"The Idle Parent came as a huge relief to the whole family. Suddenly, it was okay to leave the kids to sort it out among themselves. Suddenly, it was okay to be responsibly lazy. This is the most counterintuitive but most helpful and consoling child-raising manual I've yet read."--Alain de Botton, author of The Pleasures and Sorrows of Work and The Consolations of Philosophy"The most easy-to-follow-without-being-made-to-feel-inadequate parenting manifesto ever written . . . A godsend to parents."--The Sunday Times"Add liberal doses of music, jovial company and deep woods to play in--all central to the idle, not to say Taoist, life--and you have a recipe for bright, happy people with need of neither television nor shrink. Who could ask for more?"--The Evening StandardIn The Idle Parent, the author of The Freedom Manifesto and How to Be Idle applies his trademark left-of-center theories of idleness to what can be one of the thorniest aspects of adult life: parenting.Many parents today spend a whole lot of time worrying and wondering--frantically "helicoptering" over their children with the hope that they might somehow keep (or make?) them flawless. But where is this approach to childcare getting us? According to Hodgkinson, in our quest to give our kids everything, we fail to give them the two things they need most: the space and time to grow up self-reliant, confident, happy, and free. In this smart and hilarious book, Hodgkinson urges parents to stop worrying and instead start nurturing the natural instincts toward creativity and independence that are found in every child. And the great irony: in doing so, we will find ourselves becoming happier and better parents.

    Retro Baby: Cut Back on Infant Gear, Media and Smart Toys, and Boost Your Baby’s Development with Time-Tested Activities helps caregivers understand the potential dangers of extended equipment use and overexposure to technology.Retro Baby brings 20 years of experience from an occupational therapist and mother of three into your home. Anne Zachry, Ph.D. understands that each family and baby have different needs, and she offers flexible strategies and suggestions for playtime. With “back to the basic” ideas, Dr. Zachry gives you lots of opportunities to spend one-on-one time with your baby, creating that special bond that will last a lifetime.

     Boys tend to take longer to be trained, learn this skill at later ages, and have different challenges from girls. Parents will find an accessible plan for getting their son trained quickly, clever games to make learning to use the toilet fun, as well as important tips for handling accidents and setbacks.The book includes advice on boy-specific problems, such as whether to teach him to sit or stand and how to aim, dealing with distractions, handling refusals, and staying dry through the night. Practical and reassuring, Potty Training Boys the Easy Way is packed with all the information a family needs to achieve this important milestone calmly and confidently.

    Michaeleen Doucleff becomes a mother, she examines the studies behind modern parenting guidance and finds the evidence frustratingly limited and the conclusions often ineffective. Curious to learn about more effective parenting approaches, she visits a Maya village in the Yucatán Peninsula. There she encounters moms and dads who parent in a totally different way than we do—and raise extraordinarily kind, generous, and helpful children without yelling, nagging, or issuing timeouts. What else, Doucleff wonders, are Western parents missing out on? In Hunt, Gather, Parent, Doucleff sets out with her three-year-old daughter in tow to learn and practice parenting strategies from families in three of the world’s most venerable communities: Maya families in Mexico, Inuit families above the Arctic Circle, and Hadzabe families in Tanzania. She sees that these cultures don’t have the same problems with children that Western parents do. Most strikingly, parents build a relationship with young children that is vastly different from the one many Western parents develop—it’s built on cooperation instead of control, trust instead of fear, and personalized needs instead of standardized development milestones. Maya parents are masters at raising cooperative children. Without resorting to bribes, threats, or chore charts, Maya parents rear loyal helpers by including kids in household tasks from the time they can walk. Inuit parents have developed a remarkably effective approach for teaching children emotional intelligence. When kids cry, hit, or act out, Inuit parents respond with a calm, gentle demeanor that teaches children how to settle themselves down and think before acting. Hadzabe parents are world experts on raising confident, self-driven kids with a simple tool that protects children from stress and anxiety, so common now among American kids. Not only does Doucleff live with families and observe their techniques firsthand, she also applies them with her own daughter, with striking results. She learns to discipline without yelling. She talks to psychologists, neuroscientists, anthropologists, and sociologists and explains how these strategies can impact children’s mental health and development. Filled with practical takeaways that parents can implement immediately, Hunt, Gather, Parent helps us rethink the ways we relate to our children, and reveals a universal parenting paradigm adapted for American families.

    Why entrust your memories to hastily taken snapshots--or worse yet, none at all? Let professional photographer (and mom) Me Ra Koh help you capture the moments with 40 beautiful "photo recipes" anyone can do, with any camera. Telling your baby's story in pictures has never been easier!

    But she didn't expect to be lectured for slipping her fussing toddler a snack, or to be forbidden from packing her older daughter a school lunch. Karen is intrigued by the fact that French children happily eat everything—from beets to broccoli, from salad to spinach—while French obesity rates are a fraction of what they are in North America.Karen soon begins to see the wisdom in the "food rules" that the French use to foster healthy eating habits and good manners in babies and children. Some of the rules call into question both our eating habits and our parenting styles. Other rules evoke commonsense habits that we used to share but have somehow forgotten. Taken together, the rules suggest that we need to dramatically rethink the way we feed children, at home and at school.Combining personal anecdotes with practical tips and appetizing recipes—including Zucchini and Spinach Puree and Bouillabaisse (Fish Soup) for Babies—French Kids Eat Everything is a humorous, provocative look at families, food, and children that is filled with inspiration and advice that every parent can use.

    Wels is a well-known powerhouse advocate and has become the main voice in the industry. The marketplace for this book is constant, as the US birthrate hovers over 4 million babies born per year, and the word is getting out about the benefits of using modern cloth versus disposables. Wels is a continuous presence on her popular blogs and is often featured by other bloggers in the industry. When Wels talks, her audience listens and responds, and her audience grows. She even received a Congressional Award for her work from Maine Senator Olympia Snow. These are not your mother's cloth diapers!

    But the reality is, your pregnancy might be a sweaty, moody rollercoaster, and your children will almost certainly spend the first few years of their lives covered in food, tears and worse. And the experience is no less magical for it. In this no-holds-barred collection of essays, prominent women authors, journalists and TV personalities explore the truth about becoming mothers. Covering topics from labour to the breastapo, twins to IVF, weaning to post-birth sex, and with writers including Cathy Kelly, Adele Parks, Kathy Lette and Lucy Porter (and many more), Things I Wish I’d Known is a reassuring, moving and often hilarious collection that will speak to mothers - and mothers-to-be - everywhere.

    Hilarious, wise, and full of empathy, The Diaper Diaries helps new mothers maintain the one thing they can't survive without-a sense of humor. Cynthia Copeland, a mother of three, knows the real poop—figuratively and literally—on being a new mother, and she has the wit, skill, and generosity to share it. Illustrated throughout with the author's wonderful cartoons, The Diaper Diaries chronicles the first year of motherhood, from the hospital stay (nominees for the world's worst labor coach anyone?) to baby's first birthday and contemplating the unimaginable—having another. There are lists, quizzes, timelines, charts, and real-life stories. Birth announcement faux pas. Names and nicknames and what they really mean. Pacifier tales. A guide to Nana-speak. How a 4-mile car trip can take 2 hours. Why it's impossible to get to work without finding spit-up or rice cereal somewhere on your clothing. Ten reasons to be happy you're up at 3:15 a.m. And, with Mr. Phrenology-like illustrations, a section on the new mother's brain before and after baby, featuring: The Travel Section (Then: How to flirt your way into first class. Now: How to sweet talk your jogging stroller onto the plane), And The Sex Section (Then: Exact location of G-spot. Now: ________).

    They're too young to understand that they need guidelines in order to develop healthy adult lifestyles. A "mean mom" knows that saying no to an unhealthy snack, enforcing rules, or punishing bad behavior are all necessary aspects of parenting. But a "good mom" may have a hard time dealing with the temper tantrums and tears that inevitably follow rule enforcement. Mean Mom, Good Mom shows you how to master both sides of parenting and prepare your kids for the world. Your kids may hate you (just a little) for setting rules right now, but they'll appreciate and respect you when they're older.

    Whether you have $10,000 or $1,000, wedding planner and author behind The Budget Savvy Bride, Jessica Bishop, helps you set a realistic budget with the organizational tools and insider tips in this wedding planner. Vowing to help you get organized and stay sane, this wedding planner helps you say “I do” on a budget that is right for you.A practical wedding planner, The Budget Savvy Wedding Planner and Organizer contains: Planning Tools including checklists, worksheets, calendars, and other interactive tools Insider Tips and need-to-know advice about how to navigate wedding industry traps from an experienced wedding planner Real Budgets from real couples, plus cost breakdowns for every part of your ceremony From the ceremony to the reception, The Budget Savvy Wedding Planner and Organizer is the only wedding planner you’ll need to have the wedding of your dreams on a reasonable budget.

    Called “A Parent is Born,” the program’s tagline was “The journey to parenthood . . . from pregnancy to delivery and beyond.” Barston valiantly surmounted the problems of pregnancy and delivery. It was the “beyond” that threw her for a loop when she found that, despite every effort, she couldn’t breastfeed her son, Leo. This difficult encounter with nursing—combined with the overwhelming public attitude that breast is not only best, it is the yardstick by which parenting prowess is measured—drove Barston to explore the silenced, minority position that breastfeeding is not always the right choice for every mother and every child.Part memoir, part popular science, and part social commentary, Bottled Up probes breastfeeding politics through the lens of Barston’s own experiences as well as those of the women she has met through her popular blog, The Fearless Formula Feeder. Incorporating expert opinions, medical literature, and popular media into a pithy, often wry narrative, Barston offers a corrective to our infatuation with the breast. Impassioned, well-reasoned, and thoroughly researched, Bottled Up asks us to think with more nuance and compassion about whether breastfeeding should remain the holy grail of good parenthood.

    The behaviors are not created from a place of fear or even traditional discipline, but from 20 simple principles parents can implement in a variety of circumstances from infancy to young adulthood. Following these principles parents can positively impact the behavior of their children, enhance the parent-child relationship, increase their parenting-esteem, and promote lifelong relational skills in their children. The principles come from the perspectives of children, and have an inherent simplicity that is focused on the parent-child relationship. Following these child-centered principles fosters parent-child relationships based in love and respect.

    Want to know the secret to tackling tantrums and tears, stopping squabbles in seconds AND lay the foundations for your child's good mental health in the process?In There's No Such Thing As 'Naughty', mum to two young children, journalist and children's mental health advocate Kate Silverton shares her groundbreaking new approach to parenting under-fives that helps to make family life so much easier and and certainly a lot more fun!Kate's unique strategies, easy-to-follow scripts and simple techniques will enable you to manage those tricky everyday challenges with ease - and help you to enjoy the strongest bond possible with your child, both now and in the years ahead.Endorsed by leading figures in the field of children's mental health, at the heart of the book is a simple and revelatory way to understand how your child's brain develops and how it influences their behaviour.Rooted in the latest science - explained really simply - this engaging, accessible and warm parenting guide will redefine how you see and raise your children, with a new understanding that for under-fives, there can be no such thing as 'naughty'.

    With entries including D is for Desperation, F is for Fish Fingers, S is for Supermum and V is for Vagina, it's safe to say this is not your average A-Z.This book won't tell you what sort of parent you should (or shouldn't) be; instead, it offers a refreshingly honest account of what being a mum to three young children is really like and the surprising lessons that have been learned along the way.If you feel as though you're not 'measuring up' or are struggling to #cherisheverymoment, Sarah's tales from the thick of it will reassure and resonate with you. Above all, her commitment to telling the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth will make you laugh out loud and remind you that you are, in fact, doing a great job.