Super Dad and Week 3

Hello! This is Jill writing. Rich has been doing a great job setting up our blog and adding posts! He’s been amazing, and what a luxury to have a great new schedule here and enjoy so much more time together as a family! That was definitely our hope #1 with this move, and so far it has worked just as we hoped!

I will go ahead and post my two emails about our first two weeks in Cebu under April posts in case any of you missed those. For now, I think I will just give you a typical day here in Cebu since life is finally starting to fall into a routine.

The kids usually wake up about 6 a.m. Rich and I take turns going on runs through the neighborhood while the kids eat breakfast. Even at 6 a.m. it is very sunny and hot, and all the streets in the neighborhood are either uphill or down (though none are very steep) so a run can feel pretty strenuous! Then we take the whole family on a walk, sometimes stopping at the neighborhood park. This can be a challenge as there is always at least one child who doesn’t want to go. Hopefully it just becomes routine. Going outside does mean feeling hot … very hot!

There are dozens of dogs in our neighborhood. Cyrus loves to see them and cries when we pass them by … problem is, they’re usually barking fiercely, protecting their turf from behind the gate of their owners’ property!

When we come home, we usually go for a swim before getting ready for the day. We have a morning devotional (singing, scriptures, prayers). Jonah and Savannah fight over leading the music, so usually we have to sing several songs to appease them. Twinkle Twinkle Little Star is a must-sing.

In the late morning, Rich begins work and the children play games. I’m so glad we brought some of our favorite games. Uno and the Monster Game (Thanks, Grandma Ottley!) are played at least 10 times daily by Ashton and Savannah.

About 11:30 I make lunch and before I’ve finished, Glessie (Like Lacey with a “g”) arrives. She is our amazing house helper. I think this week we will talk with her about hiring her long term. She has been coming 5 days a week the last week and a half and has been wonderful. She starts cleaning the breakfast and lunch dishes while I put Cyrus and Jonah down for their naps.

Glessie’s specialty is cleaning and that’s what she spends most of the day doing. She cleans almost all of the dishes during the day (going home shortly after dinner), sweeps and mops the kitchen floor and any others that need it, cleans the bathrooms, tidies things up, makes any beds that haven’t been made, etc. I have to make sure I stay ahead of her with having the children do their normal chores (putting the dishes away, making beds, setting the table, putting toys away) or she will do it for them. I do still want them to have chores although that may not be typical for here. And I try to work alongside her in the kitchen when I can so she doesn’t have to do everything. She also goes to the store for us, though I still have been making a couple trips during the week, too, to find items she would not be familiar with or things like sheets at the dept. store. As time goes on, she will be able to do more and more of the frequent shopping. She also does a lot of deep cleaning for us (things like outlets, light fixtures, etc. here still need to be scrubbed) and daily she refills TP, refills purified water in the bathrooms for brushing teeth, empties garbages, etc. I know you are all thinking how spoiled we are and I can only agree! It is hard not to feel like the evil stepmother with a Cinderella in the house!

Cleaning the kitchen is a bit more work here as we have no disposal and no dishwasher. Also, after rinsing the dishes of food, we wash the dishes in hot purified water and rinse them with more purified water. Not to mention we go through a lot of dishes in a day! We also soak all of our fruits and veggies in a bleach/water solution and then rinse them with more purified water.

Cooking is more time consuming as I’m trying to get accustomed to the gas stove and gas oven. I have slowly acquired some more cookware, utensils, and appliances for the kitchen so I can make a few more things. Also, it is difficult to stay on top of everything we need at the store on a daily basis rather than stocking up once a week or every two weeks.

Anyway, while the younger two are napping, Savannah and Ashton play together, or we swim together, or we do reading time together. Ashton’s reading is really taking off and Savannah is excited about starting to learn to read. That is so much fun to have more time to do that with them. I also usually get to do some reading of my own during this time which is always nice! I’m excited to pick up some more books from the National Book Store at the mall when we have time.

In the afternoon we play, sometimes going outside. Unfortunately, going outside always means getting sweaty, but we’re getting used to that. The children have made friends with two children across the street, so that is nice. They are the children of one of the house helps that lives there. Even at 7 in the morning when we leave on our walk, little Nathaniel is usually sitting out on the sidewalk waiting to see if we will come out to play. They love pushing Jonah and Cyrus on their trikes and Nathaniel likes riding on Ashton’s bike. Grace, another of the neighbor’s house helps, is often outside with their dog, Johnnie. She has been fun to talk to as her English is very good (she worked in Houston for several years as a house help to a Philippino family there) and she is very friendly and helpful. We commiserate together over missing good Mexican food!

Dinner is still a crazy time at our house as Cyrus is usually cranky and crying at my feet as I try to cook. The other kids are just hyper, usually running around making lots of noise! I usually ask Glessie to help me with some tasks as I’m cooking and that is always so nice.

Rich often joins us for dinner, only staying in his office through dinner if things are very busy.

Glessie cleans up the dinner dishes as I put the children to bed. She then goes home for the day. Again, I can’t say enough good about her. It seems so bizarre to people here that I don’t have a “Yaya” (Nanny) at all, not to mention not have one for each of my children. They are surprised to see me doing shopping, Rich taking the laundry to the cleaners, etc. Some ways of life are certainly different here. All middle class families have at least one house help here, but the size of homes is dramatically smaller than in the U.S.

Rich finishes work about this time, too, and it is so nice to have work-free evenings! We miss going out to movies or even having a Redbox nearby, but we have enjoyed going for evening swims or catching up on all your fun emails/blogs.

Needless to say, I feel VERY spoiled! Today is a Saturday and so I did the dishes leftover from last night and the breakfast dishes. Doing all the washing by hand is time consuming and I’m always more and more grateful for the help!

So, that’s a typical day! I do long for company, so it was soooo nice to have our first guests yesterday! Jon’s former mission companion, James Fantone, and his family joined us for swimming and dinner last night. They have been so wonderful – they were the family that showed us around our first Sunday here. And I often call Cynthia, James’ wife, to ask her questions. Monday she is going to show me around to some more places here in Cebu – pediatrician’s office, International food store, etc. She is so nice to talk to because her English is flawless and she has much experience in the U.S. as half her family lives there and she has visited often. She also is somewhat new to Cebu – she grew up in Manila and still does not speak Cebuano, but continues to use Tagolog or English. Her children speak only English at home though they are learning Cebuano in school. Rich really enjoys talking with James as he is an instructor at a school of Entrepreneurship and the Fantones own several businesses. They have 3 daughters – 12-year-old Angela, 5-year-old Drea, and 7-month-old Amanda. They also have a son who died several years ago at 18-months-old. Like most families, the Fantones have a full-time house help who does all of their laundry, cleaning, and cooking, so it has been nice to talk with Cynthia about proper etiquette, compensation, etc., when it comes to that. During the 6 hours they were over yesterday, I think Cynthia only put Amanda down for a total of 5 minutes. That is another difference here, too. People generally do not let their babies cry and spoil them at least their first couple years. It makes me feel a little guilty at how little I hold my babies in comparison! Though parenting may be different in some ways here, I can only admire the type of people the Philippinos are raised to be. They are just good people, happy people, respectful and helpful. I’m just glad to observe that even here, toddlers throw fits in the grocery store! :)

I think that’s long enough for now! We miss you all so much! Rebecca, can’t wait to meet my new aunt – I mean niece :) – Olivia! I expect a full report!

Love you all!

- Jill