Conversations with Bela

Bela knows that she will be an ate soon and I showed her pictures of my first ultrasound.

Me: “Bela, here is a picture of your baby brother.”
Bela: “Mom, it is still a sea creature. It is not a He or a She. It is still an IT.”

The picture shows the fetus in my tummy which looks like a sea horse so Bela said that it is still a sea creature. I remember I told her before that since the baby inside me is still too small, we still can’t say if it is a boy or a girl. So when I told her that it is a picture of her baby brother, she disagreed right away and corrected me by referring to the baby inside me as an “it”. LOL.

Bela: “Mom, why is the baby stuck inside your tummy?”
Me: “When you were a baby, you we’re also inside my tummy for nine months.”
Bela: “I don’t want to be stuck there for nine months. Take the baby out of your tummy.”
Me: “The baby inside me is still so small. So it still can’t eat on its own so it has to be inside me so every time I eat, it gets to eat too. When the baby is already big, that is the time it can go outside my tummy. Got it?”
Bela: “Ok.”

(Remember I still refer to the baby as it, because she will correct me again and remind me that we still don’t know if she will be having a baby brother or baby sister.)

I met up with my friends from high school a few weeks ago and I brought Bela with me and they were all amazed at how Bela can speak in straight English. They even said that Bela is slang and I jokingly told them that at least she will sure get a call center outsourcing job with her diction. LOL.

But we are trying to teach her how to speak in Tagalog now specially she will be attending big school already next year and they will have Tagalog subjects like Filipino and Sibika at Kultura. My mom said that I should not worry because Bela will be able to adapt for sure since Tagalog is spoken by everybody around her so for sure, she will learn. But hubby and I are trying as early as now and even her Occupational Therapist is trying to teach her little words in Tagalog.

Bela's First Real Haircut

A few weeks ago, Bela had her first real hair cut. Her lola was the one who cut Bela’s hair when she was two years old and she hasn’t been to a real kiddie salon. So it as been two years already since her last hair cut so you can just imagine, how long her hair is.

Her lola doesn’t like Bela to have a hair cut since she thinks that it will be more difficult to manage if it were shorter. But since Bela is getting rashes all over her face and body, her lola finally agreed for Bela to have a haircut.

Howell was actually working that weekend, and so my sister, yaya, Bela and I just took a cab going to Robinson’s place. We first went to Guess to exchange the leggings that I bought for her which was kind of short and the other leggings which don’t go well with the blouse that I bought. After shopping for Bela’s clothes, we went to SM Manila since there is no kiddie salon in Robinson’s Place.

Bela actually was excited for her first hair cut because I told her that she will get to sit in a car chair and watch while she is having her haircut. She was actually behave and the only time the hair dresser had difficulty was when she was already blow drying Bela’s hair because Bela won’t stop laughing because she said that it was ticklish.

I love Bela’s hair cut now. She looks a lot younger…

Ate Bela

And so I thought I will need the best appetite suppressant because I am now 116 lbs but I guess I have to hold off my diet for at least nine months because Bela will become an Ate soon. Yes, I am so happy to announce that I am now pregnant with our second child.

Of course Howell and Bela are the most excited to receive the good news. I guess they are both hoping for a baby boy as they always refer to the baby in my tummy as “baby brother.”

When I arrived home from my checkup, Bela said “Did the doctor check the baby in your tummy?” and she kissed my tummy after that. I am sure Bela will be the sweetest ate to her sibling. I can’t wait for the time where I can see the two of them playing together. That would really be a site to behold.

Her Own Laptop

Bela has a computer class at MSS. She told me that they are playing games in the computer like coloring, alphabets, sorting, etc. That is why every time she sees us in front of the computer, she will always try to convince us to go to the Disney channel site so she can play her favorite games and watch her favorite Disney characters also.

This is good as she is showing signs of interest in the field that I and my husband is into and at least she is playing with educational games so she is learning the same time she is having fun. But sometimes, I have to work with my laptop also as I need to finish a lot of tasks so I sometimes get delayed if I need to share my laptop with her.

Now that her birthday is coming up, hubby and I are thinking if I should upgrade my laptop and give my old laptop to her. We used to ask our friends in the US to buy our gadgets at circuit city but now that it is close already, our friends suggested that we check out buy.com. And we were surprised to find out that their rates are really cheaper and they sometimes even offer free shipping.

I have to check our budget, and who knows we might afford a new laptop so Bela can have my old laptop all to herself.

Halloween @ MSS

Last October 22 was Bela’s Halloween Party at MSS. They did a costume parade while dancing to the tune of “Nobody, nobody but you.” I was so sad because I was not able to watch her perform since I can’t take another leave that week since I just took an emergency leave a week before that when I took Bela to the doctor when she got sick.

Good thing hubby was able to take a leave and so she was able to capture it in photos while my mom was able to take a video also. It was so entertaining watching Bela perform as she has no stage fright. She was dancing energetically and her teacher have to ask her to go down since it looks like she has no plans of going down the stage. LOL.

Here are some pictures:

Her gown by the way was made by Prim. This will be her ballerina dress that she will wear on her birthday. I just added wings so she will look like a fairy ballerina. LOL. You can view more pictures here.

Bela @ SG Zoo - a snapshot

Don’t I look fat in this picture and looks like I will need the best weight loss pills? But anyway, I still opted to post it in my Flickr account as this is one of the pictures where you can see that Bela did had fun while we were in Singapore.

Last year when we watched the Elephants at Work and at play show, Bela was already so tired that she was already throwing tantrums and did not really enjoyed the show. But this time, even though she did not take a nap, she watched the show with so much excitement and enthusiasm. It was a thirty minutes show and she did not even get bored for even one bit.

After the show, there was an elephant feeding program where for SGD $ 5, you will be given a basket of fruits to be fed to the elephants. I thought Bela will be so tired for this but she was still all game when I asked her if she wants to feed the elephants.

I still have to make one official post of our SG and KL trip but for the meantime, you can check out pictures for our two days in Singapore here.

Bela @ SG

We are now here in Kuala Lumpur and my conference will start tomorrow. I know I still have to look for life insurance quotes as we have to renew ours, but I can’t wait to post some pictures of our two days in Singapore.

We decided to go to Singapore as we know that Bela will have a great time there as she just loves animals. We only have few leaves left so we only have two days to spend in Singapore. Since this trip is really for Bela, our IT was just to visit the places where she will really have fun.

Since this is our second time in Singapore, Bela was familiar with the places that she can visit so she was the one making decision on where to go first. We first visited the Jurong Bird Park since we were not able to check it out last time and I am sure Bela’s favorites were:

Her close encounter with the parrots at the Children’s Parrot Show

Her photo op experience with the owl.

Her play time with the free flying birds at the Lory Loft.

Then the next day, we went to Singapore zoo. The highlights of our trip there are:

Her elephant ride.

The very wet kiss that she got from Carlos, the sea lion.

And she was able to feed the elephants.

Bela did not the sleep the whole day during those trips but she was so energetic. She was really in heaven and she kept on kissing us because she really had fun.

Bela @ 4

Two days before we leave for Singapore, Howell was finally able to finish Bela’s invitation for her birthday party. And the day before we left, hubby was able to send it to the photo center to have it printed. I wanted to have it printed before we leave since we will be back a week before her party already so we might not have time to distribute the invites. Also, since it is a long weekend and All Soul’s day, most of our relatives might be coming to my lola’s house so my mom can give out the invites.

So this is the invites that Howell was able to finish in just two days:


I was surprised that he was even able to make four different layouts. He used our pictures during our Europe trip for the background since Little Einsteins also went to Europe for an adventure. The pictures of Bela were taken during her Halloween Party at her school taken by her dad.

Hopefully, we will still have time when we arrive to give out the invites before her party.