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More of this week's wordless wednesday here!

mothers prefer websites for health information

according to the results of a recent study, low-income mothers consider websites as a better source of information about nutrition, compard to video games or pamphlets.

Responses suggested that the mothers liked the Web site format best. They paid more attention to information presented on the Web site and understood it better. They were also more likely to say they would go back to the Web site for nutrition information, compared to the video game or pamphlet. "Nutrition literacy" scores were higher for women who viewed the Web site. On follow-up testing two weeks later, mothers assigned to the Web site were no more likely to retain the information than those who saw the other two formats.

and as a web-user, i agree. i can't count the number of times i made google searches instead of consulting a doc. however, one must be careful. you have to choose and scrutinize the websites you land on and be able to discern bogus from scientifically-sound information. there are many websites out there containing dubious information, so watch out!

manila, here we come!

in just a couple of weeks more, we'll be on our way to the philippines. it's the first trip back home since we moved back to asia half a year ago. although jan and i have just been there last year, it's been almost 4 years since hubby was there last.

being the cheapskate that i am, i surfed the web extensively to find the best airfare deals. i almost booked a flight via tiger airways, but luckily chanced upon from jetstar's promotional airfares. the final bill wasn't that much different to what i would have paid tiger, but at least, we'd be landing at NAIA instead of clark, saving us a couple more hours of land travel.

we'll be staying two weeks in the philippines and i am currently fixing our itinerary, trying to see how we can maximize our stay and squeeze in as much as possible, without making it too jampacked. afterall, there's just so much a hyperactive 5-year old and pregnant me can take!

blogging bucks

i've been blogging since 2004, and have been pro-blogging for the last 2 years. i've seen how paid blogging has developed. i've been right in the thick of it when it started to shoot off the ground.

today, there are dozens of programs one can join to make a bit of extra money on their blogs. and yes, that's also one of the reasons why i decided to beef up this blog.

for the longest time, i've been against paid blogging. but over the last few months, i've seen so many successful cases-- bloggers who could pay for travels, for gadgets, for household expenses, and other stuff from the income they get from their blogs. who am i not to give in to such temptation? although we're living quite comfortably, we're not rolling in money, and i certainly could think of ways to use extra income.

if you had the chance to earn a few bucks from your blog, wouldn't you also grab the opportunity? is there a dark side to this that i am not seeing?

blog revival

since i transferred my personal blog to its own domain name, i've only used my blogger account to be able to comment on other friends' blogs. i do have a few old blogspot blogs though that i've created way back in 2004 and 2005, but never really paid attention to anymore, as i focused all my personal blogging over at transposable element.

but then i was inspired by pinaymommy and realized that, indeed, being a mom calls for a whole new blog in itself.

and the timing can't be better. in just four months or so, i'll be a second time mom!

so here i am, mommy ruth.

asus eee pc

i want this baby:



hubby has been discouraging me about it, saying i'd go nuts with a keyboard of that size and he's probably right, considering that i'm used to a "real" keyboard and it takes me time to adjust to the keys of even a normal-sized laptop.

but it's cute. and portable. imagine, it just weighs about 2 pounds! and so small it can fit in your shoulder bag! i'm gonna have this, i tell you.

now let me see where i can tweak the housebudget....

jan's christmas gifts

we’ve already secured most of jan’s christmas gifts, mostly from amazon — books, videos and cds, all in german (otherwise we would have placed our orders in the US site).



if you speak german, you can tell that jan has an advanced german vocabulary, diction and sentence construction for his age. we knew, however, that with his strengthening english and introductory mandarin, he’s running the risk of slipping on his german, so we countered this with a rich exposure to german literature at home, particularly books and audiobooks. it seems like it does help; when my FIL was here just recently, he has been positively surprised that jan has kept this, using complex sentences with clauses and almost perfect grammar.

what would we be without amazon?