Personally Pehpot Archive

If it's about me, it's in here.

My Little Shopaholic

We spoil her in almost everything, well, she’s the only girl in the family, can you blame us? hihi

So it’s about time that we spoil her sole too!

After the Max’s Restaurant and Body Shop Pay Tribute to Filipino Moms With a Pampering “Sarap-To-the-Bones” Treat press launch, we went to Trinoma to fetch the GC’s for The 30 Giveaway Ipanema Kids GC winners as well as get something to spoil Sati’s sole…

Ipanema Kids line are perfect for kids of all ages. You can find a pair for your baby or for your toddler, for pre school and for your 7 year olds.

When Sati saw these slippers, it reminds her of her brothers and wants to buy the 3 designs for his Kuya, Diko and his Sangko.

As expected my little girl had a hard time choosing, she’s torn between pink and violet! (her favorite color) In the end, she got a violet Ipanema Kids GB.

If you want to know more about Ipanema Kids, visit Ipanema Philippines Facebook Page or Ipanema Philippines website.

Ipanema Kids are available at any Bambu branch.

Villar Foundation Livelihood Projects

Being an advocate of the use of ecobags/reusable bags instead of plastic bags, it was such an honor to visit a foundation that values nature as much as I do.

The Villar Foundation is a non-stock, non-profit organization, it aims to support projects geared toward helping our less fortunate countrymen break free from the clutches of poverty.

–Villar Foundation website

Villar Foundation started in 2001 and one of their pioneer project was Sagip Ilog program. This is a program that aims to rehabilitate Las Piñas-Zapote River. According to Engr Dexter Gonzales, it was during the rehabilitation program that they noticed, that some of the garbage that was seen floating in the river was coconut husk.

Coconut husk disposal is a problem but Congw Cynthia Villar started a project that not only solves the coconut husk disposal problem but as well as improve the lives of the people, the Coconet Weaving Livelihood project

Coconet Weaving Livelihood project is now on its 7th year. The project produces coconut net from coconut husk with the use of decorticating machine. It is a machine developed by Dr. Arboleda, a dean from Bicol University. The machine separates the fibers from the husk and what is left are dust. The machine, as Engr Gonzales told us, is at 585 thousand PhP. It can decorticate 10,000 coconut husk a day.

Coconut Vendors willingly bring their coconut husk waste to the Coconet weaving factory located at Brgy E. Aldana (the factory that we visit). The husk, then will be put at the machine for decorticating (which produces two by products: fibers and dust). After the fibers are separated, a family member will dust it. After dusting, a pair will twine it to make coconut rope. After that another pair will weave it to make a coconet. Coconet making is a family matter as we were told. Each family will work hand in hand to make a coconet. According to Atty Reggie, each week, a family can produce 3 rolls of net on the average (a roll is 1 meter by 50 meters net). The foundation will buy the nets produced for the week, for 1000 PhP per roll of net and sells it for 2000 PhP. The profit that the foundation make from coconet weaving was used to pay for the blankets from the Las Piñas Handloom Weaving Center (which we also visited).

You may ask where or what is the use of the coconet? It is being used as slope protection. It was used to prevent soil erosion one of the problems faced during the rehabilitation of the river. The coconet is placed at 45 degree angle on the lands around the river. Plants (specially bamboo) where planted in between the nets. The coconet together with the plant’s root system holds the soil and absorbs water too.

Las Piñas Handloom Weaving Center is located at Bernabe Compound. It is a livelihood project that answers the call of relief operations. Villar Foundation, instead of buying blankets, decided to create their own blanket. It employs 24 workers and as mentioned, profits from the Coconet Weaving project was used to pay for the workers.

The Eco Center at Barangay Pamplona Dos is another Villar Foundation that we visited. Brgy Captain Roberto Villalon shared with us how segregation and composting made a difference in their waste management.

Their waste was classified as wet and dry. Wet are mostly composed of biodegrable waste and kitchen waste. This waste they turn into an organic fertilizer through organic composition. The food and kitchen waste collected (collection done every morning) together with the dust from the coconet weaving factory and trichodema were placed in a composting machine for one week. After a week, the food waste becomes an organic fertilizer:

And since plastics is not biodegrable, Villar Foundation think of something to make use of the plastic, specially plastic bags and sachet. This was used to make hollow blocks where in 10kg of plastic was mixed with 1 sack of cement and 20 kg of sand.

Other projects in the ecocenter are:

Biogas Project
Backyard Aquaculture
Production of Vermicompost

and I want to express my gratitude to Villar Foundation and Brgy Captain Roberto Villalon for giving me a sack of Vermicompost. For a gardener like me, Vermicompost is gold. Thank you very much! Vermicompost is actually worm manure. It has been said to be very rich in nutrients, can be used as fertilizer (worm tea) and also can be mixed with soil.

Las Piñas Arts and Crafts was our last stop. It’s a center where products from water hyacinth was made. Of course, this s another livelihood project from Villar Foundation.

After the trip, we went to Villar’s residence and had a sumptuous lunch with Congresswoman Cynthia Villar.

Congw Cynthia Villar, told us stories about Villar Foundation, how it started as well as their current projects. I am glad to hear that she also helps my city with its water hyacinth problem. I remember her saying:

How can you develop nationalism if you don’t even know what you have.

It was the old Las Piñas we were talking about and the importance of having an old part of the city preserved.

Though our time with her was limited, I believe all of us were inspired by her dedication and hard work in changing the lives of others through Villar Foundation.

Smartphones: Mom’s Best Friend

I never thought I’d be the next in line to sing the praises of smartphones, but I’ve come to the conclusion that they are a must-have item—especially for new mothers or mothers with young children! Why for this particular group? The diversity of apps you can get is just too helpful to ignore. I’ve even been trying out some of the new augmented reality apps and they’re blowing my mind! Here are the top maternal uses of smartphones:

Find retail stores without losing your mind—Whether you’re looking for grocery discounts, localpharmacies, directions to the nearest restroom or just a place that sells sunglasses on an especially bright and sunny day, the GPS features on smartphones are insanely accurate. Needless to say, you can save a lot of time in traffic not traveling the wrong direction on the wrong street during the wrong rush hour.

Use Foursquare to save some money—I wish I had known about place-based messaging sites longer because I’ve already saved a lot of money. I’m the mayor of three different venues on Foursquare and routinely get freebies and discounts simply by checking in to the place when I’m there. Also check out Gowalla and Facebook check-in.

Recipe apps—How many times have you been at the store gathering ingredients for dinner when you realized you didn’t know what the special sauce was made of? Or, you leave the store realizing you forgot the main ingredient? It’s hard to make chicken fajitas without the chicken! Fortunately, there are hundreds, possibly thousands of food apps that list the ingredients you will you need for delicious, inexpensive meals.

Augment Your Reality—Okay, this sounds a little out there, but augmented reality does have practical uses. Have you ever been driving down a street about to run out of gas, desperately hoping for the next gas station? An augmented reality app would overlay the nearest gas stations and what their prices are.

Yes, mommies use technology too and I’m here to tell you that smartphones are a must for new moms or moms leading a team of toddlers down a busy street. Use apps for shopping, meal preparation, driving, and insanity reduction!

This is a guest post from a fellow mom and yes, I am in tune with her in singing praises for Smartphones 🙂