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Shopping with children can be a joy or a chore. The choice is obvious if we have a screaming brat who cannot keep his hands to himself: leave him at home and make sure he does not even get to the main entrance of any shopping center!

However, not everyone can make that choice a reality. There are single parents and couples who not only have to eke out a living but to mind their children all other hours that they are away from work. There are no opportunities to sneak out for a second to grab that much needed egg or carton of milk without the kids in tow.

There are maids who are assigned the grocery list alongside a crying toddler, a wild kindergartner and a host of duties' and responsibilities' before their employers return home and demand dinner. There is absolutely nobody the maids can leave the brats to while she dashes about the tasks. After all, she is paid to mind the house and the kids!

There are doting grandparents, relatives and friends who are bringing the darlings' out to give their poor parents that well-needed break. It is a joy to them to have their clever charges gleefully darting about and yelling out names of items they espy, to the chagrin of other shoppers. Unfortunately, they do not realize the long term harm they are doing to the children.

There are of course the disciplinarians who believe that children's mind and body can be molded according to the expertise of the child minders. Parents who do not know how to discipline their children and enforce the strictest laws when they are in public ought to be kept at home together with the brats and not be seen in public.

Children will act according to their own will there is no perfect upbringing

If all babies were delivered by storks from the heavenly places, they would have been angelic. However, as all human beings are made in the image of God, we are equally able to choose for ourselves our own actions against the will of God, as Satan is able to, similarly for children at a shopping center where there is much newness to venture into. Most of the time, their choices are contrary to their parents', predictably so!

Children will emulate your actions mind what you model

My son used to be in a kangaroo pouch until he was too big for it. As it was, he could be looking in different directions from me and once, he tried hailing a cab from the opposite direction, as he knew whenever his desperate mother sang God, give us a taxi', she would flag at a car with a funny lighted sign attached to its roof.

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