to join a Theatre Church Conference in Silver Spring, MD on October 22 & 23. They are going to discuss on how it is like be beautiful in the Lord... not just a skin-deep type of beauty... but a beauty that's eternal. I actually checked out their website because I also want to find out more about it. Actually, this event will bring together respected thought leaders, pastors and church leaders from the nation’s most innovative growing churches to discuss the future of theatre worship. You know when you worship in a theater like service, it would have a different impact in your life, thus... resulting in us to do more good works that are pleasing to the Lord.