The Baby Book by Dr. Sears

The Baby Book: Everything You Need to Know About Your Baby From Birth to Age Two

by Dr. William Sears, Martha Sears RN and their two pediatrician sons

The sheer size of this thing sold me right away; 749 glorious pages! As you may have figured out by now, I am a reseach finatic. I won't deny it, I'm a geek--hands down. So the pocket guidebook on baby's first year I got from my midwife when pregnant was fine, but it wasn't going to sustain me for long.

Readers should be forewarned though, the book is heavily based on attachment style parenting. It's hard to say weather the Sears family has become popular because of the rise of attachment parenting or that attachment parenting has become popular because of the rise of the Sears family. It's probably a little of both. The attachment theme of the book works well with what comes naturally to me, so I think it's great. So great-in fact that I decided to buy it (which I rarely do). However, I know not everyone buys into it or feels comfortable parenting this way, so this book probably won't be for everyone. With that said, attachment parenting isn't all or nothing, and there is A LOT of information in this book that any parent could use. So, I don't want to discourage anyone from checking it out, but as with all books- give it a good look over before you decide to spend your precious dollars.

The only critique I have is the images are so LAME! They are basically monotone pencil drawings of people who look like they are straight out of the early 90s. Usually I love me some 90s nostalgia, but not these illustrations-- not at all. To be fair, I had checked out a older edition from the library and I have purchased the newest edition, primarily in hopes that these horrible pictures will be updated. We shall see.

Bottomline: I definitely recommend this book for parents who like the attachement parenting style and are in search of a very comprehensive guidebook.