Nikka: TV Broadcaster, Mother and Baker

by Veronica Cleofe-Alejar

(Nikka with her husband and children)

Hello everyone! I am Veronica Cleofe-Alejar, Nikka for short, 37 years old. I am a broadcaster by profession; a mother of four, all spaced roughly three years apart, by vocation; and a baker by passion. Our eldest, Therese, is pretty and demure and turns 9 this December; followed by mischievous yet sweet Andre who turns six this October; then chubby and charming Reuben who had just turned three this May; and lastly, lovely and smiley Isabelle who is eight weeks old. Quite a handful, eh?

Being the elder of two girls, I never thought that I would outnumber my parents in terms of how many children I would or could pop out. The magic number for them, as my Papa revealed to me one time, would have been FOUR, but due to Mama’s health problems and Papa’s perceived budgetary constraints, they only had TWO – me and my sister, Erica. Mama was never able to see any of her grandchildren, having passed away when I was just 17, and Papa was only able to see two before he himself left this world, so had they been around, they would have lauded me for giving them their magic number!

Well, it was not as if my husband and I planned  all this. Dong and I had been together as boyfriend-girlfriend for seven years before we tied the knot in 2004. We were as “straight” and “pure” as couples went, having made separate vows of chastity as teenagers. So, we never did the deed till our wedding night.

As luck would have it, that honeymoon produced our very first offspring Therese, and  every three years thereafter, we got pregnant without even regulating or spacing them! Therese, we could aver was the only planned  baby. Everybody else was, well... a pleasant surprise –      Andre was the miscounted-calendar-method-baby, Reuben was the withdrawal-method-gone-awry-boy, and Isabelle was the moved-period-that-never-materialized-baby-girl .

Not to say that we don’t cherish every single one of our children, for we adore them and consider them all as blessings from above; but had Dong had his way, we’d have only one child, and had I had my way, we would have stopped at three. But as the Lord would have it, we now have four – two boys and two girls, all wondrously healthy and beautiful.

In the modern world, having FOUR kids is already considered a “big” family. I would even dare say, four is the new EIGHT – a grade school child, a preschooler, a toddler and an infant. Quite a handful! However, children are all gifts from God. We are not the richest nor the most intelligent parents, but surely, the Lord wouldn’t have given us Therese, Andre, Reuben and Isabelle, if He didn’t think we would be able to be good stewards to His children.

And so, with faith, hope and lots of prayer, we just take everything a day at a time, love our children to the best of our abilities, and say to all the challenges that life has to offer, “Bring them on! We can do this!”