Missus Bounty Basket

03 March 2011 Toys, clothes and other stuff are accumulating in our cellar. I want to have a tidy and clean space but I just don't know where to start or is it really the problem? I guess, parting with them is not that easy. Giving each item the emotional value adds to the difficulty of the process. I even thought of sending them back home so that others might use them but it's so expensive. more or less tidy view of the living area Present day 100. My blog drafts are down to 100, and I am ecstatic about this. I will celebrate by organizing my office corner. Sort out papers and books to be read. Pens, a mug, and post-it notes. Maybe I should do a dance of celebration, thank ME for showing up almost every day.  I am not attaching any emotional value to the magazines received, but I am keeping my travel souvenirs for my art journal.  In the meantime, I will savour Paula's song (Dawson's Creek theme song), then fold the remaining laundry, have my 3rd mug of coffee and dec...

Somewhere in Greece 09 February 2011 Clothes have been washed and are ready to be ironed. I have vacuumed the whole house and the girls' unwanted toys have been put away. Now what? Today should be a good one but I'm lost. Ballenberg open-air museum Present day Judging from the day's chores, I guess I was overwhelmed. Having a preschooler and a toddler plus a room full of toys would make any mother overburdened. Looking back, I was still learning to be a mother. This is a long process because up until now, I am still at it. Nevertheless, with all the anxiety and challenges, being a Nanay to these 2 wonderful human beings is the best thing ever. :)  a walk in the forest near Giessbach falls Now, the laundry.  These days, I rarely iron our clothes. Our beddings and towels are folded unironed. They are kept in a tokador (dresser) with sachets of lavender and summer scent tucked in every fold. Thanks to the summer heat, my laundry gets to relish the sunlight and be dried in no t...

23 January 2011 image post August 2026. I thought that my beer image was accompanied by text. This one was taken while my husband and I were in Portugal. Looking at this image, I have pastéis de nata, or Portugal's custard tart in my mind. I also remember the sardine shop and a man fishing. But this post is not only to remember my trip to Portugal, this post is also for those two people who managed to come here and read my blog.  At first, I was disappointed that I was not able to gain more readers but I changed my thoughts and immediately say a prayer of gratitude for them. I have to remember the reason for completing my drafts - my why- and not to be discouraged by the outcome. I have to remember that while writing, there's this immense joy and feeling of being in the moment. I have to remember that while typing every letter, there's a sense of gratitude and an overwhelming sensation of belonging to something bigger and greater.  There's flow, presence, and just BEING...

  12 January 2011  If an hour or so of typing, loading pictures, consulting Wikipedia and a Thesaurus will help me to be better at what I'm doing so be it. I will post and hop and leave comments. So wait for me because I am coming but just right after I tuck my girls into bed.  21 August 2026 I think there's still an hour or so before my friends arrive. The rain has stopped and the sky has cleared but it's getting cold up here. Reading my draft, I see that nothing much has changed in my blogging process. Actually,  it is searching the photos that takes most of my time. I  thought that I had already sorted most of them out but no, that's not the fact. But the good thing is that they are all in my drive which can be taken anywhere. A tiny little thing that holds my memories and souvenirs of our lives and our travels. And of course, I do not tuck the girls in anymore. Yes, I like to take pictures of just about anything. And I realized in browsing thru my folders...

   30 November 2010 The alarm was set at exactly 5am. I got up to turn it off as not to wake up anybody. The snow has melted, but I feel the crispy temperature. 21 August 2026 I can easily wake up at 5 in the morning if I want to but these days there's no need for that. It's usually my husband who wakes up early and I let him have his quiet morning: coffee on the terrace. Then, before 7h, it is my turn to have that moment and we'll have another coffee together and briefly talk.    Mornings are precious moments. Coffee, conversation, and then off to the garden to check on the plants.  A little conversation with everything that is growing. There's usually some ahhs and ohhs. This visit to the garden makes me light hearted and it brings smile to my face. I remember how they started from seeds.Some will flourish, others will not. I used to be so upset about how things didn't work out or when plants died. But I became more self forgiving and just enjoyed the pr...

17 November 2010 According to Forbes.com , Geneva is the 5th most expensive city. As a stay-at-home Nanay, living here means finding ways to get inexpensive necessities for our girls. Of course, there are times when I tell myself not to be too stingy, but I guess I want more for my family, so I spend less. I mentioned here my ways of finding bargains and saving. 17 August 2026 Looking at the date, my eldest just turned three. During this time, I have already discovered the Bourse aux vêtements and the vide grenier/la rue est à vous.   Along with discovering the joy of thrifting , there's a sense of liberation in not succumbing to fast fashion, and I do value simplicity. As I learned about the hazards of plastic present in the clothes we wear and what it do to our health and environment, my choices became more obvious.  I organized my wardrobe and opted for cotton and wool gradually eliminating polyester,nylon and acrylic fabrics. I thrifted most of them and reminded my girl...

05 November 2010 I adore the book sale in this library , and every year I look forward to it. I mean, where can you get a book that recently came out in Payot and buy it for only chf 5.-?  As I have become an expert on this matter, I have listed some practical help on book sale. Here goes...   Be on time- or better yet, be ridiculously early; remember, the early bird catches the worm. Don't take a child with you--granted that I want my girls to learn to read and experience the world, taking one to a book sale is just not for me. I want to quietly enjoy my finds while having tea and some cakes.  Pen and paper- arm yourself with these to down the books' prices. You would save a ton of time. 16 August 2026 Having moved to Grand-Lancy , I have stopped going to the book sale. Instead, I scour   La ville est à vous  for English books. Though, it's very rare to find the ones I'd like to have.  But because our library has its English corner, I sometim...

02 July 2010 Going back home is just one of those things that make me really excited. From the moment I booked the flight to the time when the ticket was paid for. There was the giddiness that accompanied each little action. Baggage was filled to the max. Unfortunately, hand-carry bags could not exceed 7 kilos, but it's funny how we all manage to bring so much and still can put small items here and there. At first, my husband could not understand this because he is a light traveler. I remember the first time he came for a visit. He had this blue backpack which contained his stuff, some pasalubong, and that was it. Where was his "hand carry"? That was not in his vocabulary. But all that would soon change, thanks to a Filipina wife;-)  Now, he knows and understands the importance of hand carry and filling the baggage up to the required weight. 16 August 2026 After years of traveling with my husband and two children, I have learned the importance of traveling light. And when...

02 May 2010  15.08.2026 Just pictures of us somewhere I cannot recall. It seemed cold given the way my sister and I dressed. The other two probably didn't mind the weather or the night breeze. But for as long as I can remember, I get cold easily.  My siblings...We all looked like babies here. I mean, so young. We are an OFW 's children. If there's an abbreviation like OPOL , ours would be TPOA- TWO PARENTS, ONE ABROAD, or FHMA - FATHER AT HOME, MOTHER ABROAD. Ours is not the situation I would have liked growing up, but it happened, and fortunately we grew up not without any challenges and pain, but well. Though belonging to an OFW family left a mark that is still healing, nonetheless, healing. It affected every decision we made and are still making.  This beautiful understanding of our family's generational shadow is the one thing that propels me to create another path of love and healing without forgetting the reason behind the goal.   We are getting there, hea...

I wasn't really a morning person. One could call me Ms. Grouchy or Ms. Moody; I wouldn't mind. 14.08.2026 This was written on the 20th of April 2010. Imagine, 16 years ago, I had this one paragraph that somehow didn't make it into my post. Did I run out of words to say? Was I too busy to continue expressing my thoughts and then just decided to keep them for 15 years? Why did I bury my thoughts and not let the idea flourish into something that was supposed to be shared?  I have so many of these thoughts that I am slowly unlocking and letting the universe see the seeds it has planted within me. It's just the right thing to do. Going back to being called Ms. Grouchy. Well, I have somewhat changed over the years. I realized that Carlo has to know that I prefer to have my coffee first before any morning conversation. I would like to have mine in silence, contemplate my morning, and not have any noise or chit-chat; that's why I like Stephan Eicher's song. It somehow s...

       Just looking at this picture makes me want to have a slice and dig in.Our gorgeous-looking cake(there were actually three) arranged in a swan cake stand was prepared by Ningning , a petite and soft-spoken  Kapangpangan. (28.06.2008)  12.08.2026 Just look  at that cake!  It was  almost our first wedding anniversary when I started this draft.  I was truly in awe of our cake that I wanted to interview Ningning, unfortunately it didn't materialize. In a way, she inspired me to learn how to bake. That's why I started baking muffins and my girls' birthday cake and  some relatives ordered my cakes. There was a Spiderman cake, a baptismal cake, choco muffins, cookies and of course Peppa Pig cake with butter cream frosting and I printed and cut out Peppa and George's images.    Because of this, I accumulated a lot of baking accessories. Even contemplated on getting serious about selling baked goods. This was when...

     05.18.2008 "That which you draw on will increase. That which you share will multiply. That which you withhold will diminish. That which you are born with must be claimed,used and develop."    08.08.2026 This is my 3rd post in my series on completing my 100+ drafts. I thank myself for showing up. I don't know to whom to attribute this quote and cannot remember why I started with this particular one. In any case,here it is and I am continuing to fill it with my thoughts.     This photo was in my draft, I thought of erasing it but decided not to.  I can hear the tickling clock and and the sound of a weeding machine (debroussailleuse). It's sunny and not that hot here. We are surrrounded by pine trees and are nestled  in an area where mountains seems to majestically remind us its strenght and beauty.  There are 100+ drafts and if I want to finish them before the year ends, ideally, there should be 5 drafts to complete each week. O...

It has been two weeks since I started my morning class-two weeks of mixed emotions. This may sound so lame, but there were times when I felt so tired and just wanted to cry, but didn't. There are still adjustments to make, and we're trying to regulate baby K's sleeping time. This is not easy for all of us, but hopefully she'll get used to these changes.  - June 2008 -  I cannot remember which class is mentioned here. But the thing is, reading these 3 paragraphs, it somehow opened various emotions as if they are still in me. I would have to remind myself that I am safe and that whatever fear or helplessness was present at that time was meant to be experienced and felt for me to grow as a mother. That I did my best at that time and that the baby is now a young adult who was able to experience the love, and all is well.