Caroleen’s Treasures

So everywhere I look, I see none of the old clutter. At least from where I am sitting right now. Never mind about the two small rooms where Ella’s toys and more of our stuffs are. I already did some cleaning there but still needs more work which will follow in the next few days. Ella and I cleared her desk and bookshelf last night then I put away all of the trashes that were kept in her drawers. She’s such a keeper like me. Keeping every bit of paper that she has doodled on and just anything she wanted to keep. Can’t blame her for that because she sees me keep all her drawing and art works in an envelope. Even her hair was hidden in one of my boxes. That’s the first time her hair was cut 2 inches shorter after she decided it’s time to give herself a haircut. I have to trick her just so it won’t be obvious that I am dumping half of her treasures in the bin. I don’t feel bad at all because most of those are just plain papers that she has cut or pictures drawn by other kids.

Like yesterday, Donald and I spent time working on our blogs ’til the wee hour in the morning. That made us rise late today. When I glanced at the clock, we only have 3 hours before the bible study will begin. We were like people cleaning the house in a fast forward mode. I waxed the wooden tiles of the house while Ella helped Donald make last minute getting things in order. Since we don’t have furniture, it was easy to make the house spic and span. Donald ran to get some lunch because we don’t have time to cook. After a real quick meal, I started mixing the batter for puto cheese and sliced the cheese while Donald and Ella each had their turn in the shower. When the both got dressed, Donald helped me by preparing the molders and the steamer while I ran to take a shower. Ella was very helpful since last night. She was the one topping the puto with cheese.

It wasn’t long before the first visitors came. Filipinos are really Filipinos. The bible study was set at 2pm but everyone was late so we started at 3:30pm. Although it sounds so annoying, at least it gave me enough time to prepare the food. We had “buko” (young coconut with milk), puto cheese, cheese flavored popcorn, tropical punch and bread for merienda. Donald led the singing and also the bible study which went very smoothly except for a short, real funny debate between Tatang and her daughter (Ate Venus). Tatang sings fast and loud. He doesn’t look at the song leader’s beat and he doesn’t listen to the song leader too. He sings like he is chased by a horse and he does it everytime. I think he has hearing problem and that he doesn’t know how to read notes. We sang songs with the tenors and bases leading it and then the altos and sopranos bats in. What happened was he sings a part of one song with only two beats when it should be three. That made him start another line in the wrong time. When he finally noticed that we are not in harmony (or he was not in harmony with us), he raised his hand to stop the group and then began lecturing as to when we should be coming in. We were laughing because Tatang insists that he is right and that the ladies are singing too slow that it turned out bad when in fact he was the one who messed it up. Donald stood and pointed out the mistake but didn’t emphasized on Tatang being the culprit because it was in the bible, respect the elderly. Even so, our bible study ended very nicely and everyone pigged out on the food that was served. Glad they liked it and I am gladder that we hosted the bible study this week because we did the cleaning and polishing of the house in just a matter of hours.