it’s the day before christmas, i haven’t finished wrapping all gifts, still have to get gift tags, i haven’t sent a single card from the 50 or so we bought earlier this month, the newsletter is still untouched, we haven’t shopped for the christmas dinner, and i still have two manuscripts to edit and dozens of blog posts to write before i can call it a year. if someone out there has a time pause button, please press NOW.
i’m preparing a family newsletter, but at the rate i’m going, it’ll still take me time before i can distribute it. for all of you out there, here’s an advanced christmas number. click below and have a roll!
just about a week to go and i’m not getting anywhere done with my holiday to-do list. sure, we’ve got jan’s gifts settled and i’ve got a list of what i’m intending to get the others, but have yet to actually go out and buy them, arrgh. if it would have been possible to get everything online, i would, rather than trying to squeeze through the crowds (majority of whom aren’t really shopping, but just enjoying the aircon!).
getting christmas gifts delivered also becomes tedious when you’re operating from overseas. i’ve more or less given up on the idea of sending parcels to the philippines because i know that by this time, it would take a small miracle for it to arrive before the 24th… that is, if it arrives at all. we’re still rushing on some small knick-knacks we’d like to send the in-laws back in germany, though, and we’re counting on the deutsche post efficiency to pull it through.
yikes, there’s still the last few days of jan’s adventskalendar to get and wrap (father christmas was able to get only the first 18 gifts delivered and said he’d make a second trip to bring the rest 
). and then there’s still the family newsletter to write.
sometimes, i think holidays are too much for my shrinking brain (did you know that pregnancy makes your brain shrink?)
am depressed. pangarap na bituin is over. bitin. and no matter how i love papa piolo, i just can’t get that kilig over lobo.
an asus eee pc, for its portability and simplicity
or
an apple macbook — more power, more capabilities, a more sensible choice
or
a sony vaio ls pc/tv combo — to replace my desktop, with multimedia possibilities
arrrgh, but with the batch of expenses we’ve had to deal with this year, our planned vacation early next year, and the baby-related expenses, it looks like i’ll have to wait. 
ok, save for peace on earth and love among all mankind, what’s your christmas wish this year?
nikolaus apparently found our new address and left some goodies on our doorstep!
oranges, chocolates and:
a laser sword, hehe.
our christmas tree is up, too:
am still thinking whether i should put a few more trimmings and ornaments, but i actually rather err on the bare-and-simple than the loud-and-heavy side. it could use a few more gifts at the base, though, but as i’m not yet even halfway with christmas gift shopping…
when tardiness strikes me (which is rather often these days), this is how jan’s room looks like: a total mess.
pardon the blurred photo. jan took the photo himself.
and i’m not embarassed to say that no, i don’t feel any compulsion to clean up after jan everytime. having lived without househelp for the last several years, i’ve long given up on having a spic-and-span household where everything is in their proper places all the time. jan has always had a lot of freedom to mess up his space (which sometimes extend to the entire flat) and has often come up with creative outputs. not only can he play on his own for extended periods, he has also made full use of the toys, games, books, and other paraphernalia we have bought him. indeed, aside from a few toy figures, all his belongings are thoroughly used, abused, and enjoyed to their fullest (and that’s why i hate toy figures).
what is an ongoing crusade though, is to teach jan to clean up his own mess. sometimes, he does it with little nudging, and he’s mightily proud when he does. “look, i did it all on my own!” often though, he’d find all sorts of alibi to get away with doing just the minimum.
oh well, he’s his mother’s son afterall.
we’ve already secured most of jan’s christmas gifts, mostly from amazon.de — books, videos and cds, all in german. if you speak german, you can tell that he has an advanced german vocabulary, diction and sentence construction for his age. we knew, however, that with his strengthening english and introductory mandarin, he’s running the risk of slipping on his german, so we countered this with a rich exposure to german literature at home, particularly books and audiobooks. it seems like it does help; when my FIL was here just recently, he has been positively surprised that jan has kept this, using complex sentences with clauses and almost perfect grammar.
what would we be without amazon? although it is possible to order foreign-language items from the local bookstore here, i find it more convenient to browse and shop at amazon.
our christmas shopping is far from over, though. and looking at my to-do list this month, online shopping is definitely a convenient option. if you are planning to do any of your shopping at amazon this Christmas, too, please consider clicking through to Amazon using this link (or click on the image above)! if you do, you will be gifting me a tiny commission from amazon for anything that you purchase, at no extra cost to you. if you shop frequently at amazon, why not bookmark the link on your browser?
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