Follow me in twitter @momblogger.Sparkling and dazzling lights dance around our Christmas tree. Hundreds of tiny lights run along the garlands like waves stretching all the way to the second floor. The girls’ bright red and green Christmas stockings hang on the garlands, just waiting to be filled up with yummy candies and goodies on Christmas day. These pretty colored things make me happy as I recall fond childhood memories.

It is not the pretty lights and brightly colored tinsels that excite my kids during the holidays. The spicy aroma of cinnamon, nutmeg, mace and molasses that wafts all the way from the kitchen to their bedrooms bring warm childhood memories. For the past 23 years, I have been baking Gingerbread Man Cookies during the first week of December. They associate Gingerbread cookies with Christmas along with the magical memories tied with it.

Baking Gingerbread cookies was not a childhood tradition though. It must have been mom’s last Christmas season when I first met the Gingerbread man cookies lying on our dinner table. Mom’s Sally’s Bake Shop In Cebu often experimented with new products, and as a default taste tester, I took a bite and loved it. Mom died a few months later from breast cancer. Perhaps I wanted to bring back my mom’s memories during the Christmas season by sharing something about her with my kids who never knew her. I decided to experiment with the Gingerbread Man Cookies. The recipe was a challenge because she did not leave any behind. Knowing my mom, she probably got it from Betty Crocker or in one of her baking books. After a lot of trial and error, I modified the original recipe and called it my very own Gingerbread Man cookies. Most gingerbread recipes contained too much ginger which children did not like. To add a magical touch to the Gingerbread cookies, I concocted a tale of the running Gingerbread Man.

As soon as the first batch of gingerbread men cookies are baked, my kids’ eyes lit up, so eager to eat them. I beg for patience because I want to read a story first. What I do is place a cookie on a plate and then gather my three kids around my arms. I bring out the picture book of the “The Gingerbread Man” and read it aloud to them. The story revolves around a baker who bakes a gingerbread man for his wife and himself. The gingerbread man comes to life, realizes his creator’s plans for him, and runs away. Everyone in town tries to eat him but he just keeps evading them until finally, a sly wolf tricks him into walking right into his jaws.

As soon as the story ends, my children runs towards the plate, now even more excited to eat the first gingerbread man of the year. To their surprise, the plate is empty. “The gingerbread man has escaped, find him!” The kids scramble all over the room searching for the missing gingerbread man until they find it hiding among the books or by the computer keyboard.

The kids are adults now and much too old for gingerbread games. I forgot how they found out that the gingerbread man never really ran away. I confessed many years later that I asked one of our helpers to hide the gingerbread man while they were distracted by the story. Were they bothered by the tale? One daughter says “that doesn’t keep me from feeling a little warm and fuzzy inside as gingerbread men bake in the oven and the house gets filled with the aroma of molasses and spice. I really should get around to learning how to make these cookies. This is a tradition I’d like to pass on to my children.”

Though I don’t read the Gingerbread Man story anymore, I hang the cookies up as decorative edible items on the garlands of our kitchen and dining room. The kids share the cookies to their close friends or give it away as gifts.

This is just one of our special Christmas tradition in our family. Each family develops its own traditions. Sometimes we start new traditions, keep treasured traditions or discard a few that no longer apply. The thing that makes each holiday memorable is the unique spin your own family puts on tradition. Tradition is more than a right way to do something. The small rituals and customs that are repeated from year in and year out give our family something to anticipate While some traditions are passed on from generation to generation, I brought some of the old, added a few pieces of new and tweaked yesterday with today in hopes of creating another memory for tomorrow. These memories last forever.

Here is my Gingerbread Man Cookie recipe

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You might also want to read Positive Mental Energy and Affirmations and my other blogs like Free Filipino Food Recipes, Shopping Finds, Pinoy Food Photo Blog and Techie Gadgets. Or Follow me in twitter @momblogger.

How about visiting my Beauty over 50 blog?

Hope you can drop by! Thanks for visiting…Noemi Lardizabal-Dado.

Add me in Facebook by introducing yourself. My facebook is at facebook.com/noemidado

Follow me in twitter @momblogger.Art is not what you see, but what you make others see. Edgar Degas

The Museum of Old and New Art (MONA) at Hobart, Tasmania is just amazing and thought provoking. It is not art for arts sake. The MONA is a $200 million, quixotic project of Tasmanian businessman David Walsh. He commissioned the Museum from architect Nonda Katsalidis, filled it with his own art and made admission free. You know how they say “The object of art is not to reproduce reality, but to create a reality of the same intensity.” As I moved from one art piece to the next, I often ask myself “what is the message here? or what is the artist trying to convey?”

Whether I’m painting or not, I have this overweening interest in humanity. Even if I’m not working, I’m still analyzing people. – Alice Neel

Visitors to MONA get iPods when they enter the museum. As you walk around, ‘The O’ displays information about the works near you and plays you interviews with the artist.

I am not visually literate but so this nifty iPod help me understand some of the ideas. I have seen the case of the closure of Mideo Cruz exhibit by the bishops and other creative expressions whose concept and presented ideologies they do not agree with. Some of the pieces can come off disturbing and interesting at the same time.

I am interested to see the perspective of the artist and their thought process. “Walsh, the owner of MONA has a scientific mind with an artistic temperament. In Andrew Frost’s interview for ABC TV, David Walsh says that if he could make art, he would. He has an intellectual fascination with Darwinian evolution, time, ancient cultures and the dark areas of our humanity.”

I’m painting an idea not an ideal. Basically I’m trying to paint a structured painting full of controlled, and therefore potent, emotion. Euan Uglow

At MONA you are invited to physically and mentally relax. On the main floor, there is a bar and lots of cool furnitures to lounge about on. My daughter and I are lucky that there was no entrance fee but soon a $20 fee will be required from visitors aside from the fee of the ferry boat. The Os invite you to listen to the commentary and absorb yourself in a private bubble. Nonda Katsalidis’s grand architecture is modest and calming in the exhibition spaces.

(White library by Wilfredo Prieto. White books, shelves, tables and chairs. Born 1978, Sancti Spíritus, Cuba; lives and works in Havana, Cuba, and Barcelona, Spain 2004-6)

“In the interview on The O with Monanism artist Jan Fabre, he says that “art makes us understand we are unbearable”.
In another context, Australia’s only living Nobel laureate writer, J.M.Coetzee, asks ‘Where does the discontented feeling come from, unique to mankind, that we are not well, and what is it that we desire to be cured of?’ (In ‘Italo Svevo’, Inner Workings: Literary Essays 2000-2005, Knopf: North Sydney, 2007, 1-14)”

(Cunts and other conversations by Greg Taylor and friends. 150 life-size porcelain portrait sculptures of women’s cunts. Born 1959, Bega, NSW, Australia; lives and works in Melbourne, Australia. 2008–9 . A gallery of 150 vaginas from all ages 18 to 78 years old .)

The brilliance of MONA’s sex art is that it brings a wider audience to have this impolite conversation about ourselves, sharing one of the most powerful insights in the history of ideas.

“Walking around MONA, you see $200 million dollars worth of private wealth and it is shocking. How can any mortal accumulate such an obscene fortune? Then you think a little more on it and see the positive side. Can MONA provoke Australia’s winging, polluting mining magnates and other billionaires to do something meaningful with their lives and all that damn money?”

I heard David Walsh was a gambler , very gifted with Math and this made him acquire so much wealth which he used to buy Art pieces.

At the MONA, I am lost in my thoughts, often wondering how artists thinks. Here are just bits and pieces of the rest of MONA.

(SCHATTENSPIEL (SHADOWPLAY) HANS-PETER FELDMAN Trestle tables, turntables, lamps, electric motors, plastic figurines. Born 1941, Düsseldorf, Germany, where he lives and works 2005)

(Fat Car, by Erwin Wurm. Porsche Carrera chassis, body and interior, with polystyrene and fibreglass. Born 1954, Bruck an der Mur, Austria; lives and works in Vienna, Austria 2006)

Painting is so poetic, while sculpture is more logical and scientific and makes you worry about gravity.- Damien Hirst

I’m painting an idea not an ideal. Basically I’m trying to paint a structured painting full of controlled, and therefore potent, emotion. – Euan Uglow

You come to nature with all her theories, and she knocks them all flat. Renoir

Here is a video done by my daughter, Marielle while I finish the rest of this entry.

Museum of Old and New Art from Marielle on Vimeo.

I am not much of an art critique so let me give you a Review of David Walsh’s Museum of Old and New Art, Hobart, Tasmania from a MONA visitor.

Review of David Walsh’s Museum of Old and New Art, Hobart, Tasmania

There is no must in art because art is free. – Wassily Kandinsky
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You might also want to read Positive Mental Energy and Affirmations and my other blogs like Free Filipino Food Recipes, Shopping Finds, Pinoy Food Photo Blog and Techie Gadgets. Or Follow me in twitter @momblogger.

How about visiting my Beauty over 50 blog?

Hope you can drop by! Thanks for visiting…Noemi Lardizabal-Dado.

Add me in Facebook by introducing yourself. My facebook is at facebook.com/noemidado

Follow me in twitter @momblogger.Time And health are two precious assets that we don’t recognize and appreciate until they have been depleted. – Denis Waitley

Riding a train on our way to Abbottsford, I pondered over my vacation to Melbourne. It has been a week since I arrived here and all I could think of at first is how expensive this vacation is. Everything cost more than back home and that is partly because I am staying in a hotel in the central business district. Once I start converting Australian dollars to pesos, I feel like I am splurging when that is not really the case. The standard of living is just high here. But see, life is short fretting on material things that it is actually the time spent with my daughter that is most precious. There is a tendency for human beings to have this infinite capacity for taking things for granted. I don’t want to make that mistake.

I loved spending time with my daughter. She is like me in so many ways. We enjoy the arts, having lazy brunches and just chilling and enjoying the scenery. My daughter wanted to show me graffiti art in Hosier Lane where graffiti is not considered vandalism. Graffiti has long been a part of human history, but it wasn’t until the emergence of hip hop culture that graf began gaining recognition as an art form around the globe.

I like how supportive the City of Melbourne is towards their artists. The artwork decorating the walls near number 1 Hosier Lane and near Misty Place at number 3-5 Hosier Lane have been approved as registered street artwork. There is symbolisms out there for every artwork.

I get into the mind of Banksy , a prolific graffiti artist from Bristol, UK, whose artwork has appeared throughout Bristol, London and other locations around the world to understand graffiti art.

Is graffiti art or vandalism? That word has a lot of negative connotations and it alienates people, so no, I don’t like to use the word ‘art’ at all.

“Graffiti is one of the few tools you have if you have almost nothing. And even if you don’t come up with a picture to cure world poverty you can make someone smile while they’re having a piss.”

“People say graffiti is ugly, irresponsible and childish. But that’s only if it’s done properly.”

” I never use sketchbooks in the way you imagine a “real” artist does – perched in a terrace cafe with a pencil capturing the essence of their muse. I tried that once when I was on holiday with a girl, but her nose came out so big in the drawing that she never let me touch her again.”

“Bus stops are far more interesting and useful places to have art than in museums. Graffiti has more chance of meaning something or changing stuff than anything indoors. Graffiti has been used to start revolutions, stop wars, and generally is the voice of people who aren’t listened to. Graffiti is one of those few tools you have if you have almost nothing. And even if you don’t come up with a picture to cure world poverty you can make somebody smile while they’re having a piss.”

“A lot of people never use their initiative because nobody told them to”.

“Art is not like other culture because its success is not made by its audience. The public fill concert halls and cinemas every day, we read novels by the millions, and buy records by the billions. ‘We the people’ affect the making and quality of most of our culture, but not our art.”

“I like to think I have the guts to stand up anonymously in a western democracy and call for things no-one else believes in – like peace and justice and freedom.”

“Writing graffiti is about the most honest way you can be an artist. It takes no money to do it, you don’t need an education to understand it and there’s no admission fee.”

“A lot of people think that scuttling around stencilling images onto buildings in the middle of the night is the action of a sad, frustrated individual who can’t get attention or recognition any other way. They might be right, but I’ve done gallery shows and, if you’ve been hitting on people with all sorts of images in all sorts of places, they’re a real step backwards, painting the streets means becoming an actual part of the city. It’s not a spectator sport.”

“Remember crime against property is not real crime. People look at an oil painting and admire the use of brushstrokes to convey meaning. People look at a graffiti painting and admire the use of a drainpipe to gain access.”

“T.V. has made going to the theatre seem pointless, photography has pretty much killed painting but graffiti has remained gloriously unspoilt by progress.”

I can discern the political nature behind the art. These artists definitely think outside the box. I know I have limitations in my visual literacy but I allowed an open mind to appreciate their work. I believe that to truly appreciate a work of art, we must bring with us nothing from life, no knowledge of its affairs and ideas, no familiarity with its emotions.

Most of the photos attributed to my daughter Marielle Dado using a Nikon D7000. Some are from my iPhone——————————-
You might also want to read Positive Mental Energy and Affirmations and my other blogs like Free Filipino Food Recipes, Shopping Finds, Pinoy Food Photo Blog and Techie Gadgets. Or Follow me in twitter @momblogger.

How about visiting my Beauty over 50 blog?

Hope you can drop by! Thanks for visiting…Noemi Lardizabal-Dado.

Add me in Facebook by introducing yourself. My facebook is at facebook.com/noemidado

Follow me in twitter @momblogger.“Have a sense of pride in your motherland. Just as your mother has given birth to you, so too the land has given birth to you.” Sri Sathya

My friend Leslie Bocobo insisted that I attend the Michael Charleston “XIAO” B. Chua lecture on “Ang Pagtuturo ng Kasaysayan gamit ang Parisian life ni Juan Luna” at the Juan Luna Room (History and Destiny) of GSIS Museo ng Sining . I wondered if I would get bored if I attended. He assured me that I would enjoy Xiao lecture. A challenge was driving all the way to the GSIS Museo ng Sining. Despite my initial hesitation, Juan Luna’s painting piqued my curiosity. Controversy hounded this painting as it was purchased with government money to the tune of 46 million pesos. Today, another controversy looms as the painting is now offered for sale and there is an interested foreign buyer willing to buy it at 200 million pesos.

I needed to see this painting before it is taken away from the museum. As I stared at the painting, I wondered what Juan Luna was thinking. Was it really about a Caucasian woman? Knowing his other works like Spoliarium, there was more to this Parisian life painting. Knowing the meaning of the lady is the key to the understanding of the whole image.

MICHAEL CHARLESTON “XIAO” B. CHUA is a professor at the De La Salle Manila and the Vice President of the Philippine Historical Association

There are three interpretations of the lady but I believe the third one is more symbolic and not a mere coincidence, I wrote more about the details over at Blog Watch. In a nutshell. the lady is the mirror image of the Philippine archipelago. Xiao superimposed the Philippine Map image over the lady and I can see the contour of Northern Luzon follows the same contour of the lady’s bodice.

This interpretation contends that the lady is our motherland and if you look at the lady she is “awkwardly poised, disturbed with a blank stare, seemingly unsure whether to stand up or remain seated.” “Parisian Life” began as a tribute to great Filipinos who are on the cusp of a great change, and now a fitting testament to Luna’s genius and artistic merit, his work continues to invoke passion and create history.”

After the lecture, I felt even more pride for our motherland and that we need to value our heritage.

People should not ask the worth of “Parisian Life” but to ask what is our worth as a people to deserve a historically valuable artwork.

Mahalin ang bayan at mga pamana nito tungo sa kaginhawaan ng lahat tulad ng binanggit ni Andres Bonifacio, “Ampunin ang bayan kung nasa ay lunas pagka’t ginhawa niya ay para sa lahat.”

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You might also want to read Positive Mental Energy and Affirmations and my other blogs like Free Filipino Food Recipes, Shopping Finds, Pinoy Food Photo Blog and Techie Gadgets. Or Follow me in twitter @momblogger.

How about visiting my Beauty over 50 blog?

Hope you can drop by! Thanks for visiting…Noemi Lardizabal-Dado.

Add me in Facebook by introducing yourself. My facebook is at facebook.com/noemidado

Follow me in twitter @momblogger.

Every man ought to be a macho macho man,
To live a life of freedom, machos make a stand,
Have their own life style and ideals,
Possess the strength and confidence, life’s a steal,
You can best believe that he’s a macho man
He’s a special person in anybody’s land. (Village People – Macho Man)

Dad dancing Village People “Macho Man” at a Christmas Party in the late seventies

It’s the booming laughter I remember the most. It’s a laughter that runs across the room that never failed to cheer me up. My father may have passed away six years ago but his sense of humor, the laughter and the positive attitude remains alive in me.

My earliest memory of dad was his round belly that looked like a pillow stuffed under his polo-shirt. I was convinced that fathers also got pregnant just like mom. As I grew a little older and a little wiser I realized his paunch stayed the same way, and no baby would ever come out of it. That often puzzled me. I often laid my head on his soft paunch but only just for a minute because dad would find it uncomfortable.

My sister , Myrna believes that dad’s legacy is his example of strength and perseverance to us, the seven children and eighteen grandchildren. I learned by watching him suffer from the ravages of Stroke, that I should never give up on life, and to hold on to every precious moment with my loved ones, fully aware that, like a candle’s flame, life can flicker out in an instant.

Above all these, the best thing dad gave us is his legacy of true love and family devotion. Even though he is gone, that love and strength of character live on as we now pass these to my daughters, to our grandaughters’ children, and so forth down the generation line.

Today, I want to remember my Daddy old boy, round and pudgy, full of life, his voice confidently booming across a room, his loud laughter rising above a crowd. He may not have the body of a muscled macho man but he lived the style, the ideals, the strength and confidence of a true-blue macho man.

Dad is a special person in anybody’s land. He is alive and well in my treasured box of memories.

I miss you, dad.

For all those celebrating Father’s Day, here is a special treat from me to you. A Box of 12 dozen Krispy Kreme Doughnuts a day to each lucky commenter till June 30. Just comment here.——————————-
You might also want to read Positive Mental Energy and Affirmations and my other blogs like Free Filipino Food Recipes, Shopping Finds, Pinoy Food Photo Blog and Techie Gadgets. Or Follow me in twitter @momblogger.

How about visiting my Beauty over 50 blog?

Hope you can drop by! Thanks for visiting…Noemi Lardizabal-Dado.

Add me in Facebook by introducing yourself. My facebook is at facebook.com/noemidado

Follow me in twitter @momblogger.If you stumbled upon my blog via Shop Talk, welcome to my blog. I came up with this welcome page to guide all of you along in case you have questions on blogging. First let’s tackle the obvious, what is a blog?

1. What is a Blog?

A video on What is a blog best explains it.

‘From “Web log.” A blog is basically a journal that is available on the web. The activity of updating a blog is “blogging” and someone who keeps a blog is a “blogger.”

read more on What is a Blog?

2. How Personal Should A Personal Blog Be?

A personal blog is personal. I go out of my way to relate relevant experiences and include the advice, lessons or gifts learned from it. If my readers didn’t care about my opinion , would they be reading my blog? If they didn’t care, they’d hop on to the next blog. Reading the human emotions associated with the blogger and the interactive discussions is what separates blogging from traditional media.

read more on How Personal Should A Personal Blog Be?

3. How do I Promote My Blog?

When I started my blog, I wanted people to visit me. How else can I promote my advocacy if no one reads my blog? How else can I reach out to bereaved family members if they don’t know about my mission? I developed strategies to drawing in visitors. These Promote your blog ideas are not original but they worked for me.

read more on How do I Promote My Blog?

4. What has blogging brought me?

Blogging has brought me so much, more than I ever imagined it to be, from platform for my advocacy to expanded social and business network, recognition…

read more on What has blogging brought me?

5. How does one monetize a blog?

Here is a guide on A Blogs’ Potential with Google Adsense and Adsense Alternatives Revisted by Abe Olandres. Like I mentioned in the interview, I experimented with all monetizations possibilities. If blog monetization is your cup of tea, there is no harm in trying this out.

Read the other tips of probloggers like Abe Olandres and Darren Rowse

6. How much money do bloggers earn blogging?

I can’t locate the local poll done by Abe so let me just point you to another problogger. Based on an October 2007 poll by Darren Rowse, figures show

Keep in mind that these figures are just for those who earn something from blogging (and don’t include the 28% who don’t).

49% earned under $100
23% earned over $1000
16% earned over $2500
9% earned over $15000

…while there is significant hype around the idea of bloggers making money – that the vast majority earn very little (or nothing). A quarter of those who earn something make less than 0.33 cents per day. If that’s not a reality check then I don’t know what is.

On the flip side – a smaller group of bloggers are making good to great amounts of money. While I’m sure there are some votes that are put in the highest category falsely – I do believe that there are an increasing number of bloggers who making significant part time income through to full time income from their blogs. That top category is significant and seem to be growing.

And if you’re a mom wanting to blog, you might want to be inspired by mom bloggers by viewing this video of me and two of my friends:

I hope you learned something from the above links. Just comment if you have other questions.

Asides
With me in Shoptalk is Angelo and our most gracious host, Tony Velasquez who easily put us at ease . Other bloggers invited to this show but couldn’t make it was Benj (he was late!) , Marhgil (at work) , Gail (too busy), Abe (previous appointment) , Jayvee (out of town), Anton (out of town).

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You might also want to read Positive Mental Energy and Affirmations and my other blogs like Free Filipino Food Recipes, Shopping Finds, Pinoy Food Photo Blog and Techie Gadgets. Or Follow me in twitter @momblogger.

How about visiting my Beauty over 50 blog?

Hope you can drop by! Thanks for visiting…Noemi Lardizabal-Dado.

Add me in Facebook by introducing yourself. My facebook is at facebook.com/noemidado

Follow me in twitter @momblogger.
The lighted Christmas Village caught the attention of Mike Villar (or was it Bim ) as he entered our dining room last Saturday night with the rest of the Man Blog-gers. I can’t remember now what Lauren told me but from what I recall, Mike imagined that lilting Pling pling pling pling pli-pli-pling music playing in the background as we eat dinner and babble in our fake British accents. The way Lauren said Pling pling pling pling pli-pli-pling sounded so much like Vivaldi’s “Four Seasons”.

Haha I was laughing out loud because it is sort of true. I don’t play classical music but baroque music, a big difference of which I will explain later on. And no, we don’t play baroque music on dinner time alone. I play it any time of the day and have been playing it since the kids were little. I even hired Bagting Hangin, a string and wind ensemble to play it during Lauren’s 18th Birthday Party.

Before I get any further, let me explain the display of the English Village set. The Christmas Village set reminds me of Stratford-upon-Avon, a town I visited many years ago in the UK. The town is a popular tourist destination owing to its status as birthplace and deathbed of the playwright and poet William Shakespeare. My walks in the breathtaking village is so memorable, the scenery is just picture pretty and forever imprinted in my memories. When I saw this village set offered for sale by a friend, I just knew I wanted it to be displayed in my dining room. The village set is not a pretentious display of shallowness and hypocrisy but rather a collection of memories of visits to similar cottages in Stratford-upon-Avon. The ancient church replica reminds me of that time I visited the Holy Trinity Church, a moment of calm away from the bustle of the town. Both the courtyard and the churchyard itself are breathtakingly beautiful. Okay so now you know why that Christmas Village sits there.

Now on to the Pling pling pling pling pli-pli-pling music with two reasons:

First, the objective was to calm Lauren’s nerves.

Lauren was a sickly child often getting ill with asthma attacks every month. With visits to the emergency room every month, I had to do my share in making her calm and relaxed to ensure a faster recovery. I gave her “Visualizations for Mind Calming” of which the objective of the exercise is to gain practice in visualizing while at the same time soothing the mind. Calm and peaceful scenes from nature were quite helpful in erasing worries and distractions. I often said it out in a soft voice to imagine walking in a park, or in the woods, sitting by the lake, a walk on a hill or mountain, countryside or any spot that I though had a particularly soothing quality. Together with this mind-calming techniques, I added baroque music (specifically in largo beat) to get into slowed down body mind/body rhythms and manageable breathing.

Why Baroque music and why the largo or slow tempo?

Researchers have found that certain music types ease the brainwaves into the relaxed ‘alpha state’ that is ideal for Superlearning. One form of this superlearning music is the adagio movements of many baroque composers.

The adagio movements are around 40 to 60 beats per minute. In many string concertos and other works, the adagio movements often encapsulate the quintessential thematic and emotional material. However it is their 40-60 beats per minute and slow rhythm that slow body and mind functions and allow an alpha state of mind. This enables one to excel in retention and recall of materials presented in 20 minute intervals. It is also great for relieving stress.

From Baroque Music for Contemplation

There is a huge difference between baroque and classical music. The baroque music composers are from the likes of J.S. Bach A. Corelli, G.F. Handel, G. Telemann and A. Vivaldi in the 1600 – 1760. The classical music is from the time period 1730 – 1820 and right after the Baroque period. So if you want to refer to that Mike Villar’s Pling pling pling pling pli-pli-pling, it’s actually called Baroque Music.

Secondly, playing baroque music was to enhance the creativity in my children.

As reported in Ostrander and Schrader’s Super Learning, research discovered that the ideal state for learning is when the brain is in a relaxed, but aware state. And when they say relaxed, they do not mean asleep, but relaxed, focused and aware. It is at this point the brainwaves run at about 8 to 12 cycles per seconds or hertz. This is called the alpha state. Alpha is simply a state when you are calm and relaxed, in a way similar to when you whistle a happy tune, or when you daydream.

Getting into the Alpha State can be achieved in a number of ways and most of us achieve it several times during most days. At this time the mind is clear, receptive to information, and rapidly making ‘connections’, realizations and joining up deep thoughts. Many an ‘AHA!’ moment comes when an individual is in “Alpha”.

Years ago when this research was beginning, scientists were startled to discover that a certain kind of music can put the brain into an accelerated-learning state. Listening to Baroque Music was the number one method of getting into “Alpha”. Again, the research shows that baroque music at 60 beats per minute causes your brain to produce more alpha [calmness] waves. This happens on both the left brain’s analytical hemisphere and right side’s creative spatial hemisphere. When both hemispheres are engaged, the brain is able receive more information. You can retrieve information quickly because the music acts as a carrier wave to long-term memory storage.

Not that I wanted my kids to be superlearners, I wanted them to be calm and relaxed and eager to learn to the best of their abilities. No one is too young or too old to enjoy relaxing baroque music. Let me show you a music list for baroque music. Mind you, it has to be the slow movements from Baroque instrumental music featuring string instruments that give the best results.

Vivaldi, A.

• Largo from “Winter” from the The Four Seasons
• Largo from Concerto in D Major for Guitar and Strings
  From Baroque Guitar Concerti
• Largo from Concerto in C Major for Mandolin, Strings and Harpsichord
• Largo from Concerto in D Minor for Viola D’ Amore, Strings and Harpsichord
• Largo from Concerto in F Major for Viola D’ Amore, Two Oboes, Bassoon, Tow Horns and Figured Bass
  From Vivaldi: Three Concertos for Viola D’Amore, Two Concertos for Mandolin
• Largo from Flute Concerto No 4 in G Major
  Vivaldi: 6 Flute Concerti Opus 10

Bach, J.S.

• Largo from Concerto in G Minor for Flute and Strings, BWV 1056 (2:53)
  Bach and Telemann Flute Concertos
• Aria (or Sarabande) to The Goldberg Variations
• Largo from Harpsichord Concerto in F Minor, BWV 1056
  Greatest Hits of 1720
• Largo from Solo Harpsichord, Philharmonic Virtuosi of New York Columbia Records
• Largo from Solo Harpsichord in G Minor, BWV 975
  6 Concerti after Vivaldi
• Largo from Solo Harpsichord Concerto in C Major, BWV 976
  6 Concerti after Vivaldi
• Largo from Solo Harpsichord Concerto in F Major
  6 Concerti after Vivaldi

Handel, G.F.

• Largo from Concerto no. 1 in F (brass)
  from Music for the Royal Fireworks
• Largo from Concerto No. 3 in D (brass)
  from Music for the Royal Fireworks
• Largo from Concerto No. 1 in B-flat Major op. 3 (woodwinds and strings)
  Handel: Concerti Grossi op. 3
• From Handel’s Twelve Concerti Grossi, Opus 6, any of the largo movements can be used

Corelli, A.

• Sarabanda (Largo) from Concerto No. 7 in D Minor
  Corelli: 12 Concerti Grossi op. 5

• Preludio (largo) and Sarabanda (largo) from Concerto no. 8 in E Minor
  Corelli: 12 Concerti Grossi op. 5
• Preludio (largo) from Concerto no. 9 in A Major
  both from Corelli: 12 Concerti Grossi op. 5
  From Corelli’s Twelve Concerti Cgrossi, Opus 6, any of the largo movements can be used.

  Telemanm, G.

• Largo from Double Fantasia in G Major for Harpsichord
  Telemann: 6 Fantasias for Harpsichord
• Largo from Concerto in G Major for Viola and String Orchestra
  From Telemann

There you have it, Pling pling pling pling pli-pli-pling bringing you in “reverie” state of relaxation.——————————-
You might also want to read Positive Mental Energy and Affirmations and my other blogs like Free Filipino Food Recipes, Shopping Finds, Pinoy Food Photo Blog and Techie Gadgets. Or Follow me in twitter @momblogger.

How about visiting my Beauty over 50 blog?

Hope you can drop by! Thanks for visiting…Noemi Lardizabal-Dado.

Add me in Facebook by introducing yourself. My facebook is at facebook.com/noemidado

Follow me in twitter @momblogger.
I joined the Photo Hunters as a way to promote my blog to a wider audience. It also forces me to make use of my digital camera. Photo Hunters’ members post every Saturday based on a theme chosen by the founder of the group. You can join here. Today’s theme is Hobby and I want to present one of my hobbies, Cooking.

My favorite hobby when I am not lazy is cooking. Here is my Korean Beef Stew that my family love. I cooked this a few days ago to their utter delight.

Here is my Korean Beef Stew Recipe which was inspired by the Korean Fast Food Kimchi Restaurant in Manila——————————-
You might also want to read Positive Mental Energy and Affirmations and my other blogs like Free Filipino Food Recipes, Shopping Finds, Pinoy Food Photo Blog and Techie Gadgets. Or Follow me in twitter @momblogger.

How about visiting my Beauty over 50 blog?

Hope you can drop by! Thanks for visiting…Noemi Lardizabal-Dado.

Add me in Facebook by introducing yourself. My facebook is at facebook.com/noemidado

Follow me in twitter @momblogger.Baking Christmas sugar cookies and the Gingerbread men cookies during the last week of November has been my Christmas tradition for the past twenty years. I thought baking days were over for me now that the kids are in college but no….There was one Christmas season when I didn’t bake these cookies . Sometimes I wonder if I did that deliberately because there are no small kids at home. I found out that kids will be kids at heart and they look forward to traditions .

With a hectic schedule, I make sure that Christmas decorations are already set by the first five days of December. Before you think I am a super-mom, I am not. I am blessed with an intelligent yaya (Luijoe’s caregiver) who learned the basic rudiments on baking from me all these years. I was also blesssed with a mother who taught me how to bake since I was little girl. In turn, I was able to train my helpers so that they are armed with skills other than cooking or cleaning the house.

I can even open a small bakeshop if I wanted to but I’d rather not stress myself out. I know how it is to live in a bakeshop business. It’s not fun at all. It’s all work , work and no play. Baking should be a fun and enjoyable experience. Since I was nine years old and just before I got married, Christmas meant packing cookies into baskets, counting inventory, tying ribbons, answering calls, watching a stall , counting money and being stressed out. My ex-boyfriend now my husband thought it was a great idea to visit me during the Christmas Holidays. Haha, I told him “You will have to drive our van to stores all over Cebu if you want impress my dad.” And he drove for our business because that was the only way that he and I could be together for the holidays. I vowed that I would never bake in large-scale proportions; that I would bake because I loved to. I vowed that business should be both fun and profit at the same time.

Today, I bake out of love and pride as a mother. The only time I ever baked for profit was when my husband begged me to bake cookies for his boss because the boss liked my cookies. Ugh. My Christmas Angel Sugar cookies now adorn my Christmas angel collection. Aside from the Gingerbread Man Cookies here is my recipe for Christmas Sugar Cookies modified for our tropical climate.

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You might also want to read Positive Mental Energy and Affirmations and my other blogs like Free Filipino Food Recipes, Shopping Finds, Pinoy Food Photo Blog and Techie Gadgets. Or Follow me in twitter @momblogger.

How about visiting my Beauty over 50 blog?

Hope you can drop by! Thanks for visiting…Noemi Lardizabal-Dado.

Add me in Facebook by introducing yourself. My facebook is at facebook.com/noemidado

Follow me in twitter @momblogger.Once upon a Christmas season, a mother baked Gingerbread Men cookies to the delight of her three children who eagerly waited for the cookies to bake. The waft of molasses, cinnamon and spices excited them. “We’re hungry, mom!”. The mother told them to be patient and promised to read them the Story of the Gingerbread Man as soon as the cookies were baked.

She got three cookies and laid them on a platter.

“Can we eat the Gingerbread Man now?” The children tugged at their mom’s apron.

“Let’s read the Gingerbread Man story first so you know the legend…” the mother said and left the platter of cookies on the table. The three children and the mother huddled around the Christmas tree as she began to read…

Once upon a time a little old woman and a little old man lived in a cottage………
The little old woman and little old man were very hungry and wanted to eat the gingerbread man. As soon as he was cooked, the little old woman opened the oven door. The gingerbread man jumped out of the tin and ran out of the open window shouting, ‘Don’t eat me!’……..

The mother continued on until the end where the fox ate the Gingerbread Man.

“Did you like the story?”

“It’s sad that the fox ate the Gingerbread Man in the end. Can we now eat the Gingerbread Man Cookies? We’re not like the sly fox.” The children discussed among themselves.

“Sure…get your cookies on the plate.”

The three children turned to the platter…”Mom, look… the Gingerbread Man jumped out of the plate. He’s gone. ”

The mom looked surprised “Maybe he ran away… Let’s look for the Gingerbread Man”

The three children looked all over the house until each of them found their Gingerbread Man hidden in their toy chest.

The kids beamed with laughter “Silly Gingerbread Man. The fox will eat you anyway. Don’t run away now.”

And so this mother carried this tradition until the kids were older and wiser to know that the Gingerbread Man didn’t really ran away. By now you know I was that crazy mother. Hehe.

I instructed the kid’s caregiver to hide it discreetly while I read the story to my three children.

For the past 17 years, I bake Gingerbread Man Cookies only because my crazy tale and the warm fuzzy feeling of christmas memories give my two older girls some comfort. The holidays are a wonderful time to fill my home with the aroma and fragrance of Christmas through baking Gingerbread Man and Christmas cookies. I ‘ve baked all sorts of Christmas goodies like Lemon Squares, Fruit Cake, Brandy Cake, Apple Pie, and other bar cookies but the demand of Gingerbread Man cookies are high on the list. Though I don’t read the Gingerbread Man story anymore, I hang the cookies up on the garlands of our kitchen and dining area. The kids share the cookies to their close friends and they often say that they have never tasted a Gingerbread Man cookie.

Sure there are a few Gingerbread Man sold in other bakeshops. I bought the Gingerbread Man cookie in Starbucks last year but it tasted mostly of flour. Maybe because it’s not that easy to bake Gingerbread Man cookies . Our tropical climate makes the dough difficult to handle. Constant chilling is needed. Baking at the right temperature is tricky. If underbaked, the cookie crumbles easily. If overbaked, the cookie taste burnt and bitter. Still, I am sharing my Gingerbread Man Cookie recipe and the story for all to enjoy.

Photos of the Baking——————————-
You might also want to read Positive Mental Energy and Affirmations and my other blogs like Free Filipino Food Recipes, Shopping Finds, Pinoy Food Photo Blog and Techie Gadgets. Or Follow me in twitter @momblogger.

How about visiting my Beauty over 50 blog?

Hope you can drop by! Thanks for visiting…Noemi Lardizabal-Dado.

Add me in Facebook by introducing yourself. My facebook is at facebook.com/noemidado