I achieved a very rare milestone last night. I had a 10-game winning streak in a “Champions” Division. I am not entirely privy to the division but I am pretty sure this is not a beginner’s division.

My new routine for the past several months is to play a couple of chess games before going to sleep or after putting our son to sleep at night.

And I am also currently no. 1 as of last night.

My wife gifted me an early present, a Fitbit. Thank you so much! I love you!

I used to have a Huawei smartwatch but lost it and hopefully, I can find them. This is my first Fitbit device. I always enjoy tracking my health data, especially my sleep pattern and steps.

And as someone who’s getting older by the day, tracking my health is something I am planning to take seriously.

My wife and I are proud homeowners today. After 3 years in the making, we finally got the keys to our new house.

Just happen to see this picture again in my photo library and I am still amazed at how strong my wife is. These were her medications after her C-section.

I can’t even take two medicines in a day without losing my shit.

So proud of her!

Our kid turned 4 this week. We came back to the hotel where he was still tiny. Where we had to request a crib for our room.

But now we can’t believe he’s 4 now!

Sorry for the table shot, but I captured this perfect moment of them hugging. Our son is on the autism spectrum but it doesn’t mean he won’t show his appreciation and love to us.

The next day’s aftermath, he can’t wait to play with his new toys.

A lot has happened this week.

Wedding Anniversary

Last Thursday was our wedding anniversary. We decided to bring Lucas to Ayala for the first time in more than 2 years.

Playhouse

It was Luke’s first time playing in Ayala’s Playhouse. Or his first time since the pandemic to play in a kid’s public playhouse. We weren’t sure what to expect when we arrived. First few minutes, Luke’s uneasiness was apparent.

The playhouse wasn’t huge compared to Kidzona (the playhouse near our place). We were also expecting a slow day, but there were around 4-5 kids playing, and Luke is not yet accustomed to playing around with kids.

A few minutes in, Luke was still uncomfortable and doesn’t like to be put down on the floor. But we were able to find his spot.

Luke also explored the other sections and toys in the playhouse. At one point there were kids playing near him, but he didn’t fuss or anything. He just continued to play. We were so happy and proud of our little kiddo! Luke also got to play inside the playhouse with Nice and Juretz!

We didn’t last the whole hour since Luke got bored. As I was saying, the playhouse wasn’t that big and several of the toys have been damaged already.

Toy Shopping

Part of our agenda on that day was to buy toys for Luke. We went around Rustan’s toys section and Toys-R-Us. I was half-joking the other day that I would buy the first toy that Luke would show interest in or point to. Seconds into the Rustan’s store and Luke found the first toy he liked! That was quick lol! And more importantly, the toy was within our budget.

But my wife’s sister and his husband were the ones who paid for the toy. Thank you so much!

We went to Toys-R-Us after to look for his second toy. In the same scenario, it did not take too long for Luke to find another toy. He likes toys that are either alphabet, words, or numbers. And both of the toys he chose are in tablet form.

Lunch and poop

While we were waiting for our lunch orders, Luke pooped publicly. Luckily we were able to bring diapers. It was funny and at the same time, we were glad that he pooped since his mood will mostly depend on his comfort.

Lunch was great! It has an open sitting concept and more space for Lucas.

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WWDC 2022

My work week was consumed mostly by Apple’s WWDC 2022 event. This is for another post, but I hope this time I will be able to catch up with most of the concepts and labs, and new stuff. At last year’s WWDC I was only able to watch the Keynote and a couple of developer videos.

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Buffet with Family

Yesterday, we celebrated Father’s day in advance. We went back to Ferias at Radisson Hotel for their lunch buffet. For the first time in this vacation, Lucas allowed himself to sit on my lap. All he wants is to watch YouTube on my phone and play with his new toy which we bought the day before.

For the first time, I was able to eat in peace publicly with Luke. Also, he ran a lot in the lobby, in the restaurant, and in the hotel garden.

This is just halfway into our month-long vacation, I and my wife are very impressed with how Luke grew up and adjusted.

Here’s Lucas running away from the restaurant. 😂

Lucas has been settling well into his new morning routine and every car ride activity for the past few days. Last Friday, it was his first evening car ride. And he enjoyed the traffic lights countdown.

Weekend at Radisson

We checked in at Radisson Hotel for the weekend for my wife’s sister’s wedding. Luke’s first night went well without any tantrums. As a matter of fact, the whole weekend Luke did not fuss or cried.

Check out the view.

He was just chilling in the bed while both of our family and relatives took turns entertaining him. According to my wife, this might be the best hotel because everything is just convenient and child friendly. I agree and we both look forward to more staycation trips in the city. Of course, the cost is a little way out of our budget. But I try to look past it, this is our first vacation and we both deserve this since parenting during Covid times is just a nightmare.

Lucas went to the wedding reception, and he showed signs of annoyance at first because the sound system was too noisy. Overall, I could say he enjoyed the event and this is good for his exposure. He met several of my wife’s relatives too, we couldn’t thank them enough for the warm reception for Luke. Auntie Bebe sang twinkle little star to Luke and he loves it. The highlight of the night was when Luke pulled the mask on one of our aunties, I nervously apologized right away. But it was no biggy, I know it must have hurt her. Congratulations to Nice and Juretz!

Back in the hotel room, Luke showered with us which he has never done before. Maybe it was the warm water from the shower, or it was just him growing up right in front of our eyes.

After, we were so tired that the in-room food was mostly left untouched, humba rice and a couple of warm coffee drinks. My back and shoulder hurt so much from carrying Luke the whole night. At the end of the day I don’t mind, what matters is the exposure and events our son gets to experience and learn.

Luke went swimming in the pool

This is Luke’s second swimming pool experience. The first one, was when he was still a baby. After a while, Luke wasn’t afraid anymore to dip in the swimming pool. He played with his hands like he does in his bathtub. So proud of this young dude! We have to cut short his pool experience since it rained after. Looking forward to more staycations with pools in the near future!

Of course, it is time to go home and check out that noon. Week one concludes.

Day 1

Today is the first time my family has gone out together for about 2 years before Covid hits, lockdown, etc.

We lived about 2-3 hours (with traffic) from the city. And as one of the effects of the Covid lockdown, our son hates the outdoors. We spent the past several months preparing him for this big day. Preparations like driving around town without freaking out. The last time we did this he cried, puked, and was seasick. So surprisingly, it only took him a day to adjust to the “car ride”. My wife and I can’t really explain the joy and relief of what was happening, on how quickly our son has adjusted to the situation.

We will be staying in the city for exactly one month. What led to this staycation was so we could attend the wedding of my wife’s sister. And hopefully, get several backlog errands done.

We also consulted a doctor on what medications for our son to take for the hour-long trip. 30 minutes before the trip, we had him drink vitamins with a drowsiness effect. It kinda worked, but not really at first. First few minutes, Lucas was in his hyperactive self. Then, first few minutes of the trip, he fell asleep. He woke up right after we got out of the car. He was cool, calm, and collected. Another surprise for us. This was his cue to go apeshit, cry, freak out and it never came.

By the time we went inside the room, he was just very curious the whole time.

Take-out Orders

From where we reside, the food delivery options are very limited because of the distance from the city and traffic. So during this vacation, we made a point to order foods from our favorites before lockdown.

Visits

We got a visit from my wife’s family too! Since they are just staying near us, about 5 minutes from where we are currently staying. After 2 years I finally got to eat Shakey’s Pizza, thanks to Vida’s fam!

My brother also visited us from the capital. He decides to use his 2 weeks vacation leave here in Cebu.

Vida’s First Mac

My wife just bought her first Mac machine after years of working on Windows. And after years of hesitating and pushing back.

Her first of many look-at-where-I-am-working-now posts.

Last but not least

Our son really likes it here too. He loves to run from end to end of the living room. He adjusted really well throughout our stay. I can’t describe how happy we are for our son.

Happy Mother’s Day to my wife. Thank you for everything that you do and I’m so proud of you! I missed hanging out with you in coffee shops, dining out, and watching movies in theaters. I hope we could get to do it again with our little Bimbim.

7:14 AM

• My day begins with washing the milk bottles and the utensils of our 3 year old son. We don’t have nannies so me and my wife have always shared parenting responsibilities. Open Apple Music and play The Bouncing Souls - How I Spent My Summer Vacation album.

7:45 - 8:15 AM Coffee Time & Breakfast

• Brew coffee. While waiting for coffee, catch up on emails and Twitter. There is a new Xcode beta out today.

https://twitter.com/XcodeReleases/status/1496193213429792771

• Add it to Things as a reminder.
• After that first sip of morning coffee, it is time to prepare ingredients. Today I will be cooking SPAM fried rice.

8:32 - 8:45 AM

• Wife just woke up and needs to go to the bathroom. I gave her SPAM fried rice for breakfast afterwards while waiting for our son to wake up.

8:46 AM - 9AM

• Minutes after our son wakes up. Our son likes to cuddle right away.

9 - 10 AM

• Me and my wife will then continue eating breakfast before proceeding to work. We love to watch YouTube together while dining, while our son is in the background playing with his toys.

10 AM

• My wife will go to her office next room, while I work at the masters bedroom with our son. This is the time I set and update my calendar.

• And check my tasks for the day using Things.

• There is a new Xcode beta release today. I will try to compile our codebase today using this latest version so I can anticipate any breaking changes.

• While wating for Xcode to finish downloading, I start reading the Xcode 13.3 Beta 3 Release Notes and check if there are any potential issues or deprecations that may affect our codebase.

• There are 3 issues that caught my eye but nothing significant.

10:49 AM

• Our toddler just pooped. Time to change diapers and clean up. Text the wife.

10:56 AM

• Resume reading the Xcode release notes. Sip coffee to stay awake.

10:57 - 11:08 AM

• Xcode 13.3 Beta 3 just finished downloading. Time to compile. Open terminal and git status to make sure there are no uncommited changes from the previous day. Switch to a new branch and compile the codebase to the latest Xcode beta.

• While waiting for Xcode to archive, copy and do its thing, I go back to reading the release notes.

11:09 - 11:30 AM

• Xcode still not done with archiving.

Time to catch up on my GitHub notifications. I followed several repositories in order stay updated on the latest releases and possibly contribute or file issues.

It seems there is a new SwiftLint update. I start reading the release notes and update using homebrew. I use SwiftLint to enforce properly Swift’s code conventions and style to our codebase.

I saw git-lfs has an update but not sure if I’m using it. I forgot the command, so Google.

Negative, no git-lfs installed. Remove remaining GitHub notifications that I am not interested.

11:24 - 12 PM

• Quick play time with our toddler while waiting for Xcode beta to unarchive and to open.

12 PM - 12:40 PM

Back to work, Xcode beta is done installing. Time to compile our codebase. At this point, the build failed.

It is the same error from the previous beta version of Xcode. Open Realm’s GitHub to check on progress since I already filed an issue before. And it seems there will be a fix on the next release. Open terminal, time to get back to develop branch.

12:40 - 12:50 PM

Open Basecamp and catch up on the company’s activity.

12:50 - 1PM

If nothing interesting happens, I will then proceed to reviewing the iOS bugs from the previous week. If I found new bugs, I will then add it to our repository’s GitHub Issues.

1 - 1:30 PM

I do the same thing with our Android app, review Android bugs from the previous week. As you can see it has more bugs compared to iOS, thing is our app still supports Android 5.0 Lollipop. Yikes!

1:30 - 3 PM

• All these bugs made me hungry. And dizzy. Grab lunch and spend time with family.

3 - 4:30 PM

• Back to work. Continue reviewing the Android bugs while listening (watching) to Kotlin by Jetbrains YouTube episode Kotlin Multiplatform at Todoist! How? Where? Why?. I’m exploring migrating parts of our codebase to KMM and this topic help me decide.

4:30 - 7:00

• Time for another break. Playtime with our kid and family time. At this point of the day I’m already sleepy, so I also make sure I grab another round of coffee.

7 - 8:15 PM

• Back to work. Open Xcode 13.2.1 and start implementing the Show Password feature in the sign in page.

8:15 - 9 PM

• Bath time with our son and after we prepare for bedtime.

9 - 10 PM

• Dinner time!

10 PM

• Bedtime for our kid. This is the time to recap today’s tasks and what to work for tomorrow.

Takeaways

I just want to point out that software development is not all about coding. It is planning milestones, documentation, debugging, collaboration, research, etc.

And, as a developer dad no two days are alike.

One more thing, as a parent I am grateful to work in a company that allows me to work flexibly and trusts me to do my work in any way or time I can.