Fluff and Stuff

Usually, I advocate asking the person directly what they would like, in order to make sure you're getting them something they really want. The downside of this approach is that people are often either paisehto say what they want, or they genuinely can't think of anything extra they need at the moment. The latter is especially true for new parents. When you're stuck in the middle of that newborn haze of middle-of-the-night feedings, endless diaper changes, and seemingly constant crying, who has the bandwidth to come up with a carefully curated list of things that they'll use not just for...

Our feelings chart is a staple in our household. My husband and I both struggle with our emotions – for him, to identify them; for me, to regulate them, especially in conflict. This has been a source of stress throughout our marriage and we continue to have to work hard at this, so when we were establishing common grounds for our parenting journey, we were on the same page on equipping our children with the skills to identify and regulate their emotions well. I am not an expert by any means; I am just a tired, imperfect mother trying to...

As a psychologist (and mother), I know that being able to name feelings as well as identify emotions in themselves and others, are building blocks in helping children to regulate their emotions, feel and show empathy for others, and be able to problem-solve in social situations. This chart would be a good tool to encourage children to learn about their feelings. I really like this feelings chart because the facial expressions are clear. It is not cluttered and quite realistic (instead of emojis or clipart-style), and thus it allows children to relate to the images drawn. I also love that the...

When we first started chatting with 'Atikah about stocking her creations with us at Little Lalang, we were excited as we loved how minimalistic and simple to understand her posters were. It isn't easy to find such posters in Malay here and we love that these are now available to the Malay speaking community.  We asked 'Atikah a few questions so that she can share more about herself and her creations. Here is the interview:  1.Can you tell us a bit about yourself and why you started The Striving Mom SG?I’m ‘Atikah. I’m an ex preschool educator turned stay at...

As many of you know, I recently gave birth to my second child :) It’s been a bit of a tough (read: EXHAUSTING) time, but thankfully I’ve had lots of help and support from wonderful people, especially my three families (Ors, Angs, and Christ’s). If you have a friend with a newborn, and are wondering how to help them out, here’s my top 5 tips: 1. Message them to chat Newborns are exhausting, but new mums DO have time to chat. In fact, they have quite a lot of extra time to chat because they’re now spending hours nursing/pumping/feeding the...