Parenting issues Archives - Kids 'R' Simple

What do I hope my kids to remember about me?

I just finished 2 books by Khaled Hosseini, Kite Runner and And the Mountains Echoed. In the stories, there were many reminiscences of childhood memories as the characters grew up to adulthood and aged. Everything that shapes a person ties back to his childhood memories and his growing up experiences. I think of myself and wonder what kind of memories will my kids grow up remembering fondly of or on the flip side, what memories they wish not to surface again.

When my kids were young, we were much more carefree and ventured more outdoors and nature. There were so many new experiences and new places to go. There were no or minimal homework and tests. No expectations too. The kids enjoyed everywhere we took them to. All things were considered fun and funny. Things were simpler. I wonder if they would look back and remember those happy days.

Now that the kids are grown up, opportunities to go outdoors for play reduced dramatically. Despite the fact that our kids have no tuition and more free time than most other kids, we certainly do not go for as much outdoor play as before. 2 days of weekend are spent on art class, soccer class, piano class, homework and tests revision. Any leftover time is spent reading, watching TV, groceries shopping, running errands and meal times with grandparents or cousins. I wonder what memories would the kids remember of these weekends. Hopefully not the homework and thronging between classes. It will be good if they remember the family time, the sleepover at grandma’s, dinner with cousins and grandparents.

These days, without a maid at home, I lost some precious time to doing house chores. You lose some. You gain some. I lost some precious time with the kids after work and not to mention blogging time, but the kids gain discipline and no longer take a clean house for granted. My hours after work are divided into completing minimal house chores, especially those that irritate me tremendously if not done (eg. A clean dining table and 80% clean floor), and coaching the 2 elder kids whenever they need my help and playing with the youngest. As we have implemented 930pm lights out, it practically leaves almost zero family bonding time on weeknights.

Sometimes, one of the elder kids would tell me that homework was done for that day and that would be a lucky day to play a game of monopoly together. We have no time for TV after dinner. I am often spotted walking briskly from the dining table to the sink and back while one ear hearing some school matters from one child with the other ear hearing some escalating squabbles and anticipating my involvement. I am mostly not looking at the speaking child’s eyes when he/she talks. I wish I have more ears, more eyes, to really listen. I am a bad role model in paying attention. What do my children remember of me? Mummy never listens. Mummy never stops what she is doing to pay attention to me. Oh..

I am not too sure if house chores are to be blamed entirely. I remember when I had a helper, I did not have much luxury to look the kids in the eyes when they talk. The problem must be with me. It is a bad habit of mine to look out for something to do and forever busying myself like a headless fly, obsessed with completing chores perfectly before going on to be with the children. Should I return one night and do nothing about house chores and really do nothing and only sit and listen to each and every child when he talks? Maybe this will change the way of life I have been so tiredly accustomed to. Maybe finally, I get to be carpe diem. I may even get to spend more time with each and every child. Surely, I do not want the kids to remember me as a tired, unsmiling mother who is forever in a rush.

Periodically, one child acts up, melts down and for some time, becomes the attention seeking child. My first thought goes to blame myself for not spending more time with this child, causing him/her to undo all expected good behaviour we have painstakingly taught them. Just recently, I tried to allocate 20 minutes of uninterrupted time with every child each night. I want them to know that Mummy cares for them and am interested in all that happen in school. It is not easy to implement this when I have so little time for everything. But certainly spending 1-1 time with my children deserves priority over any other chores. I shall update you how it goes with this change.

One friend of mine comments that I had not once mentioned about spending time with my husband whenever I lament about having not enough time spent with the family. I guess he is the most neglected of all. He hardly complains although I should not take things for granted. I realise that we can never assume that there will be lots of time in future when our nest is empty to think about spending more time with our spouse. Live in the moment because we never know what will happen tomorrow or the next minute. I wonder how people allocate time for all family members. Perhaps I am too structured. Perhaps I harp too much on spending time with kids. Perhaps I am too hard up on myself. Perhaps life is actually very simple: just let go, relax and enjoy family bliss. The formula could be really no formula at all.

Today, I shall return home, forget about the house chores and connect, relax and walk into each child’s room to spend uninterrupted minutes before I take a book to read or play a game with any child who is free to entertain me. I want my kids to remember that their working mother does return home to have a relax evening, who is ever ready to look them in the eyes and really connects with them. Especially to my girl, I want her to know that a working mother does not need to slog at house chores after work. She can have happy and relax moments even when she is a mother of 3.

The Tween Years – How to talk to tweens

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As my kids grow up, I am gaining interesting experience by and by with each day. Someone told me the new teen years are between 10 to 21 years old. I prefer to refer the years of 8-12 as tween years when the kid is not so much a child anymore, yet not exactly qualify as a teen.

As a FTWM, I only have weekends and holidays to spend good bonding times with my children. It doesn’t have to be outdoors and excessive treats to MacDonald’s or spending on entrance fees to qualify as good bonding time. Many of our good bonding times are quiet times spent at home, so I realized. With the kids’ homework increasing by the level, sometimes they may even ask if our weekend programmes can be shortened so that they can have enough time to finish their homework. The first time my girl requests for homework time, I was pretty shocked and reminded myself that I need to plan around their schedule and cut down blog events or be more selective in our weekend places to go. Kids are growing up fast. At this stage, they need more down time and private time to do their own stuff. That indoor playground or art museum may not be their thing anymore. I need to be sensitive to their growing up preferences. Continue reading “The Tween Years – How to talk to tweens”

Train the kids to handle failure? Let them be raised by the Dad

A few weeks back, I attended a parenting talk by David Seah, Family Life Educator and Counsellor, engaged by my kids’ school for parents. The topic was on IQ, EQ and AQ. I really took away some very interesting points that made me think hard about our parenting style at home. He said,”If you want your kids to have adversity quotient (the ability to deal with failures), let them be raised by the father.”

Before you go all out to protest against this seemingly racist statement like how we mothers felt at the talk initially, you must give a chance for the humorous speaker to make his stand.

1) Mothers are protective by nature

Have you seen mothers throw up babies in the air for fun? Usually the image of fathers doing it will surface when you think of it. In fact, we mothers are good in churning out academics due to the fact that we are competitive by nature. Think of how we react to exam results vs the fathers. Once the child comes back with less than 100 marks, mothers’ first reaction is probably to furiously flip through the pages and scrutinize those questions with marks deductions and then do a fast calculation and conclude that without such CARELESS MISTAKES, the child could have gotten so and so marks. So well-observed and that’s ahem saying about me too…

When our child runs or cycles or moves at fast speed, or any actions that risk falling on the pavement, we are the ones who shouted instructions from behind like “Watch out for the pillar!”, “Beware of that little dog’s tail in front!” Fathers are rarely the ones who shouted warnings or maybe they do, under their breath. But you get it, the Fathers are usually the cool ones. They are less inclined to fret over small injuries. Similarly, kids’ cry harder when they see Mothers rushing to their aid than when they see Fathers strolling towards them.

2) Fathers are natural risk-takers

Get Dad to be involved more if you wish to instill some toughness and the ability to handle adversity in your child.

I guess this is hard for mothers like me to teach adversity toughness. When I saw how my son at the age of 1.5yo, my hubby allowed him to walk up and down the overhead bridge by himself with him being an arm’s length away, I almost freaked out but decided to cross my finger and watched in fear. I trust my hubby to be taking controlled and supervised risk but I definitely would not risk it myself. I am often been chastised for doing too much for the kids. Hence, I certainly agree that with the Dad around, Continue reading “Train the kids to handle failure? Let them be raised by the Dad”

Raising Girls – Determination does pay off

My Missy 11 is not afraid or shy to meet her kindy teachers anymore. For 5 long years, she had refused to return to visit her childcare teachers while her brother visited them yearly. When I coaxed her to visit her teachers the first year she left the childcare centre, she shook her head and kept saying no, never providing a reason. I gathered she might be feeling shy.

While this may seem nothing much, it actually brings me to pause for a moment to think about how this little girl has gradually changed so much over the turbulent years. You might ask me what turbulent years when we are talking about pre-teen stage. Oh, if you do ask this question, then chances are that you might belong to the category of having kids below 7yo.

Recently, I met a 13yo sister of my son’s classmate who followed her mum around the guests when her mum hosted a playdate in her house. I was pretty impressed that at a tender age of 13, she was learning the ropes of mingling with adult guests. She stood confidently beside her mum and showed interest in our conversation. When we spoke to her, she looked into our eyes. Such confidence and good social etiquette, I thought to myself. Most kids this age would have shut themselves up in their room and immersed in technology. Most kids would have avoided your eyes when they speak. Yet, this girl bothered to spend her weekend afternoon to talk to adults. I marvelled to her mum on my observation. If only my children would grow up to be like her with a good set of social skills. Her mum whispered back,”She wasn’t like this just a year ago,” and winked at me. Now it is beginning to make some sense.

For those who have daughters especially, may face similar growing up pains that I encounter with my Missy. As a girl, she is fast in all her development from baby to toddler to 7yo to 9yo to now. The fast development includes talking back at early years, lying, being rude, confused and struggling to find an identity like a teen, except she is not yet officially a teen now.

I must say after all these years of handling these disciplinary challenges Continue reading “Raising Girls – Determination does pay off”

To give or not to give – smartphone

Steve Jobs’ invention of the iPhone is probably the number one devilish invention in this modern day in my own opinion. I love it and I hate it. But the hate factor is much higher than the love factor. I love it because it helps to move the world so much faster in terms of news outreach. It rekindles long lost friendships. It helps people to stay in touch with family and friends. It provides entertainment to young and old. It saves time for people on the go answering mails, tabulating spreadsheets and reading up news. It boosts sales, boosts blogs, and it even plays a big part in rallies for international support for humanity cases, swayed voters in presidential elections. It also replaces the need for another gadget- the camera, to pack in the bag, serves as a calculator, etc etc etc.

But with it, comes many problems that I hate to deal with and many social ills too. While it gives a chance of socializing on the go via apps, it inhibits human face to face interaction. It causes compulsive disorder Continue reading “To give or not to give – smartphone”