mommy reads. book review: babywise ii

on becoming babywise book ii is the follow up to the successful/controversial on becoming babywise.  people can say what they will about it, but it is a healthy and for me a very successful parenting method.  people hate it, but whatever.  i don't criticize your parenting, so keep your nose out of mine. although i don't find as much controversy on it now as in the past, there are still people who are very anti-babywise.  i don't agree with other people 100%, and i don't expect them to agree with me 100%, but claims that these books are "child abuse" are immature and outlandish.  i have a very happy, healthy 9 month old who sleeps and eats better than most babies i know (maybe i'm just lucky)!

with all that said, now for the book review.  this book definitely didn't have all the information that book one has, but by the time you are at the point to move onto book two, sleeping and eating habits are most likely set in stone.  the book goes back and reviews the basics, reminds you the importance of keeping your marriage a priority and not just making the baby #1 while completely neglecting your spouse.  it then gets into information that you will need to parent your "pretoddler" which it considers to be 5-15 months.  yes, 5 months old is way too early i would say to consider your baby a pretoddler, but around 5 months they are no longer considered a newborn, and considered an infant, and an infant is indeed a pretoddler.

there are 5 main chapters in the book.

1.  mealtime activities.  this chapter talks about when to introduce cereal, how to do it, and how to introduce fruits and vegetables into your child's diet.  it also talks about finger foods, juice, snacks, weaning your baby and dealing with finicky eaters.

2.  highchair manners.  this chapter covered verbal instruction, methods of correction, common highchair problems (flipping plate, hands in mouth, raspberries, etc).

3.  waketime activities.  alone playtime, starting roomtime.

4.  thoughts on discipline.  how to consistently discipline and setting boundaries.

5  naps and nighttime sleep.  basically a refresher on common sleep issues.

to me, the most helpful chapters were the chapter on highchair manners and the chapter on discipline.  meals are a time where your child just doesnt' know what to do and they need the proper instruction.  i followed some of the methods in the highchair manners chapter from the get-go and ian is very well behaved while eating.  we don't have a lot of problems that parents seem to have.  he is pretty good about eating and staying clean.  we usually only have to correct him once or twice during a meal.  the discipline chapter was beneficial because i have a very curious baby.  ian is into EVERYTHING.  now that he's crawling, he's all over the place, so we have had to really set boundaries on where he can be, what he can touch and not touch.  this book provides correction methods that are safe for young children.

the book also contained an appendix, which was probably the most helpful section of all, and made reading the book worthwhile.  the appendix contained a section on child language development and teaching your baby sign language.  there were 14 signs with written and illustrated instructions.  so helpful.  i have been working on some with ian (please, all done, more, i love you, hungry, thank you, no and stop) and slowly integrating in the rest (eat, drink, thirsty, mommy, daddy, and milk (not in the book)).  as i said before, this section alone would make the book worth the buy.

so overall, it was just a reiteration of babywise, but there were a few helpful sections in dealing with your child as they get older.  it wasn't a must read, but for any babywise moms out there, you would probably find it very beneficial!

3 out of 4 stars (just for the sign language section) 2.5 or 2 without!

**special thanks to lulu from lulu in los angeles for sending me this book!!