Ariel Baby sells a wide range of high quality clothing at affordable prices. The store is located in Marina Square.

This promotion lasts till 22 March 2010 only.

I cannot say that I personally subscribe to this view in its totality, because to me, there are always pros and cons of fighting in front of your children.

Let me start with the reasons for not fighting in front of your kids.

1) Arguing about sensitive topics such as money, sex and the children.
This is definitely not advisable. If you argue about money in front of them, you create a sense of insecurity on their part. They will inevitably worry, even though you may think they are too young to understand. As for arguing about sex, that is too private a matter to be aired outside your bedroom. Lastly, it’s common sense not to fight about your kids in front of them. This causes them to feel guilty, suffer from low self-esteem and is overall very damaging to their mental and emotional well being.

2) Fighting “dirty”.
By this, I mean that both of you use demeaning and insulting words against each other, yelling and screaming and using vulgarity. You blame each other. You attack each other’s personalities and bring up hurts from the past. These will overwhelm your children and create a sense of despair for them. Sadly, I’ must admit to being guilty of this. It shocked me to see, amidst the heat of my argument with my husband, that my then 3 year old son was cowering in a corner with both hands on his ears. I immediately stopped dead in my tracks, feeling horribly ashamed of myself and vowed never to argue that way again.

On the flip side, here’s why I think it’s good to air your differences in front of your children if you do it carefully and thoughtfully.

1) Fighting constructively and respectfully.
If both of you clearly state the issue in dispute and voice out your differing views calmly with the aim of achieving a solution or compromise to the problem without attacking one another, you will indirectly teach your children several valuable lessons in life. They will learn about the need to respect the opinions of others even if they don’t agree with them. They will learn that solving conflicts does not mean giving each other the right to be verbally abusive. They also learn about patience and compromise to achieve the greater good for the family.

2) Fighting fair and ending well.
If you voice out your issues fairly without any blame or resentment towards your spouse and apologize to each other once the matter is resolved, you would have created a sense of security and reassurance for your children that their Daddy and Mummy still love each other despite not agreeing with each other all the time. This shows them the reality of the complexities of relationships. Be honest to your children. Give them more credit as they truly do understand more than you realise. If it’s appropriate, explain to them why you argued and how you achieve a solution to the problem. Let them know the fight is over and all is well again.

While there are very few people who fight for the sake of fighting (believe me, there are folks like that out there!), showing your children how to argue effectively without name-calling or personality attacks can be a wonderful gift that you can give them in order for them to grow up as balanced mature adults.

The Kidz Academy 2010 (www.thekidzacademy.com.sg) will be held at Suntec Singapore Hall 603 from 19-21 March 2010. The event will be ongoing from 11 am – 9pm on all days, with free admission. The events that Mind Edge will be involved in are as follows:

** Mind Edge and Stabilo Singapore are co-organizing the Inter-School Memory Challenge (Primary) with over 1oo participants from primary schools island-wide.

***Mind Edge has also been invited by the Singapore Book of Records to set a new record for “The Most Number of Random Digits Memorized in 5 Minutes”.

Mind Edge will also be setting up a booth at The Kidz Academy and we will be giving out free trial lessons to all kids. Mind Edge goodie bags will also be up for grabs!

KIDstyle stores are offering up to $20 savings on purchase of brand new shoes. How to avail? All you have to do is trade in your kids old shoes. Only one old pair of shoes can be traded in for every shoe purchase. This promotion is only for regular-priced shoes and sandals, and does not include crib shoes, flip-flops and EVA sandals. Brands included are OshKosh B’Gosh Kids, Levi’s Kids and Adidas Kids.

Hurry, this promo is for a limited time only!

Minister Tan also claimed that the massive oversubscription rates for new flats are misleading, as half the number of flat applicants choose not to book a flat even when invited to do so on the first day of selections, when all flats are available.

The HDB released 13, 500 flats last year, and will release around 12, 000 or more this year. This is more than the total number of flats in some of the mature estates in Singapore, such as Clementi and Jurong East.

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At the time of writing it’s eight days to an explosion of blood, guts, faecal matter and everything a prop master could conjure with a tube of KY jelly, corn syrup and edible colouring. Of course, all of it is dependent on Baby’s mood and we have no actual control on its expected day of delivery.

Hide-and-seek might be Baby’s favourite all-day past time at the moment, but somebody must have forgotten to tell Baby while it’s busy punching and kicking into Michele’s ribs, stomach and belly button, the tension and nervous energy at home visibly rises.

I hate waiting and everything associated with waiting. Tardiness, a delayed train at the station, pizza delivery boy without an offer of apology despite their “30 minutes or it’s on us” deals. Oh, and waiting.

My wonderful mother-in-law, Caroline, arrived in Melbourne six weeks ago and has been most kind as she has taken over all day-to-day activities at home. These include cooking (three meals a day without fail), cleaning (twice a week without fail) and keeping Michele occupied with her strange over-50 antics (without fail).

Caroline’s here on a one year visa and it’s greatly comforting that she expects nothing more from me as I have graciously accepted her as my mother as well. I reckon Caroline’s mostly here for Michele and our beautiful Baby but I would never fault her for that. Between our families it’s the first grandchild so both families are pretty darn excited. My mother arrives next week and she’d be here for two months. Ooh how the fireworks will fly when our mothers meet and collide! Thankfully they get along rather well and do meet up quite regularly in Singapore for afternoon tea.

Speaking of colliding, I do wish there were more avenues for friction in the family because at the moment it’s just too quiet at home. Nothing is happening and everyone’s treading on broken glass; I dropped a cup on the floor while doing the dishes yesterday and everyone reacted like Michele was giving birth!

Jokes aside, we know the calm before storm is what most parents call ‘the perfect moment to enjoy some quiet bliss’ because as soon as Baby arrives, sleep as we know it is history.

So what has the Ng family been up to these few weeks while the pendulum swings? From the looks of it, quite a lot!

Pregnancy Shots
While we do have many pictures of Michele’s pregnancy, I was intent on capturing her beautiful belly in the best possible way. I thought the best way to capture that were silhouettes of Michele against a backdrop of a setting sun, so on a cold Autumn day not two weeks ago we drove up to Dendy Beach in Brighton. Here are three standout pictures I thought did Michele’s beautiful form good justice.

Getting out
We’ve also been going out for as many walks as we can. They say walking aids in Baby’s slow relocation and aligning; ideally Baby should be born in the anterior position but right now, it’s kind of half and half.

We’ve also included some outdoor ‘further from home type’ walks to get some fresh autumn air. There really is no point staying at home all day and letting the anxious energy fester. Anxiety tends to cloud one’s judgment and ability to sleep and the last thing I would want to do is nod off while driving Michele to the hospital!

Williamstown 11 March - walking on the docks after a lunch of fish and chips.

Cleaning
Here’s a tip for all new fathers: make sure the house is clean before rushing off to the hospital. And take a picture too, because your house will never look the same again!

I know I mentioned how great Caroline has been with the domestic scene. Truth is, I help her out as much as I can. Think about it – before Caroline, there were just Michele and I in the house. The house has been very well maintained since we bought it in 2008 and though we do get lazy at times the house has never been in a state of ‘disrepair’.

Michele’s extra baggage just means she has no reason to partake in general cleaning, so while she props her feet up in the lounge Caroline and I slave away like the minions we are. I get along very well with my mother-in-law so cleaning days go by quickly. I don’t know how many men do household chores with their mothers-in-law, but I will vouch that it’s a very pleasant experience!

The next time I write for TAP much will have changed. Baby will have been born and I will be able to identify it with some semblance of a gender. More importantly I hope Michele will be recovering well and Baby is healthy. I cannot promise, though, that the next article won’t be gibberish as I’ll probably be spending more time muttering unintelligible baby sounds.

But what I can promise is that Baby will become a mini celebrity, become an internet celebrity overnight and we can retire before the age of 35.

Now wouldn’t that be a great story?!

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Editor’s Note: This is part 7 of the pregnancy diary series.

Episode 1: Adventures in Conception
Episode 2: Adventures in Conception (Part Deux)
Episode 3: It’s Alive!
Episode 4: A Mother’s Tears
Episode 5: Product Shopping, Daddy-Style
Episode 6: Packing the Baby Bag
Episode 8: Coming Soon!

When asked about the education system, seventy-percent revealed that their kids easily adapted to it. Seventy-five percent even admitted that it is a better system than that in their home country. Many also voiced their strong approval of the childcare systems and were of the opinion that the environment is a safe one for their kids.

Lifestyle changes were considerably significant for many as well, as a lot of the expats said that their kids eat less junk food. Then again, they also end up spending less time in the great outdoors and playing sports.

Are you an expat parent? What do you think of Singapore for your kids?

According to Channel News Asia, the Scout of Singapore has about 10,000 members, so don’t be surprised if a number of them will come to your door and offer to help you with some housework! Make sure that you don’t send them away. This will not only give you a chance to exercise your generosity but it will also be an opportunity for you to help train some of tomorrow’s leaders. I’m sure that there has to be at least one thing in your house that needs dusting or cleaning so you’ll definitely find something for them to do.

Little Buddies retails infant and kids apparel. The store holds very trendy designs, which are also comfortable and practical for kids. Selections include dresses, pants, tops and accessories.

Hurry, check out this store! Promo ends on 23 March 2010.

Telegraph reports the case of 2-year old Pang Ya, who already weighs 41.5 kg – that’s just a few kilos less than an average adult woman. Her parents revealed that when their child was born, she weighed in a normal 4kg, but gained weight rapidly since then. Her folks from Taocun town in Shanxi Province in China are seeking help for their obese daughter.

I can’t say for sure how the child got quite so big. However, I know many obese children who started out as cute, plump little kids who were left to eat whatever they wanted, as much as they wanted. Many parents think that discipline in eating should only be implemented at an older age. Well, it doesn’t take much to figure out that such an idea is most probably wrong.

It is quite common for people to act only when things against their wishes start happening. So I say, while kids are still small, start teaching them how live and eat healthy. This does not mean strict diet regimens. The point here is that they should learn how to make healthy choices beginning as young as possible, so that they can continue to do so in the future.