Saturday, August 23, 2008

my boys

they are the cutest things... really!  at 23 days of age, joachim is so sweet (already!)... i was holding him upright, against my shoulder to burp him and he moved his head very carefully and oh so slowly to rest it against my cheek.  melted my heart into a puddle 

gabe and rafa are funny because, even if joachim is already out of my tummy, they still high-five, give a thumbs up (good job) and do a line (index fingers touching) to my tummy. and they're very gentle with me.  and with joachim, too!  they crowd around him whenever he's around and they always want to hold his hand or, failing that, will settle for holding his foot! 

mica naman wants joachim to sleep with him in his room!  he's willing to share not only his room, his yaya and his toys, but his bed and blanket too! 

i must have done something right to deserve my boys... God is so good to me...

Thursday, August 21, 2008

A Catholic case Against Barack

i received this in my email today and i'm so disturbed by it.  read on...

you can check out an article in the Associated Content about this as well:  http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/77500/barack_hussein_obama_jr_defends_partialbirth.html

I read up on partial birth abortion and it's horrifying! Click here to read up on it.  my heart and mind shudders away from even the thought of it.  And this man (and his wife!!) are proponents of it?  it defies belief...


 A Catholic case Against Barack
 by Patrick J. Buchanan (more by this author)

            In the Pennsylvania primary, Barack Obama rolled up more than 90 percent of the African-American vote. Among Catholics, he lost by 40 points. The cool liberal Harvard Law grad was not a good fit for the socially conservative ethnics of Altoona, Aliquippa and Johnstown.

            But if Barack had a problem with Catholics then, he has a far higher hurdle to surmount in the fall, with those millions of Catholics who still take their faith and moral code seriously.

            For not only is Barack the most pro-abortion member of the Senate, with his straight A+ report card from the National Abortion Rights Action League and Planned Parenthood. He supports the late-term procedure known as partial-birth abortion, where the baby's skull is stabbed with scissors in the birth canal and the brains are sucked out to end its life swiftly and ease passage of the corpse into the pan.

            Partial-birth abortion, said the late Sen. Pat Moynihan, "comes as close to infanticide as anything I have seen in our judiciary."

            Yet, when Congress was voting to ban this terrible form of death for a mature fetus, Michelle Obama was signing fundraising letters pledging that, if elected, Barack would be “tireless” in keeping legal this “legitimate medical procedure.”

            And Barack did not let the militants down. When the Supreme Court upheld the congressional ban on this barbaric procedure, Barack denounced the court for denying “equal rights for women.”

            As David Freddoso reports in his new best-seller, “The Case Against Barack Obama,” the Illinois senator goes further than any U.S. senator has dared go in defending what John Paul II called the “culture of death.”

            Thrice in the Illinois legislature, Obama helped block a bill that was designed solely to protect the life of infants already born, and outside the womb, who had miraculously survived the attempt to kill them during an abortion. Thrice, Obama voted to let doctors and nurses allow these tiny human beings die of neglect and be tossed out with the medical waste.

            How can a man who purports to be a Christian justify this?

            If, as its advocates contend, abortion has to remain legal to protect the life and health, mental and physical, of the mother, how is a mother's life or health in the least threatened by a baby no longer inside her -- but lying on a table or in a pan fighting for life and breath?

            How is it essential for the life or health of a woman that her baby, who somehow survived the horrible ordeal of abortion, be left to die or put to death? Yet, that is what Obama voted for, thrice, in the Illinois Senate.

            When a bill almost identical to the one Barack fought in Illinois, the Born Alive Infants Protection Act, came to the floor of the U.S. Senate in 2001, the vote was 98 to 0 in favor. Barbara Boxer, the most pro-abortion member of the Senate before Barack came, spoke out on its behalf:  ”Of course, we believe everyone should deserve the protection of this bill. ... Who could be more vulnerable than a newborn baby? So, of course, we agree with that. ... We join with an ‘aye’ vote on this. I hope it will, in fact, be unanimous.”

            Obama says he opposed the Born Alive Infants Protection Act because he feared it might imperil Roe v. Wade. But if Roe v. Wade did allow infanticide or murder, which is what letting a tiny baby die of neglect or killing it outright amounts to, why would he not want that court decision reviewed and amended to outlaw infanticide?

            Is the right to an abortion so sacrosanct to Obama that killing by neglect or snuffing out of the life of tiny babies outside the womb must be protected if necessary to preserve that right?  Obama is an abortion absolutist. “I could find no instance in his entire career,” writes Freddoso, “in which he voted for any regulation or restriction on the practice of abortion.”

            In 2007, Barack pledged that, in his first act as president, he will sign the Freedom of Choice Act, which would cancel every federal, state or local regulation or restriction on abortion. The National Organization for Women says it would abolish all restrictions on government funding of abortion.

            What we once called God's Country would become the nation on earth most zealously committed to an unrestricted right of abortion from conception to birth.

            Before any devout Catholic, Evangelical Christian or Orthodox Jew votes for Obama, he or she might spend 15 minutes in Chapter 10 of Freddoso’s “Case Against Barack.” For if, as Catholics believe, abortion is the killing of an unborn child, and participation in an abortion entails automatic excommunication, how can a good Catholic support a candidate who will appoint justices to make Roe v. Wade eternal and eliminate all restrictions on a practice Catholics legislators have fought for three decades to curtail?

            And which Catholic priests and prelates will it be who give invocations at Obama rallies, even as Mother Church fights to save the lives of unborn children whom Obama believes have no right to life and no rights at all?

Tuesday, August 19, 2008

Blue swirl lamp by Lampe Berger

Category:   Household Goods
Price:   4500.00

The secret of the Lampe Berger is encapsulated in the catalytic effect developed over 100 years ago by Maurice Berger, a pharmaceutical chemist. The catalytic burner captures and destroys molecules that carry odors. The air is purified at a lower temperature zone, at the center of the burner. The mixing of the air and the movement from convection, due to the presence of hot points on the burner, ensure that odors are destroyed.

At least 48-69% of the bacteria found in a large volume of air are killed.

Where other products simply add perfume to cover unpleasant odors, the Lampe Berger actually purifies the atmosphere before perfuming it. Today, it is still the effectiveness and originality of this natural principle that ensures the success of the Lampe Berger in homes and offices around the world.

You'll be amazed how quickly the Berger lamp eliminates cigarette smoke and pet odors; it'll freshen a smoke-filled room in a matter of minutes. As for your kitchen, say good-bye to unwanted cooking odors; the Berger lamp will wipe out disagreeable smells such as tuyo!



Joachim's many faces =)




Thursday, August 14, 2008

being a new mom (again!)

I find that being a new mom for the fourth time is more relaxing... don't get me wrong... it's still a challenge - mostly because i've forgotten how painful having a c-section is!  when i first stood up (the day after i gave birth), it felt like acid was being poured on the incision site.  it was terrible! but i managed to hobble to the bathroom - dragging the iv pole behind me.  It was hard sitting up to breastfeed in bed, but so much harder moving around - having to get up to go to the nursery in makati med was not fun.  the policy of the nursery is: when you're no longer attached to the iv, they won't bring your baby to you in your room anymore.  they want you to go to them.  i understand the rationale behind it.  it's better for the newborn because they're not exposed to the dirty air of the hallways of makati med.  but it's difficult for the mommy.  whether you give birth normally or have a c-section, it's equally difficult. 

tabby and i decided to have joachim room in with us on our last night there.  mostly because i felt like the nurses in the nursery weren't reading joachim correctly.  they would call me to go to the nursery to feed him, even if he wasn't hungry.  according to them, he's hungry if he opens his eyes.  hello?!  so i would rush (as much as was possible) to the nursery because i didn't want him to cry too hard while waiting for me... when i get there, he's not crying.  and when i settle in to feed him, he sucks for about 2 minutes and then falls asleep... for an hour!  i'm there, holding him in the breastfeeding room, trying to gently wake him up so he can eat... but he's sleepy.  maybe he was just looking for me to hold him.  so ok lang... but when i decide to go back to the room and sleep (it's ususally about 3 or 4 in the morning na), the nursery calls me after 30 minutes because he's awake and want to eat daw.  frustrating.

anyway, having him room in with us was an experience.  i didn't realize that when he's roomed in with us, as far as the nursery is concerned, he's been discharged from the hospital.  they don't check on him - nothing.  the ones taking his vital signs were the student nurses.  umm... not exactly the way i imagined makati med taking care of my boy.  they didn't even make him hatid to the entrance when i was discharged the next day.  i found that strange.

now, 2 weeks after giving birth, i'm home and healing well, i think.  the pain is going away - it just hurts when i sneeze or cough, when i stand up too fast or when i walk around without the abdominal binder.  i still can't sit up from lying down because it hurts, but it's getting easier. 

it could be that i'm older, and so am having an easier time with everything - giving him a bath, changing diapers, calming him down when he's crying... everything.  i think that it has to do with being more calm and more sure of myself as a mother.  this time around, i know what i want and how i want things to be done - especially when it comes to my baby.  i'm more able to sit back and simply enjoy being a mother! 

the challenge is to balance being a new mom to joachim and being the mom of mica, gabe and rafa.  it's difficult having to balance the needs of mica, gabe and rafa with regards to joachim with the safety and comfort of joachim.  i know that the older boys need to feel needed - need to be included in taking care of the baby.  i know that they want to be included and want to be the one helping me to take care of the baby so, in a sense, things are easier for me.  it's just that in their eagerness to help, tabby and i are concerned (the yayas, too) that they might hurt (inadvertently) joachim. 

it's cool, though. things are good here at home.  they're so cute when they talk about their baby brother... the boys call him "my joachim" and "my baby"!  they're so aware of their newest brother, it's amazing!  the three have always been close - you can't give one something without the question "what about for kuya?  for gabriel (rafael)?" coming at you... now, they've added "what about for joachim?"

i catch myself tearing over the kindness and love the boys have for each other...  and laugh at their antics.  i can only imagine the chaos to come when joachim is older and able to participate in their games! 

Wednesday, August 6, 2008

Our newest angel, Joachim Uriel V. Drilon




Born on Aug. 1, 2008 at 10:57am in Makati Med, he was 7 lbs and 15 oz heavy and 20.5 inches long! =)