Review of The Happiest Baby on the Block by Harvey Karp

This is another one of those books that was recommended to me countless times while pregnant, and I can understand why!  In this book, Dr. Karp first explains why newborns are so prone to being upset, and then teaches a combination of five tactics to help sooth them.

The basic premise is that newborns are born three months too early, but if they were born much later than 40 weeks their heads would be too large to be delivered.  So the first three months of the baby's life is really like the "fourth trimester" and the parents are still caring for a fetus who happens to be outside of the womb.

Given this premise, the famous (infamous?) "5 S's" of Dr. Karp try to simulate the womb sensations.  These include swaddling, side/stomach position, shushing, swinging, and sucking.  He goes into detail on how to perform each one in separate chapters of the book.  Not all of the 5 help every baby, but most parents seem to find a magic combination that works for their kids.  My daughter liked the sucking and swinging (more like gentle jiggling) most.

I found these techniques to be incredibly useful for the first three months.  Not only did they actually work like magic most of the time, but they also empowered my husband and I to feel like we knew how to do something, and that we could do something when our newborn was crying.  And I must admit, to successfully execute the S's and have a baby calm down definitely makes a new parent feel like a million bucks!

I should mention that there is a companion DVD of Happiest Baby on the Block.  It doesn't go into as much detail about the theory of the fourth trimester and the five S's, but it does demonstrate in detail the technique for executing each of the five.  I found it very useful to watch the DVD because some of the steps, such as the swinging, were much easier to understand and do well after seeing a demonstration rather than just reading the description.

I would absolutely recommend this book and DVD to new parents everywhere.  However, once you have the steps down there really isn't much need to refer back to the them.  So if you have a mommy friend or a good library nearby, I would recommend borrowing the set.

Final Rating: Borrow

Review of Baby 411 by Denise Fields and Ari Brown, M.D.

Not all of my reviews will be glowing, but I wanted to spread the word about some of my favorites asap so that the new and expecting moms out there can get their hands on a copy.  And Baby 411 definitely ranks up there as one of my favorites!

This is a classic case of "don't judge a book by its cover".  Or its title, as the case may be.  When I first saw the book, I though both were, um, hokey.  This title was even specifically recommended to us by our prenatal class instructor, and I still passed it up.  Yet for whatever reason I put it on my baby registry.  It showed up at my door a few days after we came home from the hospital, and I was immediately hooked.

Baby 411 has a ton of great information laid out in an easily accessible way, which makes it a great reference book.  It also covers things in an easy-to-digest question-and-answer format, frequently with humor, which makes it great to read cover-to-cover.  I recommend both.  When I was home with a newborn I read this book all the way through, soaking up information.  As my baby grew and various questions cropped up, I'd turn back to the book time and again for information and answers.

The first half of this book is my favorite.  Topics include nutrition (general, then broken down into solids and liquids), "the other end", hygiene, development, etc.  It then goes on to discuss vaccines, first aid, and common infections and diseases.  This second part was a little scary for me, as I hate to think about my little girl getting sick, but it's still good information.

I should note that this book's philosophy in general, and about vaccines specifically, is "show me the science".  The authors only provide information that has been backed by scientific studies, and they are pro-vaccines.  That mostly sums up my approach to parenting, as well, but I realize not everybody agrees.

Sprinkled throughout the book are little icons pointing out helpful hints, red flags, feedback from the real world, and old wives tales (that are either debunk-able or true).  These also help to keep the reading light and entertaining.

Overall, this book is a real winner.  Lots of wonderful must-know information in a fun and easy-to-read format.  Who could ask for better?  There's a reason I recommend this to (or buy it for) all of my new mommy friends!

Final rating: Buy!

Review of Baby Bargains by Denise Fields and Alan Fields

When I first announced I was pregnant, several of my coworkers all recommended this book to me.  I was skeptical at first.  I'm not usually one to run around trying to save a few cents here and there.  So I really wasn't sure how useful a book called "Baby Bargains" would be.  But after it was recommended to me time and again, I figured I ought to check it out.

It was great.  But not for the reasons I expected.

Yes, it has some hints and tips on ways to save money for baby.  It also has suggestions for what baby gear is essential and what you can probably do without.  But the best part about this book is the product reviews.  I love the product reviews, and I'm not sure what I would have done without them!

For any given category of baby gear (cribs, high-chairs, play yards, car seats, you name it!), Baby Bargains first gives a category overview, then provides a review for each of the major manufacturers and models.  Reviews include a paragraph about the product and a letter grade.  At the end of the chapter there are recommendations for "good", "better", and "best" products, along with recommendations for grandma's house (i.e. secondary products you'll only use now and again) and recommendations for products if someone else is paying or money is no object.

I found this book to be tremendously helpful while preparing for my daughter's arrival.  I learned a lot about the product categories that really interested me.  I took their recommendations at face value for items that didn't matter to me quite as much.  And I've been happy with all of my purchases.

I also have to add that perusing this book makes you feel like you're being incredibly productive, especially when you're pregnant and too tired to actually go pounding the pavement from store to store.  Knowing what you want to buy is just as good as buying it, right?  And now that so many baby registries let you add products online, you can sit at your computer with this book in hand and make significant progress on your registry.

Finally, I've found this book helpful even after my daughter was born.  Certain categories either didn't catch my eye the first time around or weren't worth thinking about at the time, but were very useful several months down the road.  For example, there is a nice discussion of baby food brands.  This is something new parents don't need, but something that may confound parents of a six-month-old.  Ditto for booster seats for the car(I haven't yet reached that stage of parenting!).  So I've found myself flipping through Baby Bargains over and over.  It's definitely one of the most helpful books in my library.

Final Rating: Buy

Review of The Girlfriends' Guide to Pregnancy by Vicki Iovine

I loved this book.  I found it to be both funny and informative.  It was an easy and engaging read - I even found myself reading it on a plane ride during my European vacation.  It is one of the first books I recommend to girlfriends when I learn that they are pregnant.  Sometimes I even send them a copy as a gift.

There were times when this book was laugh-out-loud funny.  There were times, especially during my first trimester, when parts of the book were scary.  One section even made me a little woozy.  But as time passed I found myself becoming more desensitized to certain ideas (epidural, anyone?) and in need of answers.  Thankfully, the information Iovine provides is straight-forward and easy to understand.  And exactly what I needed.

It's been a while since I read this book, I admit, so I can't be too specific on the content (see my first post about the reality of this blog), but I clearly remember the humor of the various top-10 lists and the helpfulness of the what-to-take-to-the-hospital-and-what-not-to-take section.

The whole book is just like a conversation with a girlfriend.  A really good girlfriend who has already been through it and isn't afraid to tell you the good, the bad, and the ugly.  It made me feel more prepared for both pregnancy and the hospital stay, and it entertained me while doing so.  What more could a girl ask for?

Final Rating: Buy
(or borrow on long-term loan - you'll want it have it around for all 9 months)

A note about this blog (yes, another one)

Because my daughter was born in December 2009, I have a whole year's worth of books already under my belt.  I'll be reviewing most of those as soon as I can, so you can expect blog updates fairly regularly (once a week, perhaps) until I catch up with my current reading.  After that, I'll probably have to slow the pace a bit.  But since my list of books to be reviewed is already over 20 titles long, I think we have some time before we come to that.  We'll see what happens.

I also plan to give each title a final rating of "buy", "borrow", or "skip".  This will let you know if I think it's worth adding to your library, reading but not owning, or just not worth your time.  I'm sure there will be lots of caveats along the way, but hopefully the system will work pretty well overall.

That's all.  Now here come the book reviews.

What this blog was meant to be . . . and what it actually is

I initially had grand plans for this blog.  It was going to be a very thorough and professional blog with lots of serious and well-written book reviews.  It would be a destination for parents, who could search on a topic and find the info they needed, so that they didn't have to spend hours reading and researching.  I had this idea almost a year ago, and I started brainstorming the books I'd read and researching the best blogging platforms.

And then life happened.

I discovered that I didn't have quiet as much time as I'd hoped.  I discovered that writing a proper book review takes a bit longer, and is rather difficult when you read the book several months ago.  I even discovered that my daughter wasn't going to nap for 1.5hrs every 3 hours, as some of the books suggested she would!  The whole blog idea fell by the wayside and I set my sights on other things.

And yet, I kept reading.  And I kept recommending books to my fellow new parents.  And I kept thinking about this blog.

So here I am.  This will still be a blog about parenting books.  I will still do mini-reviews in an informal way.  And I still hope you will find them helpful.

With blogs, with parenthood, and with life, things don't always go as expected.  But that doesn't mean they don't go well.  Sometimes they even go better.  Perhaps that will be the case here, too.