Advice for Singles/ New Couples

OK, I have clearly stated I am going to dispense advice. So if you do not wish unsolicited advice, please stop reading. But if you are already married, you can read for fun since this is not directed toward you :p

1. Always find a house near the wife's mother. No matter how nice or helpful the husband's parents are, the wife will feel paiseh asking them to help out with the children too often. Whereas I have no qualms unloading them on my mother. Unfortunately I stay very far from my parents. We chose to buy a flat near my in-laws as I did not expect myself to become a sahm then, and the plan was for my in-laws to take care of the kids while I went to work. Having a readily available caregiver (i.e. wife's mother) will allow the wife to take time off for a break whenever she feels burnt out.

How is this good for the husband? Happy wife, happy life.

2. If you are not married yet, do try your very best to imagine what your girlfriend/boyfriend will be like as a parent. I know, having kids might seem very distant if you have not even planned your wedding. I know for sure that I did not seriously/properly imagine this. Basically, my thought process was - good boyfriend, good person, surely will be a good parent. Not that my hubby is not a good daddy lah, but being more hands-on will be helpful to family harmony :p

3. It is also very important to be in agreement about how many children to have, when you want them, who to take care of them, whether one should be a stay-at-home-parent, etc. It is normal for opinions to change after marriage/having the first kid. But at least you have something to fall back on. To be very frank, if you already disagree before getting married, I strongly advise thrashing things out first or errr, finding another person to marry :p

4. When you are doing up your lovenest, do consider how it will work out with kids around. In my case, luckily my house is quite big, or else I might have gone nuts whenever Jiale pours out his Lego when Didi is napping..! It is very loud! I also try to keep Jiale in the living room or kitchen when he is in an excitable mood (i.e. yelling & laughing loudly and stomping around like elephant). We only play in his bedroom if he's in the mood to read books or do quiet play, as the bedrooms are clustered closely together. I am able to manage the two boys on my own only because they have their own bedrooms and thus they can sleep on their own once they are sleep-trained. So I discourage hacking walls to combine bedrooms cos you will most likely need more bedrooms!

[Once the kids are older, I will move them into the same bedroom and use the extra bedroom as a playroom. KIV first.]

I regret hacking the wall between my master bedroom and the room next to it. (We put the wall back up before Didi was born.) I also regret buying quite a few of the furniture - such as the table and chairs at the balcony where we had visualised ourselves relaxing with a cuppa and a book/newspapers. But now I just feel they are taking up space which can be better utilized for the boys' toys or be used as a learning corner! Storage space is very important to keep the kids' stuff - not only their toys and clothes, but parenting books and other 'gear'. BUT cabinets take up wall space! Wall space which I would prefer to use for learning charts etc.

[I am very very glad we only did cabinets on one side of the kitchen. Though it did (does) feel like there wasn't enough storage space in the kitchen, I can now use one whole half of the kitchen for the boys' art & craft area and toy kitchen.]

Hmm, that's enough volunteered advice for now. I am only writing this post because I am too bored while waiting for the boys to wake up!