Merry Christmas everyone, from the Lessons Of A Dad (and the rest of the Alado family as well).
Here’s my favorite non-traditional Christmas song by Chris Tomlin (of Indescribable and How Great Is Our God fame). Mom, thanks for buying me his CD for Christmas! It’s a fantastic CD, maybe the best Christmas CD I’ve ever heard.
Indeed, Lord Jesus, we celebrate You today, because You were born so we may have life.
To my brothers and sisters in Cagayan de Oro, here’s another Chris Tomlin song that I’d like to feature here, imploring today’s Celebrant to show us His light in the recent darkness, and to give us strength and hope in that indeed, “greater things are yet to come and greater things are still to be done in this city!”
I subscribe to many dad blogs and one of these blogs, Single Dad Laughing, made one hilarious post that I’d like to share here.
On his Facebook page he posted this question: “What is something you’ve found yourself saying to a child that you never thought you would?”
The answers he got back were incredibly funny. Here are some of my favorites:
I won’t always be able to hold your hand while you poop.
Your bum probably hurts because you ate too much chocolate.
Do not play tug of war with the dog using your teeth.
Take the turtle out of your underwear! NOW!
You’re gonna have to wear something besides gloves and shoes.
Your pee-pee does not need glitter.
Sweetie, ‘Alcohol’ isn’t the best name for your new bear…
All right. Who wrapped the dog in duct tape?
Why are there butt marks on my scanner?
I’m afraid I don’t have anything to contribute here. Maybe you do? Check out his post here (there’s many more than what I posted above), which links to his other posts on the same subject, since there’s way too much hilarity for just one post.
For a while, I was starting to forget that Lessons Of A Dad is primarily a blog about parenting, as I’ve been a bit preoccupied with blogging about Typhoon Sendong’s rampaging of Cagayan de Oro City (if you still haven’t helped, pls do so). So, I need to shake this off and go back to my usual blogging theme.
Mariah Carey’s All I Want For Christmas Is You has been ringing in my ears for a while now. Why? I’ll save that for a later post, but let’s just say that I’ve been hearing the song a LOT lately, and it’s not just in the shopping malls, being among the more popular Christmas songs being played there.
While the song is obviously about a woman wanting nothing for Christmas but her beau to come back into her arms, I’ve reflected on some parts of the lyrics and I could see the heart of my children as well…my children longing for me.
I don't want a lot for Christmas There's just one thing I need I don't care about the presents Underneath the Christmas tree I don't need to hang my stocking There upon the fireplace Santa Claus won't make me happy With a toy on Christmas day I just want you for my own More than you could ever know Make my wish come true All I want for Christmas is you
I’m a teacher, and right now I’m on Christmas break along with my kids. The two weeks prior were very hectic, with lots of all-nighters and hours of overtime at work. I barely had time for them. Every morning we’d wake up and then immediately scramble to get to school, and then I’d come home at night and grumpily shoo them off to sleep. Not a very good performance from this so-called dad blogger.
As soon as the first morning of Christmas break hit, my kids (especially my son) made sure that they got my attention and demanded that we do stuff together. So now, less than a week into the break we’ve gone to the park and on several “dates” (where I give some fun and undivided quality time with only one child, no spouse or other children allowed).
Thank you very much for sharing my previous post on Typhoon Sendong on Facebook and others. I hope people have donated. If you haven’t donated yet, pls do so by scanning the right margin of this site for the Donate Button. The people of Cagayan de Oro are surely in dire need.
Free Shipping of relief goods for USA and Canada
If you’re a USA resident and you want to send stuff over, you can have your packed goods for donation picked-up at your residences. Call these numbers for info: 1-800-338-5424 CALIFORNIA, 1-866-377-1192 CHICAGO, 1-800-522-9507 NEW JERSEY, 1-877-983-9686 WASHINGTON STATE
In fact, if you live near an LBC branch, pls note that all LBC branches in the US and Canada will start serving as drop-off centers for your donations to victims of typhoon Sendong. I think all LBC branches in the Philippines already serve as such.
(Note that the pictures are not mine, but were taken from various news websites)
The eerie thing is: this man used to work for my mom. His other child is still missing.
Sorry I have been out of the blogsphere for a while. I'm pretty sure you know why.
To those whose lives have been forever changed by the fury of typhoon Sendong as it tore through Cagayan de Oro, who lost their homes and possessions, who lost family and friends, I offer my sincere condolences and prayers.
My dear readers, later in this blog I'll show you how you can help the victims of this terrible disaster.
In case you're wondering about us, we are blessed to live uptown (in Xavier Estates) and so we weathered the storm with only the minor inconvenience of having no electricity. Others were not so lucky.
As of this writing, over 600 people have lost their lives, 800 remain missing, and hundreds upon hundreds more are left homeless as of midnight last Friday night, as flash floods ripped through the lower barangays of Cagayan de Oro, the deluge being so powerful that it easily filled up entire houses in only 5-10 minutes, forcing families to scramble onto their rooftops for survival. Many, deep in their slumber, never had a chance.
Luckily, all of my friends and loved ones survived; but some of them just barely, losing everything they owned except for the clothes on their backs…yet thankful to escape with their lives. Here’s a Facebook comment of one of my co-workers:
If you live in Cagayan de Oro City and you are a teenager or are a parent of one, then you most certainly know how important it is to have the right environment available. Teens today are bombarded with so much from the internet, music, social media, movies, and even books. As a parent, you can’t help but be a little concerned for your adolescent.
Other than (hopefully) your home, do your teens have a place or a community to belong to where they can learn the right lessons in life and learn to filter out the stimuli that is not so beneficial to them?
I don’t know how you’d like to raise the adolescents in your household, but if you do not have something like that for your teen and you’d love him or her to be a part of one, you may want to clear your schedule for this Saturday afternoon (Dec. 17, 2011).
JZone is a wonderful youth ministry that my church, CCF, is doing. It has successfully molded many youths into great young men and women (see here and here for a few examples…when JZone was still called T.E.E.N.S.), and this Saturday, they are going to have a huge Christmas party to cap off the year, called MAKE A JOYFUL NOISE. See the video below for the info:
This Saturday, CCF is surely the place to be if you’re a teen. My 12 year old daughter will invite as many people as she can, so most likely I’ll see you there. CCF is located in Papa Juanito’s Square, right across the street from the Robinson’s Car Park entrance. Let’s all MAKE A JOYFUL NOISE!!
If you grew up in the 80’s, I’m sure you’ve heard Billy Joel’s iconic tune, We Didn’t Start The Fire, where the singer rapidly alluded to major events from the year of his birth to when the song was released in 1989.
I decided to use this song for my Humanities 4 class; where the students grouped together to make their own version of We Didn’t Start The Fire, but this time chronicling what is going on in their current world. There’s a nearly equal number of girls and boys in the class, and so they decided in teaming up with the same gender, resulting in two videos. They’re not professional singers like Billy Joel, but they did the best they could.
As a blogging noob, one of the things I want to learn how to do is to create an online poll or survey. Well, what better way to take that first step than to make a competition between these two student projects?
So, friends, vote in the poll below by answering this question: Which We Didn’t Start The Fire video project is better? Vote Now!!!! Think about both the content (events covered) and the entertainment value when you decide.
Oh, in case you’re wondering why my senior students look so young, The Philippines has two less years of schooling compared to the US and other parts of the world. Therefore, the high school seniors here would be the same age as sophomores in America.
Here are the two videos, ladies first:
Now here’s the guys’ entry:
Cast your vote. Please note that the results of the voting will not affect their grades whatsoever. In fact, their grades for this project have already been decided, based mainly on their peer group evaluation of each other’s efforts (freeloaders will not be rewarded).
The students begged me to reward the winner of this online gig, and so I will. Usually, if I give ice cream or other treats, they’re good. Again, their grades will not be affected…but your vote is still important nonetheless.
Billy Joel’s hit, I hope, is represented well by their efforts. So, which We Didn’t Start The Fire video project is better? Cast your vote! The kids want their ice cream.
(For more blog articles about what goes on during my teaching adventures, click here.This blog is mostly about parenting, with a bit of Christian living and ministry, marriage, Pinoy patriotism, and others topics aimed to develop the reader’s mind, body, and soul. If you would like some good, helpful articles on these topics, I would consider it an honor if you follow or subscribe to Lessons Of A Dad. You can also go to my Facebook page here, and I’m also on Twitter at @lessonsofadad)
During our lesson on leaving a heritage for your children for The Story Of Us retreat, I ran into this wonderful dad quote from Chris Gardner, the rags-to-riches finance guru who grew up not knowing his father and who very nearly lost his son as well, and whose life was made into a movie (The Pursuit of Happyness, starring Will Smith). Despite now being a renowned author and a very successful businessman, I love how he puts things in perspective.
“When I look back at the journey from homelessness to prosperity, I hold one thing dearer than all else – my commitment to my son. Doing a movie with the top movie star portraying me, doing a book with an editor who’s last book won the Pulitzer Prize – all that stuff is great, but the most important thing that I will have ever done in my life was break the cycle of men who were not there for their children.“
Beautiful. Makes me wanna get his books (see below) and watch the movie all over again. You can find more of my site’s parenting material here.
(This blog site, Lessons Of A Dad is mostly about parenting, marriage, and other topics aimed to develop the reader’s mind, body, and soul. I’d consider it an honor if you’d follow or subscribe to this site. You can also go to my Facebook page here, and I’m also on Twitter at @lessonsofadad)
A parenting word about gift giving. Being the 1st of December, Christmas is just around the corner. But, do your gifts really benefit those who receive them?
Merry Christmas everyone, from the Lessons Of A Dad (and the rest of the Alado family as well).
