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About Me

Kailua, Hawaii, United States
I was born in Claveria, Philippines on September 6, 1984. Presently, I live in Kailua, Hawaii. I'm happily married to Bryn Kaufman and loving being a mother of our son, Zachary Kai. We have a very energetic and very cute Maltese dog, named Snowy.

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Zachary's first visit to the US Mainland

Summer of  2010

June 19,  evening. Our flight by Continental Airline to Newark was two hours delayed. But our 10 month-old Zachary managed to entertain himself with the old folks, also passengers waiting. He's such a friendly, smiling little booboo. Most of the women were charmed by his big head, small face, chubby cheeks and bright eyes.

Inside the plane, Zachary made a good impression to the passengers, especially the lady sitting beside us. They became friends and she's very entertained by him. I didn't have good rest and my back ached though. But it could have been worse if there was no bassinet. He's a big boy now and can't hold him long anymore. He slept in a bassinet then I danced him when he woke up yet still tired.

June 20, midday. We arrived at Newark Liberty International Airport, my second time! Daddy made a mistake renting our car the other day then realized that our car was too small for all our luggage. It took us 3 hours to get out finally from the airport. Zachary even napped in my arms in the rental car office, at the stairs. Drove almost 2 hours to Washington Crossing, PA, where Zachary's grandfather (Opa Walt) and step-grandma (Nana Peg) live, Zac slept more in his car seat until we arrived at his Opa's house.

June 20-22, nights..exhausting nights. Zachary wasn't adjusted to time change at all. It's 6 hours time earlier than Hawaii time. He napped at 8:00 pm, woke up at 10:00 pm, played, crawled and etc then at between 2-3 am we drove around for him to go back to sleep. By 4 am he started sleeping till 10 am. I fed him his breakfast that late and had later lunch, after lunch, he napped again for an hour. How about us? Very exhausted. I drank coffee for twice a day just to keep up. His dad had to get some sleep though because he drives.

It was fun, meeting the family again. It was great to meet Zac's cousins and uncles and aunties and family friends. We even met one of the family friends, Marion,  a very intelligent woman, the mother of Jon Stewart (of The Daily Show of Jon Stewart) and she gave a book as a present to Zachary. We also met the babysitter of my husband's when he was a baby and all other wonderful people.  (Nana, holding Zac and Ms. Marion, smiling)





June 23, midday. We drove to Marlton, New Jersey to see my husband's mother and her husband, Zachary's Nana Nancy and Grandpa Jerry. It took us like more than an hour to get there and Zachary just slept the whole ride, which is really incredible.

June 24-25 with "Whisper" a wheaten terrier dog. She's a very loving dog and she loves Zachary. Every time he cries, Whisper worries. He loves his Nana very much, they even have great pictures together. Though his sleeps were still in the same pattern like the other nights.


June 25, afternoon. Started driving from Marlton, New Jersey to pass New York to arrive at Connecticut. The longest ride I ever did. We stopped at some scenic spots to stretch and rest for few minutes. Zachary slept most of the time, and every time he's awake, I did all my best to entertain him. I just got to do everything, aside from feeding him so he won't get bored. So I didn't sleep to with our driver, my husband and his mom so we can all help to take the right direction. After 8 hours, we were still driving in a winding road, so dark that the fireflies look like stars and finally arrived at the Milavsky residence, where Nana's sister and her husband live.

June 26-28. Storrs, Connecticut - the Gordon Family reunion. The first time they met Zachary and he was such a bundle of joy to everyone. His favorite uncle Joe, just made him laugh and smile at all time. The house is great and big. It's in the middle of the woods, which is really beautiful, so green and lushly, full of life and beautiful wild flowers. It was so great to be there adding the wonderful family we belong to now. They're such nice people, friendly, funny, artistic and good-looking. I will not be surprised, when someday Zachary will be known for an art.


June 28, evening. We arrived at the Newark Marriott Hotel, stayed there for a night before flying back to Hawaii. We met my friend, Tessie (with her husband), who's been my friend for a long time and shared a boarding house with her way back in Cagayan de Oro, Philippines. It was an exciting experience knowing that we met again, here in the US.

June 29, evening. Back in Hawaii (after 10 hours flight)! the vacation went so fast. We were all tired but thanked God for we made it. It wasn't easy for taking a baby this age in a flight but we survived and we learned a lot. Because of my not-so-good sleep nights during my vacation, I started appreciating my interrupted sleeps with baby Zac at home and feel good waking up in the morning without red eyes :).

Reminiscing our love story: Year 2

Our story of being together is one of those virtual love stories that came to life. Me and my husband met on a dating site, http://www.filipinaheart.com/. on the 29th of July, 2007. He was 41 years old and I was 22 years old at that time. We both believed that we clicked immediately because we are both looking for the same things in a relationship- loyalty and honesty. Unfortunately, in the past, we both experienced being cheated, lied and betrayed so we were both sympathetic to each other's pain and what we had to go through in order to move on.

We really didn't waste so much time. He fell in love with me in the 3rd day of communicating online, such as email and chat. Of course both sides had competitors and started choosing little by little and ended up with each other's username. Our first time together, in person was August 28, 2007 just a month after flirting with each other online, he came to the Philippines to visit me. We spent our days in Boracay Island, Philippines and it was very dreamy and memorable. Nervous, excited, happy and emotional oh he was that day and I was just confident and felt sure that this is the right man this time.

Of course he had to fly back to Hawaii after ten short days of vacation with me and this time it was more difficult. We just kept missing each other so much, painfully. So he decided to start our papers to get a visa to enter the US. December 2007, he spent his Christmas time with me and met my family for the first time. On the 25th, he proposed for marriage and happily I said "yes" of course.

After five months of waiting my visa (fiancee) got approved then it was time to pack. Enjoyed the remaining moments with my family and friend and took off to be with my husband. May 13, 2008 I arrived in Hawaii and started a life with him. Challenging- everything is too beautiful, too much to ask for and I learned to adjust the life of being ahead. June 15, 2008, father's day, we got married in the famous tourist destination, Ko'olina though we held it on the outside property, very beautiful, naturally fancy Secret Beach. Indeed, first time to feel so secured and really happy once again.

Today is June 18, 2010.. 3 days passed our wedding date, it's been two years since we declared ourselves as one (and counting). I love being married to him and he told me that he would never want any wife other than me :).

Baby Zac has a Guardian Angel

May 22, 2010 at 12:55 am.

I woke up with an excruciating pain in the top of my head. I sat on the bed with my baby in the back, sleeping on his tummy. I tried to figure out what's going on, while I was pulling my hair area where the pain was. For a moment, I thought I had a brain tumor or something. The pain ran down my neck and my left ear.

I was about to panic when I heard baby Zac moved, trying to find a comfortable sleeping position. He was off his pillow so I grabbed him up so I can put back on his pillow....then,  Jesus Christ! A 2-3 inches long centepede crawled out from my baby Zac's underneath! It was hiding under baby Zac in the pillow!


Adrenaline rush, quickly held baby Zac to run towards my husband's room and called that I got bitten by the centepede in my head. So he went down to the garage to get the insects spray. I gave baby Zac to my husband, got the spray, and find the centepede myself to kill it. I moved all the pillows in our bed and there it was! sprayed it, it tried to run away and sprayed it again and boom! it curled in itself, poisoned but fought to live so I crushed it baby Zac's little hard book.

I didn't feel good with my head with the pain, but I was so relief that it didn't bite baby Zac at all not ended up in the emergency room. I always believe that guardian angels always protect babies from harm. With what happened, I was just very emotional that it was incredible that the centepede hiding under baby Zac's tummy, didn't bite him. Thank God and angels for the protection!

Now, I'm just recovering from the centepede bite in my head because i'm sure that was happened, with the icepack in my head. Good thing, the bite is not deadly and non-toxic, so i'm good.

Your Baby Can Read

When a TV commercial of "Your Baby Can Read" appeared on the screen, my husband realized that it might be very helpful for our baby to introduce him to reading for future benefits. So, he ordered it at Amazon.com.

It comes with a lot of stuffs actually. The set includes, 5 DVD set with sliding word cards, 5 lift-a-flap books, 50 word game cards, 82 dual sided cards, correction pen and a re-usable card, and the DVD guide for parents on how to use the mediums.

We've been letting our baby Zac watch the video of first stage of learning. We are absolutely amazed of the attention he's giving to the words. He doesn't watch all of it, but he never misses the nursery rhymes in the middle of the show, "The Twinkle, twinkle little star," and "The Itsy Bitsy Spider".  As of now, he started working on his "wave" and "bye-bye" with his arms and we didn't teach him that. He got it from watching the DVD. So, we keep doing the gestures with him so he would always remember. Taking one step at a time, I bet our baby can read too soon. :D